Eat, Read, and Be Mommy

I won an advance copy of Lynda Cohen Loigman’s The Two-Family House several years ago; I can’t remember exactly when, but it had to have been some months previous to its release date in March of 2016.*

There’s a reason for the memory lapse, I promise.

My youngest was born in February of 2015 and was eating well and sleeping through the night by summer; then came the very first of our family’s infamous fall flus.  It hit us all, and it lingered, and for my baby girl, it interfered with an ear infection.  Her ears suddenly got worse instead of better and she ended up on a different antibiotic; what was worse, she threw up what little she ate and had no appetite for days.  When she finally managed to kick all the germs to the curb, she was STARVING, and suddenly I had a 7.5-month-old who was eating in the middle of the night again.  By the time that faded, her sleep habits were shot, and subsequent ear infections meant nothing could be done about that until she got tubes in April of 2016 and then grew accustomed enough to them that I put my foot down about her wanting to fall asleep in Mommy’s (and ONLY Mommy’s) arms.  (Not just at night, mind you, but during the night, any time she woke up, as far as I could tell.  I woke up one night and she was sleeping on my chest; I had NO MEMORY WHATSOEVER of getting her out of her crib, but my husband–who sleeps like the dead–was adamant that he hadn’t done it.  I’m pretty sure I got up, got her, and brought her back to bed with me without ever actually waking up at all.)  Sleep re-training had to happen then in order to save my sanity, but in the meantime, 6-8 months passed by in a foggy blur.  Would you like to guess what I wasn’t doing during that period of time?

If your answer is “as much reading as usual, especially of adult fiction that promised to be emotional,” then congratulations! because you are SO very right.  My to-be-read piles exploded, and I’m still trying to recover.  Honestly, I wouldn’t have made it as far as I have if my treadmill hadn’t died, forcing me to move to the elliptical and audiobooks.  My hubby found Loigman’s book on audio and put it on my phone so that I could listen to it while exercising (and while folding laundry and working on puzzles and so many, many more things), and so I am FINALLY able to review it here for my faithful readers’ benefit.  Wahoo!

I have to say, though, The Two-Family House doesn’t make for an easy review.  It’s hard to tell whether Loigman meant for the family secret that’s the catalyst for the story to be known at the beginning or not; her foreshadowing is heavy-handed enough that it was very quickly obvious to me.  That secret is based on a choice made out of a difficult situation and a lack of true emotional health; it only causes more difficult situations all around and worsening emotional health for at least one character, and yet the good that also comes from it is complicated and might not have occurred otherwise.  Reviews on Goodreads for this one are interestingly mixed, but when I finished listening to the audiobook (complete with accents that definitely helped immerse me in the setting!), my reactions surprised me.

1.  If I’d realized the level of complicated family dynamics and tragedy involved, I never would have read it, because that’s not really my thing.
2.  I’m DESPERATELY grateful not to have read this when I had a newborn.  Emotional roller coasters shouldn’t be ridden during times of serious hormonal   fluctuation.
3.  I was surprisingly glad to have read it, despite it not being my thing.
4.  Some reviewers complained about Loigman’s characterization, but I emotionally engaged with the main characters early on.
5.  I wanted to slide into easy judgments and dismissal of frustrating characters more than once, and yet Loigman gave me just enough for each character that   I couldn’t.  Human beings are complex, and she portrayed that complexity successfully.
6.  I was more satisfied with the ending than I ever could have imagined being.
7.  I think–I really think–that I liked it.  And considering where it went as a story, that’s a pretty impressive thing for me to say.
8.  If my description appeals to you, you should definitely read it.  If you’re on the fence, give it a try.   And if you think it’s not your thing, I respect that–but   remember, it’s not mine either.  And yet…

*Thanks to St. Martin’s Press for the advance copy and the opportunity to give it an unbiased review.