Limbo : A Memoir

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Summary: The Evolution of a Writer . . .
Review: A. Manette Ansay has been a favorite of mine since her first published novel "Vinegar Hill"; she's one of those authors that you buy in hardcover because you can't wait for the paperback. Her most recent novel "Midnight Champagne" was so good that it begs to be savored over and over again.

So when I saw that she had written her memoir I was anxious to read about this young writer that I so admire. Now that I have read it I have even MORE for which to admire her. The descriptions of her phisical dibilitation are heart breaking...but at the same time her spirit is uplifting; her talent is daunting.

I especially appreciate her description of losing her Catholic faith. I went through the same gamut of emotions - panic and peace - when I lost mine.

Everything she writes strikes true. I will be the first in line for her next work.

Rating:
Summary: I devoured this book in two short reads
Review: Ansay has a gift for painting a scene complete with sights, sounds, smells, and tastes. She gracefully unfolds the moments of her life so that you don't just an observe, but rather, you experience.

From reading you learn to appreciate what it means and what it feels like to have faith, question faith, lose faith, and find it again in new forms. And she does it all without preaching.

A very honest work and well worth the read.

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Summary: Atypical Memoir
Review: I enjoyed this book, for the most part. Ansay is best when she addresses her disease. This is an atypical memoir, as most memoirs concerning diseases have the following pattern: I was healthy; I became ill with a specific disease (or addicted, alcoholic, etc.); I recovered. Ansay is courageous in showing us a less "hopeful" situation. To this day, she does not have a specific diagnosis of her affliction, and not only has she not recovered, she is realistic in revealing that she may never recover. She writes about what her day-to-day life is like, and that it may never change. She also honestly writes about peoples' different reactions to her in a wheelchair; many had the gall to ask what was wrong, and others were wondering what she must have done "wrong" in a past life "to deserve this"! No one would just let her have the disease, plain and simple, and go on with her life. She shows that she is more than her disease; she is a sensitive, open writer. As other critics have noted (Sontag, etc), for some reason, our society demands that illness must have meaning. Ansay is explaining, in this memoir, that it just is what it is.

Rating:
Summary: an interesting person
Review: i very much enjoyed reading this book.ansay is a beautiful writer although there are a few times where it seems she is trying too hard,and it doesn't flow as well.they probably just stand out in contrast to the rest of the prose,however.the people and places she talks about really come alive. i can relate to a lot of the catholic upbringing,though her experience of it was more intense than mine.the conclusions she comes to at the end of the book are not for the philosophically naive,and are reminiscent of much of eastern philosophy. however,i think there are more chapters to follow,and i hope someday she will write another installment as her life unfolds further.

Rating:
Summary: Breath-taking!
Review: Like another reviewer before me, I have been a huge fan of Manette Ansay's fiction for years. I was first sucked in with her amazing and honest novel "Sister" (it brought me to tears several times, including on a Peter Pan bus from Boston to Springfield--thankfully I was travelling alone), and then I proceeded to read everything she published before and since. When I read that she had published a memoir about becoming a writer, I was incredibly excited and waited in anticipation to read it.

Ansay does not disappoint. In fact, this incredible, emotional, poignant (oh, I could pour on the adjectives--there are so many wonderful facets to this book--but how hard it is to find the right words to describe EXACTLY how I felt reading it) reaffirmed my love of this author's work. The book is intensely personal, which is how her fiction feels when you read it--one of the reasons why I have enjoyed her novels so much. She has a gift for capturing the details of a memory that can transport you to a time and place in her life so that you feel you were there with her, knew the people she knew. And what an incredible life journey she has had, continues to have.

Manette Ansay articulates to perfection the passing thoughts and feelings and events that happen in life. Her voice is genuine and sincere. This is one of those books that just grabs you and does not let go. Part of me wanted to read more slowly and savor the writing, while the other part just could not stop racing along, so intent was I on finding out "what happened next", how she felt, what she thought. Yes, this is a work of non-fiction, but it is REAL in many ways, not just factually. It resonates in the heart, in the mind, long after you close the book.

The book jacket promises that Manette Ansay is working on another novel--and I can barely wait.

Rating:
Summary: lyrical and dispassionate
Review: Since writing my own memoir, BABY CATCHER: Chronicles of a Modern Midwife (Scribner 2002), I have been studying the style of other memorists. I found Ansay's prose lyrical, mesmerizing, and almost poetic throughout this beautiful book. To be able to write about her losses as a result of a still-mysterious illness similar to MS, with calmness and lack of hyperbole, is admirable and enviable. From the very beginning you know this story doesn't have a happy outcome, but at no time did I feel depressed. On some level, I rejoiced for this author, for her own successes and insight and hope and the joy in small gains, small triumphs over her difficulties. Limbo is a love story, an admirable one. I wish this author lived next door to me. I would sit at her feet in awe and bake her cookies and bread at every opportunity. May she continue to write and write and write.

Rating:
Summary: perspective
Review: The author gives an important perspective on chronic, undiagnosed pain. As in _Vinegar Hill_ , her knowledge of Catholism is incorrect.

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Summary: Criqique
Review: This book, to be fair, should be critiqued by a handicapped person. Even if their handicaps aren't the same, experiences are pretty much the same. As a handipped person, I think this writer made up much of what she claims to have experienced, not about her illness and her experience with going from doctor to doctor and resisting permanence but about her experiences with people. Those seem to me to be a lot of fiction based on fact.

It wasn't until the last few pages of the book that I started agreeing with her. But even there she didn't go far enough. I'm sure that a memoir written by a 37 year old (which is the age I believe she was when she wrote this last year) is ridiculous; at that age you still have a lot of life left to experience, and you certainly aren't as wise about your past as you will be when you're older. Even at 45, I'm wiser than I was at 37. And "wiser" is important when you're philosophizing about your condition like she did in that book.

The biggest thing she doesn't get yet, which surprises me since she has kids, is that what happened to her hurt her parents much, much more than it did her. She sort of mentions that near the end of the book when she talks about her father finally saying, after all those years, it's too bad this had to happen to you. Notice, though, the emphasis she puts on it taking him so many years to say that.

Throughout the book, she constantly puts down two things: her parents and the Catholic church. Of course, her parents aren't the same as mine, but I still think she's unnecessarily hard on them. It made me dislike her, as a matter of fact. And, as a former Catholic trying to justify her attitude toward the Catholic church, she puts in print absolute falsehoods about the Catholic church. This made me think she's not as smart as she thinks she is. For instance, she insists that the Catholic church teaches that limbo is a place where even 2-day-old babies go if they haven't been baptized, which is untrue, and I think someone should call her on that. The Catholic church does not teach that; the author is remembering incorrectly something that she thinks a teacher said when she was in elementary school.

But the last few pages of the book were good. As a handicapped person who became handicapped at exactly the same time of life when she did, when I was 20 and in the middle of my college education, I understood more, I'm sure, than a nonhandicapped person would when she said that becoming handicapped isn't so much a travesty as it is something that just is, something that is more remarkable than awful (to paraphrase).

She talks endlessly about all her pain before and now, and I think it may be similar to mine. I'm never not in pain, but I've found that, when you talk about it, you're more aware of it, so talking about it isn't good. I talked about it a lot the first couple/few years after I became handicapped only because I didn't think it would last forever, much like when you have a headache and complain about that. That's where I understood her resistance; she didn't think it was permanent.

I would never write a whole book about my life. It would bring up too many memories I'm happy to forget about. I don't know how she could.