It’s a toss-up which of the two continues to irk me more: that Dad shamed me that day and then made a joke of it in public, or that his brother stole my shame and mocked me in a novel. If you grow up around novelists, someday you will be collateral damage for a good story. My aunt Joan had an aphorism that I was to learn the hard way: “A writer is always selling somebody out.”
