Driving with Dead People: A Memoir
by Monica Holloway
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other reviews (showing 1-20 of 342)
Read in May, 2007
I just finished the 2nd lap through almost my whole bookcase, so I was looking for fresh blood and this caught my eye while I was at Target (it's one of their special book club books or something).
It started off as a "Girl Named Zippy" kind of childhood telling of things and then got dark too close to the end, so you close the book kind of... unfulfilled? I suppose that is an occupational hazard of writing a memoir when you're young(ish) or are writing about semi-recent events. Th...more
It started off as a "Girl Named Zippy" kind of childhood telling of things and then got dark too close to the end, so you close the book kind of... unfulfilled? I suppose that is an occupational hazard of writing a memoir when you're young(ish) or are writing about semi-recent events. Th...more
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Read in April, 2008
I read Glass Castle over a month before this book and I've come to a profound conclusion. I may not have had my parents as long as I'd wanted, but they were great parents. The girl in Glass Castle and now Monica Halloway, both endured child abuse most of their lives and their parents were around a LONG time. My mom died when I as 24 and my dad when I was 17; I may have been a little sheltered, but they brought me up VERY well. I always felt loved, that they were proud of me, and if they were dis...more
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Read in June, 2008
Another one-day read; I am really on a roll here!
I had seen an ad for this book in The New Yorker last year, and the book sounded intriguing. Apparently, I didn't read the copy very well (or the copy was very misleading) because I was expecting a really different book. What I thought was going to be wry recollection of being raised in a funeral home (a la Six Feet Under) turned out to be a memoir of the author's abusive childhood and rocky recovery.
Although the story naturally inspires the...more
I had seen an ad for this book in The New Yorker last year, and the book sounded intriguing. Apparently, I didn't read the copy very well (or the copy was very misleading) because I was expecting a really different book. What I thought was going to be wry recollection of being raised in a funeral home (a la Six Feet Under) turned out to be a memoir of the author's abusive childhood and rocky recovery.
Although the story naturally inspires the...more
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Read in May, 2008
I needed something "fun" to read and chose this. I love this book so far. Monica is an interesting girl with many "exciting" adventures with her fascination on death and the dead and dying. This book is well written from the child's point of view. The phrasing and emotions are true to a 9 year old, especially when she hurts herself and needs crutches - her response "Crutches! All right!!!" - she is a child craving attention. I cant wait to read more!
Well I...more
Well I...more
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Read in June, 2007
This is a really fasinating book. This girl is growing up in a home where the dad is obsesed with death and stops to take pictures of cars accidents, the mother goes back to school and becomes neglectful and not to mention, her best friend's family runs the town's funeral home. As she grows it becomes apparent to her that her life is screwed up and waiting to come is her parents' biggest betrayal yet. It is truely a beautiful memoir of one girl's refusal to be put down despite her family.
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Read in March, 2007
An intriuging true story of a girl who has a horrific childhood addled with both abuse and sheer indifference at the hands of her parents. Holloway becomes obsessed with death, as she sees this as the only viable option in her dark life, and ends up befriending the daughter of the town's funeral home owner. Most kids have a summer job flipping burgers or scooping ice cream, Holloway spent summers in her teenage years driving with dead people, literally picking up dead bodies at the local airport...more
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Read in June, 2007
I did not expect to enjoy this book as much as I did. From the title, you might expect this to be the memoir of the daughter of a mortician or something similar. Instead, she uses a recurring theme of death to recount significant events in her life starting at age 8. The use of death is not morbid, but rather, builds to bring the author through a different kind of death altogether. I think that part is meant to be a surprise to the reader, so I won't elaborate. Suffice it to say this book i...more
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Read in July, 2008
One of those memoirs that make you laugh and then shake your head and then wince a lot. Not hugely original themes based on these familiar elements: a dysfunctional family, an idiosyncratic kid, a small town in the rural Midwest. Because the author was obsessed with death and liked to play at the local mortuary, and because she's about the same age and the setting was similar, this book did remind me a bit of Alison Bechdel's Fun Home. (But it's not as brilliant.) Warning to anyone who's ...more
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Read in January, 2008
This memoir spans Monica Holloway's life from age 8 to the present time. I found the parts about her wholly dysfunctional childhood much more interesting than the later sections (especially tale after tale of all of the mistakes she made during her college and post-college years), but the entire book is very readable and compelling, and it's really sad that it took so long for the author to find the kind of settled life that she deserved. (The title, by the way, comes from the section of the b...more
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Read in January, 2007
recommends it for:
anyone who has had to confront the monsters in the closet or is looking for the courage to do so.
Books enter our lives through mysterious paths sometimes. I'd put this on my amazon wish list and seen it noted in the New Yorker. Then, for my final shoot for a magazine I was parting ways with, I was asked to photograph the author. Not only is Monica's story told with tremendous candor and wit, after becoming friends I learned first hand how authentically voice comes through in the narrative. As a big fan of the genre, too many memoirs are over written and lack the real voice behind the tale. ...more
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Read in May, 2008
I expected this book to be very different than what it was- the brief glance I gave it at the bookstore left me thinking it was a lighthearted memoir by a girl who'd grown up helping out at a funeral home.... Instead it was an account of Monica's family, growing up, and her adulthood- as she grapples with dark secrets from her family's past.... As I read it, I found it very easy to like and root for the narrator- such resilience and courage! It was a little dark though, definitely not "l...more
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Has a copy to sell/swap
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Read in June, 2008
recommends it for:
anyone
I really liked this book. I enjoyed that it started from a child's perspective from about the age of 5 until adulthood. The story is about a disfunctional family and growing up in that troubled environment. The story was lightened up with humor and although it was compared to "Running With Scissors", I didn't find it as harsh. I enjoyed reading it and I think even though I have no similarities in terms of the family life I really felt like I could relate to the author throughout the bo
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Read in April, 2007
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.
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Read in July, 2007
The title of this book totally sucked me in, but it's not a great memoir, or even a good one. The author clearly had a horrible childhood, but she relies heavily on simply cataloguing events without reflecting on them. The material is rich (and painful), but the book lacks perspective from the adult the narrator has become. In other words, it's a trauma memoir, much heavier on the trauma than the memoir.
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Read in April, 2008
Interesting memoir. I enjoyed the point of view in which this sad but humorous tale was told.
The book tells of Monica's life up through age 40. Her troubled childhood, her horrible parents, and her siblings all play a role. My favorite part was that she loved to spend time with the local funeral directors family and ended up driving the hearse for extra money in high school.
The book tells of Monica's life up through age 40. Her troubled childhood, her horrible parents, and her siblings all play a role. My favorite part was that she loved to spend time with the local funeral directors family and ended up driving the hearse for extra money in high school.
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Read in July, 2008
I've managed to read a lot of memoirs about screwed up families, but I think this one takes the cake. I didn't know which parent to be more livid at. I cannot even imagine how Holloway managed a semi normal life after such a messed up childhood. On a side note, I found all of the funeral parlor stuff to be fascinating. Parts of this book are not for the faint of heart.
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Read in May, 2008
If you like books about dysfunctional childhoods, as I appear to, you'll like this book. The book is grimly humorous, although a bit harrowing at the end. The writer is very funny and close to my age so the era feels familiar. Also it takes place in southern Ohio (near KY) and southern California so the locales also feel familiar.
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This book was a surprise. You think that it's going to be about this little girl who ends up having an obsession with death and the mortuary and the story ends up being about something totally different. Great story but it's not a "good feeling" book, if that is what you are looking for.
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Read in January, 2008
What a terrible childhood this girl had. She develops a fascination with death at an early age, and that is the underlying theme of the whole book. With a monster for a father and her selfish mother, it's a wonder this girl made it out of childhood alive and somewhat sane.
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Read in January, 2008
I thought this book was going to be a humorous memoir of a childhood in a funeral home. Boy, was I wrong. Instead, I got a rather sad tale, with some humor, of a girl obsessed with dying because of the abuse she suffers at home. It was an interesting and very sad book.
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