C itibaren Çatalören Köyü, 06720 Çatalören Köyü/Bala/Ankara, Türkiye
Loved the writing, loved the story.
I like Tucker’s writing. I really enjoyed Living in a Foreign Language where he chronicled the process he and wife Jill Eikenberry went through buying a house in Italy. He has a lovely pace to his writing and a sort of self-deprecating humor that is just right, somewhat reminiscent of Peter Mayle. So I was looking forward to how he would deal with the issue of aging parents and how families juggle responsibilities and careers to accommodate the needs of various family members. This is an issue that I (and many of my friends) struggle with. How to help Mom or Dad when you live and work half a continent away? When do we step in and take over financial decisions? When do we take away the car? Hire caregivers? Move our parent(s) into assisted living or a nursing home or a memory care unit (i.e. Alzheimer’s ward)? How do we handle how we feel having to do all these things? Tucker does touch on these issues, but he also spends a good deal of the book on his life “away” from the issues, and focused on food. (And his way of writing about food is nothing short of delicious!) Perhaps it was because the aging parent in this case is his wife’s mother and not his, but there was a certain distance from the issues in the book that left me … hungry and vaguely dissatisfied. Perhaps it was just that the subject matter doesn’t lend itself to his style of writing. I was happy for him that the situation worked out as it did, but it didn’t completely resonate with me.