The Book Nook

An Unforgettable Story   American author Adam Haslett’s debut work became a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award.  Today’s featured book is his second novel, “Imagine Me Gone”, which won two awards and was also a Pulitzer Prize finalist.  Haslett is known for his deeply moving works and this book revisits two of the recurring themes for which he’s known: mental illness and sibling relationships. The story follows British-American family through a few decades.  Shortly after John and Margaret get engaged in 1960s London, she’s surprised to learn that John has been hospitalized for depression.  Doctors cannot tell her what his future will be like and she ponders whether to end their engagement.  In the end they marry and have three children, first Michael, then Celia and later Alec. Michael displays a brilliant knowledge of contemporary music and a rather unusual preoccupation with the plight of slaves, while Celia exhibits coping skills well beyond her age.  Alec is much younger than his siblings and often feels they exclude him from their fun and friendship. The five members alternate in relating their part in the tale, with each chapter adding another layer of understanding. John’s periodic depression takes a toll on everyone.  His descriptions of the mental anguish that force him into a type of hibernation explain why he grows apart from the others and vice versa.  It also brings insights into why his mental suffering is not something easily banished by summoning enough willpower. The title of the book comes from an incident when Celia and Alec were sailing with their father during one of their New England vacations.  John pretends to play dead after telling them “Imagine me gone, imagine it’s just the two of you.  What do you do now?”  It’s a challenge to see if they can return to land on their own.  Alec panics but Celia stays calm, resentful of her brother’s helplessness while she struggles to remember the steps her father took to navigate safely home. As the complex and fascinating narrative progresses, we’re witness to witness the joys, challenges and tragedies.  Each does their best to deal with problems, familial and other relationships, with varying levels of success.  As they do, readers are party to the regrets and negative emotions, words and actions of each character, but also to love and loyalty they feel and show towards each other. All are concerned concern about Michael’s growing dependence on medications, their fading efficacy, his mounting debts and his increasingly anxious behavior.  All have tried helping him in their own way, but there is sometimes bitter disagreement about the best course of action.  Michael’s chapters do much to shed more light on the burden of depression. The seriousness of the themes Haslett explores make this a disquieting read at times, sometimes even painful.  Haslett’s excellent use of humor, particularly in the sections when Michael provides answers to a medical questionnaire, not only provide balance but showcase the author’s masterful writing. There’s superlative character exploration and development that gives life to each one.  Even if the character’s name wasn’t noted at the beginning of each chapter, there’s no mistaking the speaker’s identity.  Haslett’s lush prose takes us into the minds of each person, describing their thoughts, hopes and fears.  The level of detail easily brings each character to life as they discuss their current situation or recall memories from their past. The author doesn’t try to give us a feel for a certain era or advance a personal agenda beyond addressing issues of economic and racial justice.  Instead, we’re given an examination of family dynamics that feels almost too real.  While dysfunction plays a major role here, do love, loyalty and genuine concern do, too.  It is the concern and compassion that anchors this novel of love, bereavement and depression. Some have compared this book to William Faulkner’s classic 1930 novel “As I Lay Dying”.  The most obvious similarity is the use of multiple viewpoints to reach the heart of the characters.  Both stories contain a spectrum of moods from pathos to comedy, explore interpersonal relationships between a family’s members and dig into the deeper conflicts they feel.  Faulkner’s work is still considered high-quality literature and I think Adam Haslett is well on his way to reaching that accolade, if he isn’t there already. If you’ve gotten the feeling that this is heavy read, you’re right.  But it’s worth getting through the tough moments to glimpse the essence of each character in this beautiful and insightful tale.  They are moments that breathe reality into a tragic and captivating story that makes “Imagine Me Gone” such a page-turner.  In the end, we know that tragedy is not the only thing that defines us.