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Labor Day

by Joyce Maynard (Goodreads Author)

3.6 of 5 stars 3.60 · rating details · 2,856 ratings · 627 reviews

With the end of summer closing in and a steamy Labor Day weekend looming in the town of Holton Mills, New Hampshire, thirteen-year-old Henry—lonely, friendless, not too good at sports—spends most of his time watching television, reading, and daydreaming about the soft skin and budding bodies of his female classmates. For company Henry has his long-divorced mother, Adele—a...more

Hardcover, 244 pages

Published July 28th 2009 by William Morrow & Company (first published 2009)

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Feb 26, 2010 Barbara rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: Merilee

I must comment that early in my reading of this book, I was contemplating that it would be deserving of a 3 star rating. I certainly was in error, because as I progressed the story became richer and more nuanced. When finally I reached the denouement I realized that I held in my hands a beautiful, evocative gem, which had brought me to tears.

Labor Day is the tale of a fourteen year old boy, Henry, who lives in isolation with his long-divorced, emotionally fragile mother. On one of their rare out...more

15 likes · like · see review

Feb 15, 2009 Jackie rated it 5 of 5 stars

Recommended to Jackie by: Tavia Kowalchuk from HarperCollins

Shelves: work-review-related-reading, 5-star

This is only a bound manuscript at this point, but I believe it's scheduled for late summer 2009 publication.

I haven't read anything by Maynard before, but she's certainly on my list of authors to read more of now. This story, which I easily devoured in a lazy day at home, is touching on so many levels. Told through the eyes of a 13 year old boy, it's the story of five days when an escaped criminal comes to live with him and his mom, changing their lives forever. Henry feels responsible for his...more

5 likes · like · see review

Aug 16, 2009 Sarah rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: adult-fiction, contemporary, bildungsroman

Well written and mildly satisfying, Labor Day is a very quick read. In fact, I read it just this afternoon after hiking. A suspicious stranger, who turns out to be an escaped prisoner, approaches a young boy and his mother for a ride while they're out shopping. They take him in, he offers to help around the house, and interesting bonds form. The mother is your standard borderline character, suffering from depression and desiring isolation. Her son is a typical teenage product of divorce, steppin...more

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Sep 13, 2009 Rhonda rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: read-in-2009

Thirteen-year old Henry and his divorced mother take a RARE trip to the mall the Friday before Labor Day. While there, a bleeding man approaches Henry and asks to come home with him. Strangely, his mother agrees...
This may be the answer Henry has hoped for...someone to bring her mother out of her funk. But this man brings with him some secrets...which eventually teach Henry about friendship, jealousy, betrayal, the importance of others in your life, and that real love is worth waiting for..........more Thirteen-year old Henry and his divorced mother take a RARE trip to the mall the Friday before Labor Day. While there, a bleeding man approaches Henry and asks to come home with him. Strangely, his mother agrees...
This may be the answer Henry has hoped for...someone to bring her mother out of her funk. But this man brings with him some secrets...which eventually teach Henry about friendship, jealousy, betrayal, the importance of others in your life, and that real love is worth waiting for...........a lot of lessons for a 13-year old to learn in such a short time..

I thought I'd share the last few paragraphs of the story...the last TWO sentences sorta contain spoilers, so don't finish it if you don't want any hints as to what goes on the book.... I've separated the last two sentences by asterics so you can stop...the first part is worth reading... but I thought this was a good summary of his lessons learned...

Quote:

written by Henry when he is now 31-years old...

"When our daughter cries, we pull the car over by the side of the road and unbuckle her seat belt, and just hold her. Sometimes the place we pull over may be inconvenient for this. An interstate highway, more than likely. Or we might be only twenty minutes from their house---close enough that you might say, never mind, push on through.
But I always stop to hold our daughter. Or one of us does. If there are large trucks barreling past, we may walk down the embankment, away from the noise a little. Or I'll cup my hands over her ears. If there's grass, I may lie down in it, and lay her on the bare skin of my chest---or if it's winter, buckle her inside my jacket, or place a handful of snow on her tongue, and if it's night, we may look at the stars for a minute. What I have found is that a baby---though she doesn't know words yet, or information, or the rules of life---is the most reliable judge of feelings. All a baby has with which to take in the world are her five senses. Hold her, sing to her, show her the night sky or a quivering leaf, or a bug. Those are the ways---the only ways---she learns about the world---whether it is a safe and loving place, or a harsh one.
What she will register, at least, will be the fact that she is not alone. And it has been my experience that when you do this---slow down, pay attention, follow the simple instincts of love---a person is likely to respond favorably. It is generally true of babies, and most other people too, perhaps. Also dogs. Hamsters even. And people so damaged by life in the world that there might seem no hope for them, only there may be.
So I talk to her. Sometimes we dance. When our daughter's breathing is steady again---maybe she has fallen asleep, maybe not---we buckle her up in her car seat and continue north.

**********
I always know, whatever hour it may be when we pull down the long dirt road leading to their house, that the lights will be on, and the door will be open even before we reach it---my mother standing there, with Frank beside her.
You brought the baby, she says. (less)

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Jul 22, 2009 Will Byrnes rated it 4 of 5 stars

Henry is a 13-year-old living with his pet hamster, Joe, and his agoraphobic, damaged mother at the end of a cul-de-sac in Holton Mills, New Hampshire. He sees his father on Saturday nights for unappetizing outings to Friendly’s with dad’s new family. Henry is small, unathletic and on the lower steps of the social ladder at school. But changes are afoot. His body is changing in obvious ways and his interests are beginning to point, sometimes embarrassingly so, toward girls. Life takes a turn on...more

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Aug 03, 2009 Kasa Cotugno rated it 4 of 5 stars

There is a metaphor at the heart of this book, that of the creation of an upper crust for a peach pie and the difficulties encountered when the hands are shaky and the weather is humid. It must be handled delicately and involves a little magic. Such magic is present when a stranger who also happens to be an escaped convict lands in the house of a 13 year old self-described "loser" and his agoraphobic mother, both of whom could use a great deal of help. If the setup sounds a little too facile, th...more

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Aug 20, 2009 Mary rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: first-reads

I started reading this book at 10 PM and I just could not put it down.
Labor Day is such a family day. It is idylic in American life; it is the last breath of that carefree Summer. Except there is nothing carefree about Henry and his family and Labor Day changes their lives.

A sad adolescent boy and his depressed mother meet a convict at the discount store and take him home with them. What happens in the next few days makes for a great story. These characters are real and the reader "comes of age"...more

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May 04, 2013 Ms.pegasus rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Those looking for a piece of delicate writing and a fresh treatment of some familiar themes

Recommended to Ms.pegasus by: publicity from the upcoming movie

Shelves: fiction

LABOR DAY has been described as a “coming of age” story. How inadequate is that description. True, it is told in the voice of a 13 year old boy. True, it focuses on that boy's transition into adolescence. The problem is that such a description flattens the characters into types, and reduces the reader's emotions into a predictable revisiting of youthful emotional turmoil and sexual awareness. Instead, Maynard offers a focused gallery of unique characters. We meet Henry's damaged mother, Adele. S...more LABOR DAY has been described as a “coming of age” story. How inadequate is that description. True, it is told in the voice of a 13 year old boy. True, it focuses on that boy's transition into adolescence. The problem is that such a description flattens the characters into types, and reduces the reader's emotions into a predictable revisiting of youthful emotional turmoil and sexual awareness. Instead, Maynard offers a focused gallery of unique characters. We meet Henry's damaged mother, Adele. She is so depressed that her son Henry spends much of his energy contriving excuses to get her out of the house. His role feels more like caretaker than child. He listens to Adele's most intimate stories – how she met his father, her love of dance, her sorrows, her paranoia, and her restless isolation. On the rare errand, she makes Henry get out of the car and run into the bank or store, so paralyzing is her crushed imagination. Henry concludes: “I could feel her loneliness and longing, before I had a name for it. It had probably never been about my father really. Looking at him now, it was hard to imagine he could ever have been worthy of her. What she had loved was loving” (31). Maynard reveals this character slowly. The reader is lulled into believing we know Adele, and part of us dislikes her for putting her son in this ever-wary, intensely protective state. There is even a lull in the pace of the story, until the past and the present come together, moving forward into the future with the accelerating momentum of high tide.

The story is told with delicacy and candor, as if spilling directly from the mind of a 13 year old. Maynard eschews the use of quotation marks, even as she constructs passages of remembered dialogue, enhancing the feeling that we are listening to Henry's filtered memories. It's a testament spoken from the heart. “...there was something about the way Frank fed my mother that made the whole thing almost beautiful, like he was a jeweler or a scientist, or one of those old Japanese men who work all day on a single bonsai.”(p.41) One pictures the eroticism hidden behind those words.

At the same time, the reader is also allowed an objective viewpoint. We see that no matter how difficult Henry's situation before that fateful Labor Day weekend, at least he has reduced it to a formulaic predictability. That predictability is upset when Frank, the man Henry mistakes for an injured store employee seeking first-aid on his own, enters their lives. No matter how positive the changes are that Frank brings, adjusting to the new territory of unpredictability is disconcerting and confusing to Henry.

This is a beautiful piece of writing. I don't want to give away anything more of the plot. Despite its male protagonist, I suspect it will have greater appeal for women than for men, but not because its emotional portraiture.

NOTE: I picked up this book because Acton was one of the locations for the upcoming film, although the actual setting in the book is a small town in New Hampshire. The writing is so central to the enjoyment of this book that I wonder how the movie will treat the story. Guess I'll have to wait until Labor Day!(less)

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Apr 16, 2013 Margaret rated it 2 of 5 stars

I felt like an observer of events as I read this book. I never became involved with the characters or with their situation.
Told from the voice of 13 year old Henry, this is the story of his unstable mother and a mysterious man who comes to spend the 6 days leading up to Labor Day with them. Henry lives with his mother who has withdrawn from life, staying at home as much as possible and avoiding any personal contact with anyone other than Henry when possible until the day Henry and his mother are...more

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Mar 05, 2012 Bonnie Brody rated it 4 of 5 stars

I am a fan of Joyce Maynard and have read To Die For and Baby Love (Coronet Books). I enjoyed both of these books and know what a good writer she is.

In order to appreciate this beautifully written book, one must be able to suspend belief in the logical. I was able to do so and appreciated the book in many ways. I'm not sure that all readers will be able to suspend their beliefs to the extent that I did.

The book is about a six day period around Labor Day in a small New Hampshire town. A 13 year-o...more

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Dec 21, 2011 Rebecca rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: chicklit

I love books that take place over a small time period. Throw in a small cast and what could be a boring book, is a story I'll really enjoy! This book takes place over Labor Day weekend, so timeline, check. A prison escapee talks his way into a single mother and son's house and sort of holds them captive all weekend, but not really. The mother is crazy, which contributes to the story a lot. But the story was told from the son's point of view, which was interesting. He knows there is something not...more

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Jul 25, 2011 Pam rated it 4 of 5 stars

http://iwriteinbooks.wordpress.com/20...

There isn’t much to do in Holton Mills, New Hampshire, especially for thirteen-year-old Henry. He lives with mis mom who has a strange history to go along with her current habit of running scared from the outdoors. Though he occasionally gets out of the house for school, as Labor Day weekend dawns, he admits to feeling like the summer has been a bit long. Relying on his talkative, albeit, generally anti-social mother and a hamster for company, Henry sticks...more

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Jan 28, 2011 Steven rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: novels

Joyce Maynard's Labor Day is a seriously flawed book, a disappointment in so many ways. But...

The book is written from the viewpoint of a 13 year old boy except for the last 30 pages. She manages to write that quite convincingly. There seemed to be honesty in the emotions expressed. Some of the characters are three dimensional, though most aren't.

So what are the flaws. Frank is a saint, not a bad bone in his body. Everybody has a few bad bones. The timing is far too condensed, only 6 days. But m...more

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Jan 21, 2011 Jaime rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2011, general_fiction

I had mixed feelings about this book. In one way, it’s a gentle story about love and a teenaged boy who has had to be the adult for way too long. On the other hand, it feels a little contrived. A woman and her son bring into their home a strange man without even a flicker of worry or doubt or suspicion? Even before they find out he’s an escaped convict, you’d expect the situation to raise some flags. But, if you can accept the premise, the story of their Labor Day weekend does its job to pull yo...more

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Nov 02, 2010 Judith rated it 1 of 5 stars

Joyce Maynard caught my interest years ago with the publication of her memoir about her life with J.D. Salinger. At the time she was widely vilified for exposing an intimate picture of an author who is practically a national treasure. I found that book fascinating, well-written and I had no problem with her sharing her story with the world. By the time I finished that book I had more respect for Maynard than for Salinger.

Labor Day is my first experience with her fiction and I found it hilarious...more Joyce Maynard caught my interest years ago with the publication of her memoir about her life with J.D. Salinger. At the time she was widely vilified for exposing an intimate picture of an author who is practically a national treasure. I found that book fascinating, well-written and I had no problem with her sharing her story with the world. By the time I finished that book I had more respect for Maynard than for Salinger.

Labor Day is my first experience with her fiction and I found it hilarious, though it's not an intentionally funny book. A convicted murderer (Frank) escapes a prison hospital and meets 13-year old Henry and his mother, Adele, at a Wal-Mart type store. And they find him so charming within 5 minutes that, although bleeding and wearing clothes with the price-tags still on, he accompanies them out of the store and into their car, without objection,telling them at some point that he thinks he will hang out with them a few days. When they get home, Henry points out that it's against the law to harbor a criminal, and to get around this, Frank asks Adele if he could tie her up. She responds that she has a collection of silk scarves and Frank proceeds to tie her to the chair with her scarves. And even told through the eyes of a 13 year old boy, we get all the sexual innuendo in that scene. Then he says he makes the best chili in the world, and sure enough, Henry thinks later, while eating his chili and watching Frank feed his mother every bite, it is the best chili he's ever tasted. Frank proceeds to prove himself useful by cleaning out the furnace, fixing broken appliances, rotating the tires on their car, baking biscuits and peach pie, and teaching Henry how to catch a ball! That does it, next Labor Day I am going straight to Wal-Mart and I am going to stay there till I find me a useful convict to take home. I hope he can wash windows too.

But that's not the funny part. What made me laugh was the narration of the 13-year old boy. This is Henry contemplating his parents' divorce: "What I decided was, it hadn't been losing my father that broke my mother's heart, if that was what had taken place, as it appeared. It was losing love itself----the dream of making your way across America on popcorn and hot dogs, dancing your way across America, in a sparkly dress with red underpants. Having someone think you were beautiful, which, she had told me, my father used to tell her she was, every day.. . ." yeah, that sounds like a 13 year old boy, only he'd have to be Truman Capote. If Salinger reads this book, he will get the last laugh. (less)

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Jul 27, 2010 Jennifer rated it 4 of 5 stars

From My Blog...

Thirteen-year-old Henry and his mother Adele meet Frank Chambers in Pricemart and bring him back to their home, beginning 6 days that change the course of several lives in the novel Labor Day by Joyce Maynard. Henry narrates the story giving the reader insights into his life prior to meeting Frank, the life changing six days of Labor Day weekend of his 13th year and then Henry jumps forward in time eventually bringing the reader to present day, two decades later with the lessons h...more

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Apr 24, 2010 Joan Colby rated it 4 of 5 stars

Maynard has a way of emotionally impacting the reader that is unique. At first, in this story where the narrator is a 13 year old boy, I had trouble accepting that a boy of that age would have this amount of sensitivity, but then I realized that the story was being told in retrospect. The novel is about 6 days preceding the Labor Day weekend. The narrator and his mother, who suffers from depression which followed a stillbirth and repeated miscarriages, and then a divorce, are approached in a sto...more

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Feb 20, 2010 Nancy rated it 5 of 5 stars

I've really enjoyed Maynard's nonfiction--I've reread the essays in "Domestic Affairs" a number of times--but her fictional books have been less compelling for me. Good reads, but always with a character or situation that irritated me enough to reduce enjoyment.

There was something about "Labor Day," however, that wouldn't let me go. On the face of it, it's another oddball story--a mentally unstable mother, an escaped prisoner, and a kid whose life shows signs of going nowhere permanently.

Maynar...more

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Jan 03, 2010 Abigail rated it 5 of 5 stars

I read this book in a few days. I couldn't put it down. I found the story line very interesting, and I couldn't wait to see what would happen. The story is about what happened to a 13 year old boy named Henry during labor day weekend. The book is narrated by him when he is younger and as an adult.

Henry is a misfit who lives with his depressed and slightly mentally unstable mother. On a rare shopping trip to a store, they are approached by an injured man (a prison escapee) who talks them into tak...more

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Jul 30, 2009 Anderson's Bookshops rated it 5 of 5 stars

Recommended to Anderson's Bookshops by: Fellow Anderson's Booksellers

Shelves: joes-shelf

Joe rated it: 5 stars

Read in June, 2009
This is the best novel I've read since The Story of Edgar Sawtelle and expect it will be the best I'll read this year. Labor Day focuses on six days around the end-of-summer holiday and similarly marks transition as the 13-year-old narrator feels himself growing up. He tells the story of the unlikely -- but completely believable -- relationship that develops as he and his mother shelter the prison escapee. The book explores the transformational power of lo...more

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Apr 26, 2011 Mickey (I'm A Book Shark) rated it 3 of 5 stars Recommends it for: General fiction fans

Shelves: 2011, audio

I thought this was a young adult novel, but it was really a novel about a young adult. There is a big difference in these two things. The more I think about it, the more I wonder why any adult would want to read (basically) an adult novel written from the perspective of a very young teenager. This story of this family couldn't be told from any other perspective if the reader wants to understand the fundamental details, why things happen the way they do, etc. Henry is the son of Adele, a hermit o...more

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Apr 21, 2011 Robyn rated it 3 of 5 stars

The concept is pretty straightforward: over a Labor Day weekend, an escaped convict comes across a single (damaged) mother and her young teenaged boy, and "kidnaps" them. The book is about what unfolds over that weekend. I started off not being convinced by the story. The set up and the writing was a little on the precious side: not convincing as the voice of a 13 year old boy, but seeming more like a writer trying to impersonate a 13 year old boy. The narrative also dragged about a third of the...more

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May 23, 2012 Saskia rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Dit boek raakt je vanaf het allereerste moment en laat je niet meer los. Sowieso doet de cover je smelten en na het lezen van Een lang weekend sluit je ook Henry in je hart. Wat een mooi boek, zég!

Henry woont met zijn moeder alleen, omdat zijn ouders gescheiden zijn. Ze leven erg sober en hebben weinig tot geen contacten, waardoor hun wereldje erg klein is. In een supermarkt komen ze Frank tegen, een ontsnapte gevangene, en nemen hem mee naar huis. Thuis leert Frank hen een perzikentaart bakken...more

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May 31, 2011 Carol rated it 4 of 5 stars

This was another "I can't put it down" book for me! After seeing the high ratings it was getting on Amazon and Goodreads, I was really looking forward to this book. However, the opening pages did not impress me - such a simplistic style of writing. I actually looked it up to see if I was reading a book from the Young Adults section. Soon, I realized, it was because of the narrator being thirteen years old. Duh! After having discovered this, I quickly became very engrossed in the story. It may no...more

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Aug 04, 2009 Laurel-Rain rated it 5 of 5 stars

From the very beginning of “Labor Day,” the reader is immersed in the mind, emotions and everyday life of a thirteen-year-old boy during one memorable Labor Day weekend. All told from the first-person narrator Henry.

Living in a small New Hampshire town, Henry is miserably aware of his limitations and those of his family members—from his mother, who is almost an agoraphobic, to his father whose new family with his new wife and new kids has no idea how to relate to him. Their stilted Saturday even...more From the very beginning of “Labor Day,” the reader is immersed in the mind, emotions and everyday life of a thirteen-year-old boy during one memorable Labor Day weekend. All told from the first-person narrator Henry.

Living in a small New Hampshire town, Henry is miserably aware of his limitations and those of his family members—from his mother, who is almost an agoraphobic, to his father whose new family with his new wife and new kids has no idea how to relate to him. Their stilted Saturday evenings out seem excruciating, and yet returning home to the mother whose need for him is almost too much…well, Henry is ripe for something extraordinary... something that will completely turn his world on end.

And then, at the Pricemart store early in that Labor Day weekend, the totally unexpected thing happens. First of all, it is very unusual for Henry and his mother to be out at all. His mother Adele avoids stores to the point that when she does go out, she usually buys enough provisions to stock up, therefore avoiding another such outing for many weeks…or months.

Therefore, it’s almost a quirk of fate, the two of them being in the store that day—it’s a last-minute clothes-buying expedition for Henry.

So when the man, bleeding and injured, approaches Henry, asking for help, it is such a fluke that of all the people this man could approach, Henry would be there for the encounter. And from that moment on, events tumble forward into such an unlikely scenario that the reader is drawn in and inevitably mesmerized by the unfolding moments.

We see the story unfold gradually, however, as the narrator takes us back and forth, filling us in on the backstory of each of the characters, helping us understand the context in which we find ourselves.

And then, almost like a slow crescendo, everything builds to the dramatic ending.

That’s all I’m going to say about the plot, lest I spoil it for the readers. Suffice it to say that the way you perceive certain things in life may never be the same again.

Afterwards, we are gifted with a few scenes of Henry’s life in adulthood, looking back on that summer weekend and how everything affected him—and not just negatively. We see how one incident of piecrust making with a stranger impacts Henry so much that he becomes a master chef as an adult. We discover how all of the events shaped his feelings about love, passion, betrayal…and how the haunting consequences of one weekend informed so much of his life in the years to come.

As I turned the last page, I wanted more…more about these characters and the events afterward; more of their experiences, living life through their eyes for just a little bit longer. They felt like friends…or possibly neighbors.

I will not forget this story.

(less)

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Oct 05, 2012 Francesca Forrest rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: book-group

A lit-fic book I read for book group. I liked the story scenario quite a bit: escaping convict hides out with shut-in divorcée and her loner adolescent son; everyone's life improves (he's fleeing a real prison and he helps her get out of her psychological/emotional prison, get it?). But of course it can't last. I liked the characters, and I mainly liked the storytelling (from the son's perspective). Buut, I found the doubts the son ends up having and the mechanism whereby a betrayal takes place...more

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Jul 14, 2010 Andrea rated it 4 of 5 stars

THE STORY IS ABOUT A DEEPLY DEPRESSED MOTHER RAISING HER 11 YEAR OLD SON. THE ACTION TAKES PLACE OVER THE LONG LABOR DAY WEEKEND - IN THIS CASE IT WAS 5 DAYS. HENRY LIVES WITH HIS MOTHER AND GOES TO DINNER WITH HIS DAD AND NEW FAMILY ON SUNDAY EVENINGS.

HIS MOTHER, ADELE NEVER GOES OUT - SHE SENDS HENRY FOR MOST EVERYTHING. BEFORE SCHOOL STARTS, ADELE GOES TO A DEPARTMENT STORE WITH HENRY TO BUY HIM NEW SCHOOL PANTS. DURING THIS TRIP, A MAN THAT HAS A OBVIOUS HEAD WOUND, ASKES HENRY FOR HELP. AL...more

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Jun 20, 2012 Kristina rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I usually try to read as little about a book as possible so as not to ruin anything in the story. Other than seeing the cover, I really had no idea what this book was going to be about. I'm not really sure what assumptions I made based on the cover other than to say that the book turned out to be like nothing I had expected it to be.

The story starts out with the main character, Henry, a 13 year old boy meeting a stranger and convincing his mother to give him a ride. The stranger ends up being an...more

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May 18, 2011 Cynthia rated it 3 of 5 stars

Fiction like this is what makes people want to read biography.
This is a real "paint by numbers" novel, a book that has all the requisite plot points and the required story arc and "challenging situation" that the characters have to resolve. It has integrity, but only in the sense that the voice and tone are pretty consistent from beginning to end.
But this is a book with no heart or soul or honesty. It's contrived. It's full of Important Symbolism. It seems like something written by a team of a...more

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Oct 16, 2012 Karen rated it 4 of 5 stars

This is a coming of age story of a thirteen-year-old boy named Henry set in a small town in New Hampshire in the 1980s. The main part of the story takes place during Labor Day weekend. Henry isn't good at sports, doesn't have friends, and spends all his time at home with his mother, who has become a recluse after a failed marriage and other disappointments. But a few days before Labor Day weekend, a stranger asks for their help, and ends up changing their lives.

I enjoyed the author's easy writin...more

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About Joyce Maynard

Joyce Maynard first came to national attention with the publication of her New York Times cover story “An Eighteen-Year-Old Looks Back on Life” in 1973, when she was a freshman at Yale. Since then, she has been a reporter and columnist for The New York Times, a syndicated newspaper columnist whose “Domestic Affairs” column appeared in more than fifty papers nationwide, a regular contributor to NPR...more

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“She felt everything too deeply, it was like the world was too much for her.” — 14 people liked it

“No, I said. I didn't remember that. There was so much to remember, sometimes the best thing was to forget.” — 8 people liked it

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