Reviews for Life goes on

The average rating for Life goes on based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2018-07-12 00:00:00 Lawrence Gustafson Reading Road Trip 2020 Current location: Vermont As obsessed as I've been with Shirley Jackson for the past two years of my life, you'd have thought she'd have been my first choice for the state of Vermont. Foolishly, she wasn't. Many of Ms. Jackson's novels indicate a New England setting, but most of them could be set just as easily on Mars. Given that, and given how many of her stories I'd already read, I set out to read THREE different novels set in the state of Vermont (that all SUCKED) before finally remembering two Shirley Jackson memoirs I had never touched. I quickly ran back to Shirley. Personally, I think the two best books coming out of Vermont are The Haunting of Hill House and We Have Always Lived in the Castle. I don't think Hill House ever declares an official state setting, but Castle does, and they were both written by Jackson from her house in Vermont. Jackson was not a Vermont native, but it's an aspect of her story that makes her impression of locals even that much more entertaining. As a child, everything I learned about Vermont came from the show, Newhart, Bob Newhart's sitcom about a couple from NYC who decide to head to Vermont to run an inn. From what I recall of the show, it was almost perpetually snowing, every time a character looked out the window or opened the front door, and everyone who worked at the inn or stayed at the inn indicated the stereotype of the Vermont resident: quirky, stoic, hard-working. Shirley Jackson does nothing to dispel such stereotypes here in her memoir. She and her husband, Stanley Edgar Hyman, relocated to Vermont after finding NYC unaffordable and they decided to rent a huge house that someone made available to them for an unusually low amount. It is here that the Hymans settle down to make baby after baby after baby after baby and count out their nickels and dimes, with Shirley commenting on her colorful neighbors and her own colorful inability to fit in anywhere properly. This is a unique snapshot of family life in the early 1950s, and, wow, is it different from today. Shirley and her husband, Stanley, despite being a couple on the rise, have no real clout or social standing in this small New England town. Their neighbors do not give a rat's ass who either of them are, and the residents become almost a cast of characters in their own right, most of them with their hand outstretched to receive their NICKEL for payment. Money is a constant theme here, or lack of money. The Hymans are broke, the Hymans can't stop making babies (was it the last name??), and the Hymans can't stop smoking those cigarettes or drinking that damn brandy. You can NOT believe how cheap everything is, or I could not. Granted, it was the early 50s and it was a small town in Vermont, but it is truly staggering to me that you could pay for things like milk, bread and gas with a handful of pennies. Let me tell you what has NOT changed, though: the invalidation of women. I was positively sickened by how Shirley Jackson, an educated woman, a writer, a mother of multiple children, was treated like a child herself by almost everyone: car mechanics, school teachers, medical staff, plumbers. Given the fact that I have spent the past seven weeks with a rather threatening medical condition and I have been treated like an idiot by almost every doctor (save two) that I've encountered this month, I can not STAND IT how women are invalidated, especially by medical staff. I have actually been denied important testing this month because the assumption was made that it was just a case of NERVES. I might have been better, weeks ago, had I been taken seriously. And here was Shirley Jackson, 70 years ago, being checked in by the desk clerk at the hospital, to deliver a baby: “Age?” she asked. “Sex? Occupation?” “Writer,” I said. “Housewife,” she said. “Writer,” I said. “I'll just put down housewife,” she said. . . . “Husband's name?” she said. “Address? Occupation?” “Just put down housewife,” I said. “I don't remember his name, really.” “Legitimate?” “What?” I said. “Is your husband the father of this child? Do you have a husband?” “Please,” I said plaintively, “can I go on upstairs?” “Well, really,” she said, and sniffed. “You're only having a baby." I hope you can see, by this example, how Shirley was treated as a woman and how FUNNY she continues to be, no matter the circumstance (I don't remember his name, really!!). This book reveals Shirley's inspiration for many of her stories, and I smiled like a nutter throughout the whole read. It's not all inspiring or funny; there are several sections filled with the minutiae of housekeeping, and, as I mentioned above, a fixation on prices and lists, but this is one helluva time capsule and when Shirley Jackson mentions that she tends to make breakfast for the kids while smoking a cigarette, so she can jump-start her day, I just about died of joy. Turns out, my fantasy is true: The Lottery and Other Stories

Review # 2 was written on 2021-03-10 00:00:00 Fred Hill A fun fact about this book is that it is the funniest, the most interesting, the unique-est, and the most underrated book of all time. If I need to dedicate my life to forming various legitimate-seeming committees and subcommittees and awards ceremonies and aliases in order to convince people of that fact, so be it. I am willing to make screaming from the rooftops on the subject of this my sole purpose. This is just the best. I slumped so hard after reading it because I couldn't imagine finding any book that brought me the joy that this brought me - and then I remembered that there's a sequel, and I promptly bought it both in paperback and as an ebook - and then I remembered that Shirley Jackson, in a truly nonsensical and evil act, is no longer with us, and therefore once I read the sequel I will be plumb out of nonfiction memoirs about her demon children growing up in Vermont. And I just am not prepared to live that lifestyle yet. Bottom line: Subcommittee-forming it is. ----------------- pre-review sometimes i go so long without truly enjoying a book from first page to last that i forget how to even rate them. (updating because i will be giving this 5 stars) review to come / 5!!!! ----------------- tbr review there's a distinct possibility i'm in love with shirley jackson