Talk Before Sleep

I'm in the middle of rereading Elizabeth Berg's Talk Before Sleep. It was the first book by Berg that I'd read, years ago, purchased at what had been my favorite bookstore (Brigit Books in St. Petersburg, which has long since closed). Since then, I've reread it several times; it is probably my favorite of Berg's books that I've read to date.

Talk Before Sleep is the story of friendship, told from Ann's perspective. Ann and Ruth first met at a party. Ann was immediately put off by Ruth's good looks; she soon discovers, though, that Ruth has an honesty that is even more breath-taking than her looks. However, Ruth soon discovers she has breast cancer, which ends up spreading; by the end of the book, it has killed her.

There are no actual chapters throughout the book, instead leaving a gap between segments. The book dances back and forth between the past and the present. The present follows the story of Ruth's dying and death and how her group of friends - a group of women who are as different a $1,000 cashmere sweater and a comfortable t-shirt - reacts to her illness and death, as well as each other. Ruth's boss, Sarah, is the "kind of woman who can wear a perfectly tailored silk dress to take out the garbage and not spill a single thing on it...management material through and through," while L.D. "is a football-player-sized woman I've never seen in anything but checked flannel shirts and bib overalls..." Meanwhile, the flashbacks tell how Ann and Ruth met, their developing friendship, and what happens in their lives as they inch forward to the final illness.

While a review in Kirkus states that "Berg...offers a sappy tale about a woman witnessing the death of her friend..." (https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/elizabeth-berg/talk-before-sleep/), and NYU School of Medicine's Literature, Arts, and Medicine Database states that "Unfortunately, like many books with much pathos, Talk Before Sleep often missteps into the territory of bathos...the book is mortally flawed in its two-dimensional portrayal of men..." (http://litmed.med.nyu.edu/Annotation?action=view&annid=1150), there are other sites that give the book positive reviews (http://www.storycirclebookreviews.org/reviews/talksleep.shtml , http://www.bookreporter.com/reviews/talk-before-sleep ). While the men in this book might not have been as three-dimensional as the women are, I felt that it was due more to the fact that the book dealt with women's friendships during profound illness than about rounding out characters that one only sees in the periphery.

Meanwhile, for those of us who have either experienced a medical scare ourselves or of friends and family members, this book rings true in its story.

Please Look After Mom

Some books get a lot of positive press, or, at least, decent press, which turns out to be completely true. Then, there are those with the aforementioned positive press that, for whatever reason, are difficult to get into. Please Look After Mom falls into the latter category.

The different chapters appear to be written with a different character as the main person trying to find Mom, but in a stilted way. The first segment is in the third person: you go to see Mom, you wonder where Mom is, Mom is proud of you, you tell Mom...It feels more like an exercise one might find in a college writing class: "And please, write your story consistently in the third person..." The second chapter was similarly written, but with another of the lost woman's children as the central character, looking for Mom.

The premise is interesting enough: Mom has gotten lost while heading somewhere by train; her adult children must find her. Written by a more skilled writer, it could have been spellbinding. However, the stilted writing detracted from the book enough that I had trouble reading it. Granted, it may have been the fault of the translator; however, I doubt it.

If you have one book to buy this month, find another one. Borrow this one from your local library; then, if you find it more enjoyable than I did, buy it. Otherwise, find something that you're sure to enjoy for years to come.

Please Look After Mom by Kyung-Sook Shin
My rating: 2 of 5 stars



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