Sunday, March 09, 2008

Saddest book ever

I'm reading the saddest book on earth. It's called, "You Remind Me Of Me" and is written by a guy named Dan Chaon. Not only are the inter-twined plots all sad (i.e., boy is savagely attacked by a dog and survives, child disappears from the yard and goes missing, man slips into drug addiction, etc.), the narrative is sad.

How sad? Well, here's a passage that's not *too* sad --
"Jonah's mother would talk about his brother sometimes -- the baby she had given up for adoption when she was in high school. She would joke sometimes about it. Whenever she saw a lady with an infant, she would say, "Oh, look, there's my baby!" and she would smile at Jonah, as if they were sharing a bitter joke. After Jonah's grandfather died, when she started taking drugs more she would occasionally grow sentimental.

"Don't you wish I'd given you up, Jonah?" she would say, full of slurry self-pity, in a haze of her own angry thoughts. "I'll bet he's a lot happier than you are."

Each time I pick this book up I am propelled to a place of great sadness.

It's a good thing I'm deliriously happy now.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

U R D Best!