Review by New York Times Review
Working as an obituary writer could get you down, if you were the kind of person who let it. Lende isn't. Instead, she has used her job chronicling the deaths in her hometown, Haines, Alaska, for the last two decades to foster a literary bent (this is her third memoir) and a determinedly sunny outlook. In chapters with titles that double as admonitions - "Pretty Good Is Better Than Perfect," "Wear a Personal Flotation Device," "Listen to Your Mother" - she teases wisdom from the lives her obits celebrate as well as from her own experiences as a mother and grandmother. Because Haines is so tiny, the dearly departed are usually Lende's friends and neighbors, adding poignancy to a narrative that can read like a cross between Garrison Keillor's Lake Wobegon tales and "Chicken Soup for the Soul." Time and again, Lende traces tragic life arcs: a friend who receives a diagnosis of terminal breast cancer, a fisherman who slips off his boat and drowns, pulled away by a swift current from the life ring his daughter had tossed him. Though these meditations are marred by the occasional hollow platitude, each conveys the unsentimental conviction that the good in our lives shouldn't be overshadowed by their inevitable end. Lende finds bountiful evidence that the human response to suffering "binds us together across dinner tables, neighborhoods, towns and cities, and even time." Cold comfort? Perhaps. Still, her insistence that there is solace to be found even during life's darkest moments can be as bracing as a polar bear plunge.
Copyright (c) The New York Times Company [May 10, 2015]
Review by Booklist Review
You can learn a lot about life from death. As a newspaper obituary writer in a small town in Alaska, Lende has summed up her guidance for approaching life in the words find the good. Much like the phrase itself, the book is simple yet profound. Lende's insight stems from any number of moments, both with her family and with members of her close-knit community. With gentle humor and empathy, she introduces a number of people who provide examples of how to live well, from the fisherman who is always willing to put work aside for a visit, to the Swedish woman who exults in the tidy hotel she runs. Lende, author of the best-selling If You Lived Here, I'd Know Your Name (2005), knows how to keep things grounded enough in everyday struggles to avoid becoming overly saccharine. Her homespun stories will speak meaningfully to readers. The overarching message is that the life we get is precious, as obituary writer Lende knows so well, and should be lived in such a way as to create much good to be remembered by.--Thoreson, Bridget Copyright 2015 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Lende hones the skills she learned as an obituary writer for the town of Haines, Alaska, in her memoir, capturing big and small moments to tell her life's story. She teases out great moments within her life and the people she encounters through her work, reinforcing the book's message, which is reflected in the title. Her skills as a writer are not as useful, however, when it comes to narrating the audio version of her memoir. Though she reads with passion in some passages, at other times her voice is flat, and she seems uninterested in what she is reading. The narration would be more powerful in a professional narrator's voice. Despite this, listeners can still take much from the message and the compassion in the writing. An Algonquin hardcover. (Apr.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
Read by the author, this story of life in small-town Alaska imparts a sense of community to listeners. Lende (Take Good Care of the Garden and the Dogs) writes obituaries for her local paper, the Chilkat Valley News. Weaving stories of her own family life with those of her friends and neighbors, Lende reminds listeners that it is necessary to search for the good in situations and people and that there is always something about which to be positive, regardless of how dire circumstances may appear. As examples, she shares her methods for gathering necessary information from the families of the recently deceased and how she seeks out stories to affirm their lives. Her words serve as a reminder to break the habits of negativity. VERDICT A quick listen, this book is an inspiration.-Cheryl Youse, Moultrie, GA © Copyright 2015. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
An unlikely source delivers tidbits on living well.An obituary writer might be the last person readers would expect to provide wise advice, but Alaska Dispatch News columnist Lende (Take Good Care of the Garden and the Dogs: Family, Friendships, and Faith in Small-Town Alaska, 2010, etc.) turns out to have just the right perspective, as her job centers on finding and writing about the best part of each deceased person's life. In these short observations, the author examines what makes the people in the small town of Haines, Alaska, tick. She follows the intricate weave of relationships between family and friends that creates a close-knit community, and she expands on these ideas to create nuggets of insight universal to everyone. "Find the good" is the essence of living a noble, meaningful life, and Lende explores this mantra in a variety of ways. She writes of the fisherman who refused a good-paying state job so he could spend more time with his family; of the man who drowned because he had no life vest, which prompted the town to raise money for personal floatation suspenders for every fisherman; and of the woman diagnosed with terminal cancer who continued to teach because it brought her the greatest joy and forced her to live in the moment. Each brief life story is a distillation of the highs and lows of that person's life, and Lende considers the many unexpected ways in which ordinary people touched one another, even if they were not always aware of it. Honest and simple yet full of lasting strength, the author's prose demonstrates what makes a life better rather than worseincluding something as simple as picking up heart-shaped stones on the beach with a grandchild. Optimistic, slightly humorous reflections on living a fully engaged, meaningful life. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
