This may be my favorite book this year. Maybe. Probably.

I read a few reviews by folks confused about whether this book was a memoir. It is certainly clever how the author denies such a claim, as she doesn't want to reveal too much about her mother. Her mother was private and would not have wanted anything less than her best written about her. And I get that. My mother was not unlike the hero of this book in that regard. And yet, that is likely all they had in common. The narrator, though, wants to write about the mother, because it keeps her alive. And I understand that so much.

On p. 142 the author explains: "...When I write about my mother and my family and worry whether I have the right, I assure myself, I am only one person. Every one person is allowed their own story.

Some members of a family might never really trust the writer in their midst. With good reason? You tell me.

By which I mean: the fictional me is unmarried, an only child, childless. The actual me is not. (The fictional me is the narrator of this book. the actual me is the author. All Cretans are liars; I myself am a Cretan.) No, I'm telling the truth now, I swear. I have a brother, and some offspring, and am married. I love everyone and I want to keep them safe, safe from me particularly..."

After my own mother died (and this is an indulgent digression), I tried to read books on death and grief and morning, and little helped (with the very big exception being H Is for Hawk). This book more than made up for all of the others.

This book is short and sweet and also succinct, and I nearly read it within 24 hours. I always enjoy the work of Elizabeth McCracken (as a bookseller I recommended the hell out of The Giant's House), but I really really love this book.. And the hero of this book? Wow, what a force to be reckoned with. What a fantastic character to read.

Elizabeth McCracken has set up this book as a bit of a joke to her real mother and to her readers by ridiculing memoirs, and how much her mother detested memoirs, but the mother of our narrator is now ten month's dead and this novel is all about her mother, and readers are left to ponder if this is semi-autobiographical/semi-fictional, because throughout the book this question surfaces, and eventually, most readers may not care, Inquisitive readers may research and discover the author's mother did have cerebral palsy, and this mother in the novel does also, and I'm guessing many aspects of the book are about the mother. In the end, it doesn't really matter what is true or not, It's a quick read about this woman taking a visit to London, a place she enjoyed visiting with her mother, and she reflects on mostly her mother, but also her father, as she explores the city, while exploring her relationship with her mother. It's well-written and is a fairly quick read, so read it for what is, not what it may be, or could be, but simply enjoy the words on the page.

The Hero of This Book—what a brilliantly captivating work written by Elizabeth McCracken. Is it a descriptive treatise on the writing life? Is it a memoir, an autobiographical novel, or a work of fiction? At any rate, it is clever and thought-provoking, and I was completely overcome by it. The story describes a woman walking the streets of London and reminiscing about a trip taken there with her mother before she died. Be prepared for touching narratives of memories as the author describes her mother: the complications of a long-ago surgery, her love of Peter Pan, mother’s vanity concerning her hair, and even her enjoyment of an early morning cocktail. As the author/narrator visits the museum, the theatre, or other attractions, the world seems to present reminders of what Mother would have enjoyed. Mom’s presence is still there…everywhere. This writing almost serves as a primer on grief. Wrapped in the spirit of those we’ve lost are both heartache and humor if we choose to search and find them. This book goes on my “read again” list. Thank you to NetGalley, Ecco Publishing, and author Elizabeth McCracken for the ARC.

We are told this book is a novel, not a memoir, but the lines seems to blur as you read the story. The narrator reflects on her mother’s life while visiting London, one of her favorite cities. It’s told in typical Elizabeth McCracken fashion - it’s funny, sad, and even weird at times, but the writing is beautiful and I finished the book with a sense of grief and appreciation.

Thank you to Ecco and NetGalley for this ARC.

The Hero of This Book is my second McCracken book to read. This is a story about a writer's memoir about her relationship with her mother. The mother in the book is a woman with a larger personality and the writer is grieving her death.

While reading the entire book, i continually questioned if this was in fact a memoir or a work of fiction. Was McCracken actually writing about her relationship with her mother and not writing a fictitious story?

I felt like McCracken wrote in a disjointed frantic way. The story and even sentences felt like they bounced back and forth in a nonsensical way. Was this intentional or was this poor editing?

2.5 stars rounded up to 3.

I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley and the publisher in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

The Hero of This Book by Elizabeth McCracken was covered in my Fall Book Preview, where I share a curated list of the season’s hottest new titles including the books I’ve most enjoyed, the ones I’m most looking forward to reading, and the ones the industry is most excited about. This is a fascinating and quick book!
Our Fall Book Preview event is exclusively for members of our MMD Book Club community and What Should I Read Next Patreon “Book Lover” supporters. Our communities also received a printable of all the picks with The Hero of This Book's publishing info and release date included.

Whether the narrator is musing about eating a bad cheddar cheese and cress sandwich or remembering her mother’s square, child-sized feet, McCracken’s descriptions are delightful.

One strength of this book is the way its style illustrates how being overwhelmed by the loss of a loved one can look something like ADHD. The narrator, flooded by memories, tells her story in what feels like stream of consciousness, jumping from one topic to the next (e.g., rambling on about her writing philosophy and then back to her mother’s estate sale, and so on). Anyone who has lost a loved one can identify with these jumbled thinking patterns.

As enjoyable as this work is, the narrator’s likeability is somewhat diminished when she passes judgment on an English couple in London who are holding a “We Voted to Leave” sign. The narrator not only admits to thinking these people are jerks, but she also confesses she “didn’t hate them, as I would have if I had seen somebody holding a sign with that awful imperative MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN.” Rather than reinforcing the narrator’s deep mourning for her mother, it just makes her seem petty.

Overall, an engaging read. Recommend!

The narrator of this touching tale is a writer who travels to London to relive time spent there with her recently deceased mother. The reader follows her as she revisits museums, theaters and other places she and her mother visited together. Traveling with her disabled mother presented challenges - not for her indomitable mother who took obstacles in stride and lived large.
The narrator tells us the book isn't a memoir but clearly it is. She shares her life experience as the child of eccentric parents who is on pilgrimage of grief. Does it matter how the story is labeled? She recalls a time in a writing class when she wrote a "non-fiction short story" that was mercilessly criticized by a classmate "which is it, fiction or non fiction?" The instructor's response gave her permission to write as she chose and call it what she wanted - "it doesn't make any difference - call it what you want."
McCracken chose to write a non-fiction memoir as fiction and it doesn't matter. She allows readers to share her grief along with her joy as she remembers her mother.

What a delight! It is a novel that reads like a memoir and it is an homage to the author/narrator's mother who is deceased. Elizabeth McCracken is both humorous and touching in her development of her mother's personality. The narrator travels to London which was a favorite city of her mother's and a place they visited together. She describes her mother's physical challenges and makes it very clear that her mother did not consider them to be a disability. This is not a sad book, but a beautifully sweet book.

Elizabeth McCracken can do no wrong.. I felt this book was one of the best books I've read this year. I loved the gentleness and love that you felt through the words. This story was very moving!

This book is a "novel" not a memoir, even though it's reads like a memoir. The main character reminds us of this throughout the book.

I was able to read this book in one sitting since it was pretty engaging and had a clear narrator's voice throughout.

The main character is on a trip to London not long after her mom died and is reliving many of her memories with mom. It was pretty simple and touching. I felt like I really got to know both characters.

The voice and style of this book was great and I enjoyed it more than I had anticipated.

Thank you to Ecco and Netgalley for providing a copy of this ARC for my honest review.

A fictionalized memoir of the author's mother. McCracken is as witty and hilarious as usual even when dealing with grief.

Elizabeth McCracken wants you to know that she doesn’t write memoirs (well, okay, she did write ~one~). And she does not write about her mother. So this is a novel about the narrator’s mother, and about writing. She, the author, teaches creative writing at UT-Austin. So this is a novel, absolutely, not a memoir. Believe what you care to believe.

The narrator here visits London, recalls a trip there with her mother, and remembers what she describes as her mother’s extraordinary way of being in the world. She admires many things about her mother, recalls her stubbornness and her mother’s enthusiasm and strong opinions.

I was caught up by the careful observations, the reflections, the playfulness. I read it in an afternoon.

I recommend her short story collection, The Souvenir Museum, for more of her wonderful writing.

Thank you for this early copy. I will share some of these thoughts on Instagram (@jant.reads).

Elizabeth McCracken is the author of many books including one of my favorites The Giant’s House. The Hero of this Book rests in a liminal space between fiction and memoir. The reader is assured, multiple times, that this is a work of fiction, but McCracken also toys with us, almost daring the reader to read it as a memoir about McCracken’s mother. The narrative follows a woman who has recently lost her mother and she meanders through London where she used to travel with her mother. As she walks, she recalls memories and details about her mom, her relationship with her mom and she also has larger discussions about writing and blurred lines between fiction and memoir. This slim but beautifully written book is an exploration of mother daughter relationships, grief and a meta look at the act of writing itself. And perhaps a tribute to McCracken’s own late mother….or not….since after all, this is a work of fiction. Thank you to Ecco and to NetGalley for the advanced review copy.

This book reads like a memoir, but the narrator denied it. The narrator is unnames throughout. We know she is a writer, a middle-aged female who has recently lost here mother. Her mother seems to be someone the narrator had a great deal of admiration and respect for and love. The narrator has taken a trip to London and she is reminiscing about her mother, the time they came to London together, how her mother handled her challenging body, things they had done together and with her father and grandmother. It deals with the narrator working through her grief. The entire book.

This was slow to start, but it drew me in after awhile as I got used to the writing style and I started to enjoy reading about the relationship between the narrator and her mother. Some of the excerpts were interesting. The writing was just a rambling montage, but it fit the purpose. I've rated it three stars because sometimes I was bored, but sometimes I enjoyed the memories. I still think it's at least partially a memoir.

Thanks to Ecco through Netgalley for an advance copy. This book will be published on October 4, 2022.

Elizabeth McCracken is back with what feels like a hybrid novel/memoir, which is fine with me. Everything she has written since 1997's The Giant's House is wonderfully of a piece. I'd recommend reading her actual memoir, An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination: A Memoir. The two books together illuminate the development of a person who processes life through writing. Highly recommended both for fans, and for those new to McCracken, her backlog is a treasure.

My mother’s body was just her body….I can say that I don’t think it made much of a difference in my childhood.
from The Hero of This Book by Elizabeth McCracken

My mother was diagnosed with psoriasis at age sixteen. By the time she was twenty-seven she had lost joints to psoriatic arthritis. During my teenage years, the psoriasis sometimes covered 90% of her body, and in winter often found her bedridden.

Mom asked me later in life if I had been embarrassed by her when growing up. I never saw her disease as ‘her’. As a girl, I knew my mom was the youngest and prettiest of all my girlfriends’ moms, with fashionable hair, red lipstick, her face unlined. My friends all liked her. She taught us to jitterbug. She listened to popular music and liked the latest fashions. I could answer, no, I was never embarrassed by my mom’s disease. Even thought I applied tar ointment or olive oil to her scalp to soak overnight, opened jars she could not grasp, I didn’t see her disability. I saw the mother who read late into the night, argued with neighbors over political issue, her generosity, her stubbornness.

“Her body was her body. It wasn’t something to overcome or accept any more than yours was,” the narrator tells us about her mother whose ability to walk was stolen by disease and bad operations. The Hero of This Book is the narrator’s story of her mother, a strong willed, brilliant, flawed, eccentric woman.

She did not let her disease limit her. When invited to a meeting she was told she was the only disabled person to have ever attended. There were elevators inside, she explained, but she had to crawl up the stairs to the building on her hands and knees. The daughter recalls their trips to the movies and the theater and abroad. She also contends wit her deceased parent’s home; they were hoarders and neither able or willing to clean the house. Fiercely private, they resented in home care.

Reading, my mind returned again and again to my own mother, who died in 1991 at age fifty-seven of cancer.

Mom often told me she did not want to live into an old age that found her unable to care for herself. Luckily, her last decade was better with an immunosuppressant drug. Her skin condition improved and the joint damage stabilized, although her fingers were already bent and her neck frozen into a permanent hunch. Her life had been one doctor and experimental treatment after another, interns coming in to see her unusual case.

“Mom didn’t want people to see her dead body as she had so little privacy in life,” McCracken’s narrator tells us. And its exactly what my mom told me. When mom died in the hospital, I arrived to see family gathered in her room, crying. She was already gone. And I remembered her words and wanted to tell them to leave! Leave her alone!

The narrator is a writer, not a mother, single, middle-aged. She talks about her life and her relationship to her mother, about her father and about his relationship to her mother. She refers to the complicated world we live in, “monsters everywhere, with terrible hair and red neckties.” About teaching and writing.

McCracken’s book is a quiet read, with subtle humor and subtle pathos. It’s introspective, thoughtful. As I got into it, I found myself identifying more and more with the narrator. Loss is universal, coming to terms with the loss of a parent shared by us all. The details differ, but not the task of learning to cope with the loss.

“I wish I could remember all the stories she told about herself,” the narrator tells us. Don’t we all.

I received a free egalley from the publisher through NetGalley. My review is fair and unbiased.

I understand there is a debate as to whether this is fiction or memoir. While it doesn’t matter either way, to this reader, I tend to think it leans toward the latter. A daughter is mourning her mother while wandering around London. The mother is drawn with intense detail, as is the relationship, and while there’s interest and probably solace here, it seems extremely limited. And arbitrary. The book has none of the magic of fiction, again for this reader. Maybe others, especially McCracken fans, will disagree. Good for them.

The setting: "Ten months after her mother's death, the narrator of The Hero of This Book takes a trip to London. The city was a favourite of her mother's ... she finds herself reflecting on her mother's life and their relationship.... The woman, a writer, recalls all that made her complicated mother extraordinary - her brilliant wit, her generosity, her unbelievable obstinacy, her sheer will in seizing life despite physical difficulties ... [it is] a searing examination of grief and renewal, and of a deeply felt relationship between a child and her parents. What begins as a question of filial devotion ultimately becomes a lesson in what it means to write."

This description [taken from the book blurb] does not do it justice. First and foremost--prose--wow. Although an easy read, there is so much depth that one must stand back and review/reread to digest all.

Is this fiction, a memoir, an autobiography? The writer [in the book] denies it is a memoir, but there is undeniably truth and many similarities [having done a bit of research]. And, maybe, admittedly "emotionally autobiographical."

There are beautiful, vivid descriptions--but so many that my examples are not reflective of the breadth of the wonderful writing. You will have to read this book for yourself.

Consider:
"His canines were obelisks."

"(Cup board: This is where cups board.)"

"... a missed boat when there was another boat in fourteen minutes was not a missed boat; it only meant you were early for the next one."

"My mother and I liked churches for their touristic possibilities, filled as they were with scupture, stained glass..."

"My mother was a great appreciator. It was a pleasure to take her places, because she enjoyed herself so much and so audibly. That was her form of gratitude."

And: "My mother loved stories, though, particularly stories about herself, and she is, I think, the hero of this book, which she would like." [eponymous, so...]

Her stubborn, physically compromised mother [not to use either the words disabled or handicapped--it was according to her grandmother, a birth injury]--provides much of the focus of the narrative--her shoes and hair receive quite a lot of attention. But--the father (especially), grandmother [considerable mention], and maternal twin also are present.

There is love, grief, and humor. I believe the book is a love letter to her late mother.

I sensed from the first few pages that I was going to like this book; I was not disappointed. Highly recommend. 4.25

I loved reading this. It hits one of my favorite sweet spots, which is the place where you don't know where real life ends and fiction begins. It has so many interesting insights to offer on craft, family, death, art... this is one of those books that I can't even count the number of people I'd recommend it too. I just wish I'd had a physical copy so I could've written all over it! I do think it could come across as a bit preachy or overly pretentious at times esp depending on the audience, so it's a 4.75 for me.