The erratics

"In this award-winning memoir, two sisters reckon with the convalescence and death of their outlandishly tyrannical mother and the care of their psychologically terrorized father, all relayed with dark humor and brutal honesty. When Vicki and her sister learn their mother has been hospitalized...

Full description

Main Author: Laveau-Harvie, Vicki (Author)
Format: Books Print Book
Language: English
Published: New York : Alfred A. Knopf, 2020.
Edition: First United States edition.
Subjects:
Summary: "In this award-winning memoir, two sisters reckon with the convalescence and death of their outlandishly tyrannical mother and the care of their psychologically terrorized father, all relayed with dark humor and brutal honesty. When Vicki and her sister learn their mother has been hospitalized for a broken hip, they return to their parents' home in Alberta to put things back in order. Though their parents disowned them years before, the sisters now reassert themselves in the dysfunctional household: their father, undernourished and suffering from Stockholm syndrome, is unable to see that he is in danger from his outlandish and vindictive wife. Rearranging their lives to be the daughters they were never allowed to be, the sisters focus their efforts on helping their father cope with the unending manipulations of their mother, and must encounter all the characters common in the circus of caretaking--oddball nurses and home helpers; over-opinionated hospital staff who have fallen for their mother's compulsive lies--along with the pressures that come with caring for elderly loved (and sometimes unloved) ones. Set against the natural world of remotest Alberta ("in winter the cold will kill you, nothing personal"), this memoir--at once dark and hopeful--shatters precedents about grief, anger and family trauma with surprising tenderness and humor"--
Item Description: "A memoir" --Cover.
"A Borzoi book" --Title page verso.
"Originally published in Australia in paperback by Finch Publishing Pty Limited, New South Wales, in 2018, and subsequently published by Fourth Estate, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Australia Pty Limited, Sydney, in 2019."--Title page verso.
Physical Description: 201 pages ; 22 cm
ISBN: 9780525658610
0525658610
Author Notes: VICKI LAVEAU-HARVIE was born in Canada but lived for many years in France before settling in Australia. In France she worked as a translator and a business editor, despite being a specialist in eighteenth-century French literature. In Sydney she lectured in French Studies at Macquarie University. After retiring, she taught ethics in a primary school. The Erratics won the 2018 Finch Memoir Prize and was the winner of the 2019 Stella Prize. She has also won prizes for short fiction and poetry.