Mary Adkins

This epistolary novel is told in emails, notes, texts, etc. Iris keeps a blog during the process of dying from cancer. When the story opens, it is all the people she has left behind who drive the storyline. Her older sister, Jade, feels that she has to make her sister's dreams come true - but isn't sure what those are after all. Smith, Iris' boss, feels a need to publish the blog as requested by Iris. The push and pull between the two of them is interspersed with hilarious input from Carl, Smith's hapless intern. I thought the novel captured well the conflicting emotions of grief and stress and the balm that human connection can provide… (meer)

This week was rough. I started off reading this feeling so confident about life and kind of feeling like I'd found my place. Halfway through this book, well.

It took me six days to read this relatively short book, and there were so many times I read a page just to try and distract myself. There were some lovely hilarious moments in there but it's hard to separate my concept of how much I enjoyed this from the connotations thinking if it will bring.

So some thoughts to remind myself: the best intern, an excellent program, branding a dentist, an Airbnb pizza problem.… (meer)