Stitches

October 28, 2013
Lamott's (Help, Thanks, Wow) latest inspirational title explores how we can find significance in the face of pain or disaster. Readers are guided by an older, wiser Lamott than we met 20 years ago, when Operating Instructions was published. This narrator is not afraid to say that she has learned a few things, and that there are not "shortcuts to wisdom and self-knowledge⦠. I so resent this." This is also vintage Lamott: funny, brilliantly self-deprecating, and insightful. Characteristically, she ruminates about needing help to get through life, and about finding your family in a group of people who love you and who are not necessarily your blood kin. Indeed, faithful readers may be disappointed by the extent to which Lamott reprises earlier themesâas in Traveling Mercies, Lamott here quotes C. S. Lewis on forgiveness and says it is best to start with something small; she rehearses a vignette she previously told in a novel. Still, Lamott succeeds at using "some of Christianity's language and symbols" to offer spiritual truths that will reach beyond a church audience, and the delights of this new offering outweigh the frustrating repetitions.

February 1, 2014

Lamott's (Bird by Bird) new book is brief and conversational and strives to offer comfort without platitudes. Lamott is at her best when she is midstory, as with the tale of the teen at her Sunday school who, while making coffee-filter paper angels, is asked, "What does humane mean?" and responds, "It means why are all of our projects about coffee filters?" Like Lamott's Sunday school coffee-filter arts and crafts projects, this little book has a homey feel, and while it might linger too long on generalities or overwork a metaphor in a few places, listeners will feel that Lamott has generously given them what she knows about meaning, hope, and repair, humbly and with the same thoughtful and humorous irreverence we have come to expect from her. Lamott herself reads, and her voice lends a warm imperfection that suits the deeply personal subject matter just fine. VERDICT Readers who are drawn in by the subtitle will not be disappointed, in spite of the brevity of the book. Lamott fans will also likely find exactly what they've come for.--Heather Malcolm, Bow, WA

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