Darin Strauss

This little book is a memoir--but a memoir like none other I've read. The author (whose novel, "More Than it Hurts You" I have read and was impressed by) tells us on the first page that he killed a girl when he was eighteen. She was a schoolmate on a bicycle and he was driving the car that hit and ultimately killed her. Writing this book at age 38, he documents the painfully honest reflection on his feelings and behaviors over the years as a result of the accident. But it isn't just one more show more "accident memoir;" he didn't want to become "one more person creating an entertainment out of misfortune, distilling honey from vinegar." And somehow he didn't. Anyone reading this book who lives with a traumatic event/episode/memory that refuses to be erased by time will be drawn into Strauss' story and maybe even encouraged by its transparency. show less

Darin Strauss formats his Half a Life in an unusual, organic way; the fragmented chapters and blank pages between them seem to mirror the workings of memory itself. Blank pages stand in for gaps in memory (or time), and details rise up abruptly, like memories bubbling to the surface of consciousness.

This book is, at its core, a man’s effort to understand how a tragic event in his youth – hitting and killing a girl on her bike with his car – has shaped his life. Half a Life spans the show more years from the accident to adulthood, and we witness the progression of his sadness and slow, gnawing guilt over time. Could he have done something differently? Had she committed suicide? Can he really embrace his own life after taking someone else’s? These are the questions he struggles to answer, though there are no definitive answers to be had.

While the narrative is occasionally bogged down by simile, Strauss provides vivid images of the connection he feels to the girl’s family and her “ghost” as it follows him through life. He constantly worries about how others perceive him, both in high school and years later. Is he seen as a careless murderer? A victim of coincidence? In a way true to life (as acknowledged by the author), there are no grand epiphanies to be found here. We feel both the weight of his remorse and, increasingly, a sense of calm. He finds a way to forgive himself while never forgetting the past that has defined him. show less

This book is being marketed as a romance, a love story. I say, really? There are elements of that in it, to be sure, but in some ways this book is quite the opposite. The story is two-fold. One part is a part-fictional, small-part memoir of the author's grandfather, who may or may not have had an affair with Lucille Ball. They met at a party in New York, before she was nearly as famous as she would later become. He was established in his real estate career, married, with children. She too show more was already married, and focused on making herself (and Desi) a rising star in the acting world. But they caught each other's attention and a slight obsession followed. The book jumps through the years, following both, and interspersed with the author's own story of talking to his dying grandfather (the one who, as a younger man, is a character in the larger story - don't worry, it's not as confusing as it sounds).

Do Lucille and the author's grandfather ever get together? Well, such is the stuff that stories are made of. Did any of this really happen? That's a more complicated question. What is the responsibility of the author of historical fiction to historical fact? Strauss is completely clear that he doesn't know the truth of the matter, but he also acknowledges fudging such fundamental facts as the day of the week on which I Love Lucy aired. And why? That particular detail is absolutely not relevant to the plot, so why bother to change a fact of history. To me, that calls the entire enterprise of this book into doubt. Maybe he did that on purpose, since he himself doesn't know the truth of the possible relationship between his grandfather and Lucille Ball.

Setting the absolute truth aside, this is a very readable story. It follows Lucille Ball through her early struggles with Desi and her career, into her stardom, and through the collapse of her marriage, even as she continues to grow more powerful in Hollywood. It follows Isidore Strauss, mostly through a family lens, as his children grow and his wife becomes an alcoholic. Either of these stories separately might have made good reading. Tying them together is something of a conceit on the author's part, and it doesn't quite work. show less

The writing is beautiful. The phrases and descriptions so evocative: "While the world is not a place of widespread kindness, a few oysters thrive in a sea of clams. Occasional grace exists. Mother, knowing my brother and me for more than one child, kept her calm." See what I mean?

But the subject matter here is disturbing. (Chang and Eng were the "original" Siamese twins and became world-wide celebrities.) The book is narrated by Eng, and we see envy, pettiness, lust, sloth, and a deep show more unhappiness - always a desire to be apart and yet a great loneliness. show less