by Anne Enright
This title is beautifully written. A mother and granddaughter struggle to reconcile the gorgeous poetry and international renown of their father/grandfather with his abuse and abandonment of the family. Alternating chapters told from the perspective of the granddaughter and mother, sandwiching a chapter told from the poet from his boyhood. The book dwells in what is said and unsaid, assumptions and presumptions of the motivations and actions of others with vivid detail of the inner lives and memories of all involved. Poems of heartbreak and natural beauty are peppered and repeated throughout, a background and foreground refrain in the lives of the women.
