Sigh… where to begin? Reviewing a book like this is a bit of a challenge. Purmort’s biggest claim to fame, and her reason for writing a memoir in the first place, is that her husband died of cancer. So, if you criticize a book like this, you come across as a jerk… So with that understanding, I am going into this immediately letting you know that I DISLIKED this book. Apparently my husband’s company paid this lady to come as a keynote speaker for some event. He wasn’t terribly impressed, but he knows I love books and was curious to see what I thought, hence, this book came into my life.
Purmont apparently became “viral” when she wrote an obituary for her dead husband. People all over raved about it, and somehow the powers that be decided that a memoir should be written. I get it. We live in a digital world. Something comes across my internet and grasps the imagination for a milisecond, and then I move on. In this climate, however, all sorts of people are given platforms, whether they have a unique viewpoint or anything to add. Minus the snappy obituary… I really don’t think Purort’s book adds anything to a discussion about anything. Love, Cancer, Grief, Loss… nothing. Now, get ready for me to sound like a jerk, but I know people, I actually know people who have had larger challenges in life than losing a husband, a father, and having a miscarriage within a month time frame, and in conversations with those women, I feel they understand and can convey those BIG topics yet they’ve not been given a platform (nor would they want to shine a spotlight on their own lives in that way). Due to the nature of Purmort’s “fame”, I felt a lot of the writing was disingenuous, or maybe her personality was the problem. Purmort comes across as someone incredibly insecure that just wants you to like her. She covers this insecurity with an artificial bravado that is, frankly, off putting. But I get ahead of myself, let me tell you what this one is about. And disclaimer, anytime anyone uses the “one wild and precious life” quote, a part of me dies inside.
Purmort starts her book with the “one wild and precious life” quote, so you know this is going to be a millennial love fest of pseudo intellectual psychology. Purmort was apparently dating around and dating all the wrong people when she met her future husband, Aaron, who she’d met at some other time but she didn’t recall that. Though she and Aaron seem like they have little in common, aside from height, they seem to click and begin dating and living together when a seizure reveals that Aaron has a tumor (read: cancer) and it is bad… so they get engaged and subsequently married. They do all sorts of other things that rational people don’t usually do, but he has a tumor and they are living to the fullest. They have a child, then they have miscarriage, then both Purport’s husband and father die. So she has a toddler, she’s a widow, and she has lost her father. All within a short time frame. Sympathetic? Yes. Good reading material… not exactly. It had the potential to be but Purmort’s writing style (bloggy at best… just bad at worst) tries too hard. She tries to be clever. She tries to be profound. She tries to be hilarious and outrageous. In short, she is trying to recreate what people loved about her obituary for her deceased husband. It doesn’t work as a book. Not only is it poorly organized it is poorly written.
And now, I am fully prepared to embrace the jerkdom and tell you that she knew her husband for a total of 4 years. That is dating, living together, marriage, child, chemotherapy, etc. Their entire courtship was a whirlwind of drama. One wonders what their lives would have looked like without cancer. Would they have married? Would they have had children? Would they have divorced? Would the day to day living of who is going to empty the trash, who is going to pay this bill, what show is going to be next to binge watch on netflix have been enough to keep Purmort going… because based on this book, the girl loves some drama. I didn’t like this book. I wouldn’t suggest this book.
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