Making Toast: a family story

Making Toast: a family story
By Roger Rosenblatt
Ecco, c2010. 166 p. Nonfiction

When Roger Rosenblatt’s daughter died, he and his wife immediately left to be with their son-in-law and grandchildren. The next morning, one of the children asked how long they would be staying. Rosenblatt replied, “Forever.”

Making Toast is the very intimate story of how grief changes the dimensions of our lives and how families re-arrange and realign in order to survive. Rosenblatt shares minute details that allow the reader to appreciate how even the mundane ritual of making toast can be an act of love.

The famous essayist tells the family's story as a composition of short vignettes that examine the sweetness and sorrow that accompany the loss of a daughter--who is also a wife, a sister and a mother. It is a tribute to Rosenblatt’s daughter, Amy and a beautiful reflection on the poignancy of death. Each family member is rendered in cherished, personal tones and because the essayist shares his own experience the community is at once both richer and stronger. The author has an effortless, quiet touch that somehow makes the book even more powerful. Making Toast is recommended for anyone who has lost a child and everyone who loves a beautiful book.

DAP