Can't We Talk about Something More Pleasant?: A Memoir

Author(s): Roz Chast

Graphic Novels

#1 "New York Times "Bestseller2014 National Book Award FinalistWinner of the inaugural 2014 Kirkus Prize in nonfictionWinner of the National Book Critics Circle Award Winner of the 2014 Books for a Better Life AwardWinner of the 2015 Reuben Award from National Cartoonists Society In her first memoir, Roz Chast brings her signature wit to the topic of aging parents. Spanning the last several years of their lives and told through four-color cartoons, family photos, and documents, and a narrative as rife with laughs as it is with tears, Chast's memoir is both comfort and comic relief for anyone experiencing the life-altering loss of elderly parents. While the particulars are Chast-ian in their idiosyncrasies--an anxious father who had relied heavily on his wife for stability as he slipped into dementia and a former assistant principal mother whose overbearing personality had sidelined Roz for decades--the themes are universal: adult children accepting a parental role; aging and unstable parents leaving a family home for an institution; dealing with uncomfortable physical intimacies; and hiring strangers to provide the most personal care. An amazing portrait of two lives at their end and an only child coping as best she can, "Can't We Talk about Something More Pleasant" shows the full range of Roz Chast's talent as cartoonist and storyteller.


Product Information

Roz Chast grew up in Brooklyn. Her cartoons began appearing in the "New Yorker "in 1978. Since then, she has published more than one thousand cartoons in the magazine. She has written and illustrated many books, including "What I Hate: From A to Z," and the collections of her own cartoons "The Party After You Left" and "Theories of Everything." This is her first memoir. www.rozchast.com

General Fields

  • : 9781632861016
  • : Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
  • : Bloomsbury USA
  • : September 2016
  • : September 2016
  • : books

Special Fields

  • : Roz Chast
  • : Paperback / softback