The Kids Are All Right

July 6, 2009
In a memoir rendered eerily dry and scattered by emotional distance, the four Welch children, orphaned in their youth in the mid-1980s, recount by turns their memories and impressions of that painful time. Growing up in an affluent community of Bedford, N.Y., to a glamorous mother and a handsome father who was the head of an oil company, the children—Amanda (born in 1965), Liz (1969), Dan (1971) and Diana (1977)—were devastated first by the sudden death of their father in a car accident in 1983, followed by their mother three and a half years later after a long, wrenching bout with cancer. The two eldest girls, teenagers at the time and initiated into the drug and rock and roll scene, remember most vividly the details of that era when their mother, already diagnosed with uterine cancer, discovered that their father left a large debt; the family had to consolidate by selling their big house and their horses. After their mother died, the children were put in the care of others, mostly with disastrous consequences, especially for Diana, farmed out to a controlling neighbor family who initially hoped to adopt her, but decide otherwise after she hit her awkward teens. Each struggled to forge an identity within harrowing circumstances, with numbing results. Dan became a troublemaker and bounced out of boarding school, while Amanda, heavily into drugs, dropped out of NYU, and Liz traveled to get out of the house.

August 15, 2009
In alternating monologues, four siblings tell their story of love, loss, redemption and reconciliation.

In 1983, the Welch children—19-year-old Amanda, 16-year-old Liz, 14-year-old Dan and eight-year-old Diana—were living happy, sheltered lives in a New York City suburb. But this idyllic existence was soon shattered by the death in a car accident of their businessman father, leaving them not only grief-stricken but saddled with debt. Their mother, an actress in soap operas, tried to hold things together but was soon diagnosed with cancer and died three years later after a long, agonizing battle with the disease. Left on their own, the Welch children took very different paths of self-discovery and struggled to maintain the often frayed bonds among them. Amanda escaped to a bohemian life as an NYU student; Liz traveled the world; Dan became lost, first as a stoned-out slacker and then as a mean drunk. Diana was left in the custody of a family whose mother subjected her to endless psychological abuse, while the other siblings tried to convince themselves she was fine."To be honest, I never thought much about Diana," writes Dan."I just assumed she was happy and well. I don't think I could have handled imagining it any other way." Diana felt abandoned and, as children do, blamed herself for her feelings. The four eventually reunited, but it was through events they responded to rather than created. Each sibling speaks in his or her own words, as they describe their thoughts and actions as the events unfolded. It's a love-filled but often fraught dialogue, and the reader is a privileged silent witness to their testimony.

A brutally honest book that captures the journey of four people too young to face the challenges they nevertheless had to face.

(COPYRIGHT (2009) KIRKUS REVIEWS/NIELSEN BUSINESS MEDIA, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.)

September 15, 2009
We all wanted to go home, but none of us could because we had no home to go to. Like Dave Eggers A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius (2000), this frank, wry, aching memoir follows children of privilege in the 1980s who lose everything after the sudden deaths of both parents. In alternating narratives, four siblings describe life after their father is killed in a car crash and, months later, their mother dies from cancer. After being shuttled off to different East Coast homes and colleges, they try to maintain their connection, particularly with the youngest child, Diana. As the authors build on each others memories, they find contradictions: Actually . . . the grapefruit-size tumor came later, says Amanda as she tracks their mothers illness. I dont remember any of that, says Liz, after Amanda finds her grieving and barefoot, surrounded by shards of a broken bathroom mirror. Starting with the titles pun, this unusual account will leave readers musing over memorys slippery nature; the imperfect, enduring bonds of family; and the human hearts remarkable resilience.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2009, American Library Association.)