The Way The Crow Flies

by Ann-Marie MacDonald.

This was a very moving book.

Compelling.

Gripping.

There was just a hint of the Tolstoy style- story interspersed with the author's narrative.

It was a sad story- but more complex than that.

Joy and sorrow all mixed up together.

I finished it last night.

Way too late.

I wept.

Like "War and Peace", I might read this again just to absorb more of the wisdom. More from the narrative.

I started dogging ears at the end of the book.

Here are two tidbits:

"Early thirty-something existential moment of truth, when you first realize that not everyone you worked with in your twenties is a genius, that some people are "wild and crazy" and others simply have a substance problem, that the alluring sexy-sad people are just depressive, that depression is rage slowed down, that mania is grief speeded up. The first great winnowing."

 

"When a parent dies, a planet disappears, and the night sky will never look the same again. It doesn't matter how grown up we are when we lose one. And when both are gone it's as though we are permanently without a kind of roof- invisible shield, first line of defence between ourselves and mortality, gone."

 

I recommend it, but unless you are made of stone, it will stir things. It will move you.