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No details are spared and at times it's rather hard to read, but the reality of it is portrayed with utmost candor and sympathy. But the author is also open and honest about the joy we feel and how it commingles with the grief and how happiness and gratitude can coexist with sorrow when she shares:
Gloriously funny, utterly heartbreaking, and really just brilliant, We All Want Impossible Things is one of the best novels on friendship I've ever read. I loved it. AJ PEARCE, author of DEAR MRS BIRD Edi, a 45-year-old mom and documentary filmmaker, is dying of ovarian cancer in a hospice in Western Massachusetts. Where does a novel go with this setup? THE AUTHOR: Hi! I should probably tell you about myself as a writer, even if you were here to find out some other kind of thing! I write (wrote?) the cooking and lifestyle blog Ben & Birdy. I'm not sure why I wrote "lifestyle." Maybe I mean the kind of lifestyle where you sew your hand to a maple leaf garland while drinking pinot noir. This is not an easy book to read, despite the deft touch, we go through the death watch with Ashley. The author injects the ironic note of Ashley’s sexual reawakening as the life force drains from her dearest friend. The author is also frank about the physical reality of cancer and explicitly shows how grueling it can be to care for a friend while watching them die – there are falls and tears, leaking tubes that soak Edi in bile, and gradual changes to Edi’s appearance and mental state as the end draws near.
I listened to the audio narrated by the wonderful Jane Oppenheimer. She was brilliant narrating the story. DISCLOSURE: Thank you to Random House UK, Transworld Publishers, Doubleday via Netgalley for providing a digital ARC of We All Want Impossible Things by Catherine Newman for review. All opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own personal opinions. Heat the oven to 350 F / 180 C. Grease a round 9-inch (24-cm) springform cake tin and line the bottom with parchment paper. (This is easy to do if you remember to trace the bottom of the tin before you’ve greased it, and less easy to do afterwards.) I recently read an essay by this author and it was amazing. So I bought this book she just wrote, and it was downright appalling. And in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make. -She made – and took – a lot of it.”
My cousin, Margaret, really loved this book. So if you are my cousin Margaret, please do not read any further. Keep that good feeling going that the book gave you. Also, I really like Margaret’s book recommendations so maybe this one just hit me at the wrong time.In a stand mixer or with a sturdy wooden spoon, beat the ricotta, sugar, and lemon zest until smooth. Mikki Brammer's The Collected Regrets of Clover is a big-hearted and life-affirming debut about a death doula who, in caring for others at the end of their life, has forgotten how to live her own, for readers of The Midnight Library. In Newman's hands... this tale of love and friendship is tender, funny, life-affirming joy. MARIE CLAIRE, 'Best Books of 2023' One of my favourite books ever' Marian Keyes; 'Dazzling' Rachel Joyce; 'You'll devour every word' Katherine Heiny; for fans of Nora Ephron and Sorrow and Bliss, a heart-wrenching, laugh-out-loud celebration of friendship at its imperfect and radiant best. Everywhere, behind closed doors, people are dying, and people are grieving them. It’s the most basic fact about human life — tied with birth, I guess — but it’s so startling too… A worldwide crescendo of grief, sustained day after day, and only one tiny note of it is mine,” the narrator writes.
Emma Beddington Tears and laughter: We All Want Impossible Things, by Catherine Newman, reviewed When Edi is moved to palliative care, her best friend Ash keeps vigil at her bedside, recalling their lifetime of shared jokes and experiences As Ash sleeps with many, she shapes her life around the last days of Edi, finding herself stumbling through the process of grief, the inevitable loss, creating final lasting memories and of being there for Edi, bearing witness to the bodily indignities as the end comes ever closer, the inescapable pain, and tsunami of tears and fears, feeling desperately ill prepared. But it is of course complicated, an emotional time of Ash forging closer connections with her family and friends, as they form a unbreakable circle of love and light around Edi. The spirit of life overflows with its beauty, irreverence, joy, humour, wit, a bountiful array of food, drink and parties. There is the hunt for Edi’s all time favourite Sicilian lemon polenta pound cake, the magic of music, questions of life and death, painting nails, the wonders of Farrah Fawcett and Pinky Pie, and stepping into an emotional quagmire as Ash tries to work out what to hold onto and when to let go. Devastatingly humorous and humorously devastating, We All Want Impossible Things is an unbelievably brilliant and funny book about friendship, family, food, sex, and death. Catherine Newman serves up a masterclass in narrative - you'll stay up late devouring every word. KATHERINE HEINY, author of EARLY MORNING RISER and STANDARD DEVIATION
Book Summary
Funny and tender and life affirming and quite simply GLORIOUS....The way the friendship is depicted in this story is a masterpiece... To say I have been deeply moved by this book would be an understatement. My heart is broken after finishing it this morning but it is also singing. SARAH TURNER We All Want Impossible Things is a thing of rare beauty: sweet and sharp, to be devoured, then remembered and loved life-long. i Everywhere, behind closed doors, people are dying, and people are grieving them. It's the most basic fact about human life---tied with birth, I guess---but it's startling too. Everybody dies and yet it's unendurable." Full of humour, warmth and eye-popping honesty ... a beautiful, candid and uplifting testament to female friendship that will make you laugh and cry WOMAN & HOME Soon, the more I read, the more I had trouble putting it down. I got to know Ash better and begin to understand how screwed up her life was. Whose life wouldn't take a downturn if their best friend was in the final stages of life?
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