I've recently read a ton of graphic novels and memoirs - some I loved and others not so much but were still a thrill to read. Guts by Raina Telgemeier I am always on the lookout for Raina Telgemeier's comics, so when I found Guts available at my library's Overdrive catalog last year, I had to request it right away. Her comics are always delightful, designed for the middle-grade audience, and written very well. Guts is a continuation of her Smile nonfiction graphic memoir series (see Smile and Sisters ) and recounts a period in her childhood when she experienced IBS for the first time. When Raina wakes up one night with an upset tummy, she just assumes it's a stomach bug as her mom is also showing the same symptoms. But when it doesn't go away soon but is instead influenced by the daily highs and lows of being a middle grader - good friends, not so good ones, and then the bullies, she realizes there's something else going on. If you have not read the previous

Doesn't it always begin that way? A telephone call across the miles, one reality exchanged for another in an instant. Not that you weren't waiting for it all along in some dark place of your mind where you hold such things that cannot yet be brought into the light. You wish for a bad connection, crossed lines, a lapse in hearing, a rush into dream. But you're only hearing what you fear, though none of it seems real.Ann's father and mother stayed just four hours away along with her uncle, who was her father's identical twin - all in their eighties. Her father's stroke was only the beginning of a long journey towards death and loss, accompanied by an endless frenzy of diseases, sadness, closure, regular visits to the doctor, a move to a retirement home first, then a nursing home. Ann will lose all three within a span of five years, and then just three months from the publication of her book, she loses her husband to cancer.
Full Moon at Noontide was a gut-wrenching reading experience. And I mean every word of that. There is a lot of sadness in this book, and I cried at almost every page. It reminded me of the grandparents I lost, and the other old folks I never got to know. As a friend of mine says, "life happens and so does death". But as in Ann's case, where do you even get the strength to watch three dearest people snatched from you suddenly within a few years? Add your spouse and your adorable dog to that equation, and I might even give up on life totally. And that is where this beautiful memoir scores. It doesn't leave you feeling depressed and upset at the rules of life and death. Instead, it teaches you several lessons in a subtle manner. It opens you up to the very realities of the lives of the people when they are old and near-death - that regular visit to the hospital, each time returning back leaving behind a part of you; that frequent lapse of memory and/or consciousness; that simple smile on their face when they see their child or grandchild; and that week-long waiting for the weekly ritual of a night out at a restaurant.
Death scares me a lot. It is the one big fear I have been having for years. And when I was about to start reading this, I was expecting to put it down every few pages. But as Thomas R. Cole, who wrote the introduction for this book said, I was also seduced by this book from the beginning. Ann weaves the characters of the twins - Homer (her father) and Henry, and her mother, Grace, so vividly, that by the time I turned the last page, I felt I lost someone so dear to me. These three amazing characters had very successful lives, and to see them struggle through their last years in life was very hard for me, and yet this is what happens in reality. But their life is not all tragedy, as there is plenty of humor in the book to get through the days of watching them slip away. I had never before looked at life from their perspective - it was always as a third person. But Full Moon at Noontide changed that. It made me want to reach out to Ann, hug her and tell her it's alright. Her experiences were tragic, but she faced them with a courage that I surely do not have.
I haven't stayed long enough or come often enough no matter how long I stay or how often I come.





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I received this book for free from the publisher via Pump Up Your Book.

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