Talk Before Sleep
- Book Review,
by Elizabeth Berg
From Publishers Weekly
Because it is rendered with such clarity, authority and feeling, Berg's novel may cause readers to forget that this story of a woman's death from cancer is fiction. Berg's ( Durable Goods ) depiction of a sisterhood of women banding together to succor a friend is never falsely sentimental. Accurately observed details and honest descriptions of the body's frailties make the narrative gripping and immediate. But intensely real characterizations, outrageous black humor and graceful prose are what render it memorable. Narrator Ann Stanley, a nurse who loves her young daughter and husband but sometimes hates the institution of marriage, recognizes a soul mate when she meets Ruth Thomas. A talented artist, Ruth is mercurial, outspoken, fearless, charming, charismatic. When she leaves her caustic, icy husband and (regretfully) her teenaged son, she is eager to embrace new experiences, to find love and artistic fulfillment. Instead, she is sidetracked by cancer, which she fights gallantly, even into its terminal phase. Ann and several other devoted friends spend days and nights by Ruth's side, helping her to die. Berg writes candidly--if ultimately a bit too schematically--about the bonds between women that transcend the male-female relationship. A celebration of intimate friendship as well as a cry of grief, this book is a weeper, all right, but its effect is cathartic. Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From School Library Journal
YA-A painful, gripping story about two best friends, Ann and Ruth, and Ruth's ultimate death of cancer. While the outcome may be tragic, the telling is lyrical. The women met when they both were in their late 30s, and for the 4 or 5 years of their friendship, Ann has been the follower and pupil to Ruth's exhilarating and thought-provoking leadership and teaching. Ruth has forced Ann to examine her comfortable life with her husband and child by her example of freedom and independence. She seems to be everything Ann is afraid or unable to be-beautiful, artistic, appealing to both sexes, and self-confident. Her love life thrives and her times with Ann provide excitement and challenges. When Ruth is diagnosed with terminal cancer, Ann, once a nurse, becomes the mainstay of the small group of women who surround their friend, but feels little in common with them. Much of this brief novel focuses on the interplay among these characters as they all try, each in her own way, to do her best for Ruth. Readers realize, along with Ann, how important relationships can be, and how important it is to communicate feelings and be honest. Ruth is the catalyst for self-discovery on the part of each of the figures, and her own discoveries are satisfying. This is a beautifully realized story and so well written that mature YAs will gain insights and strength from it.Susan H. Woodcock, King's Park Library, Burke, VACopyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Library Journal
The subject of women's friendships in the face of death is sensitively handled in Berg's ( Durable Goods , LJ 4/15/93) second novel. Conventional and quiet, Ann Stanley never had a true best friend until she met the beautiful and outgoing Ruth Thomas. Over the years, their friendship deepens and enriches them both. Then Ruth is diagnosed with rapidly metastasizing breast cancer. During the period of Ruth's dying, a small group of women, along with Ann, share Ruth's doctor visits, help make funeral plans, and enjoy late-night lobster feasts together. They talk about men, children, sex, the future, and the past. They weep, laugh, analyze, and try to console one another. Never preachy or maudlin, this novel is utterly convincing. All the conversations ring true; all the emotions are recognizable and real. Many women will be able to identify with the subject matter of this novel, which should guarantee it a well-deserved readership. Highly recommended for all public libraries.- Nancy Pearl, Washington Ctr. for the Book, SeattleCopyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From AudioFile
Although they hated each other at first sight, Ruth and Ann become friends who share their lives, and now must share death. Elizabeth Berg presents a story that strips away some of the mystery of feminine interaction, while maintaining a sense of realness that listeners will surely appreciate. This is due, in part, to Beth Fowler's superb narration. Almost confessional in nature, her delivery is at once thoughtful and humorous, weaving in and out of the text's complex emotions. While TALK BEFORE SLEEP may not give definitive insight to the depths of friendship between two women, it is certainly a tender and credible story, smartly illuminated by Fowler's performance. R.A.P. (c) AudioFile 2000, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine
From Booklist
Berg has written another perfectly constructed and tender novel. Her first, Durable Goods , was a particularly lyrical coming-of-age story. This is a particularly sensitive coming-to-terms-with-death tale, as well as a novel about friendship among women. In a brief prologue, Berg tells us that she lost a dear friend to breast cancer, and, clearly, her novel is a form of healing as well as a call for more research into the causes and prevention of breast cancer. Having said that, we must also say that this is a supple and subtle novel free of any didacticism or mawkishness. Berg's gentle narrator, Ann, sets the tone as she carefully, even ritualistically, describes the final days of her best friend. Ruth is a beautiful and vital woman who has attained an amazing level of serenity in the midst of the pain and ravagement of cancer. Ann puts her own life on hold to be with Ruth, feeding her rich, indulgent meals (when she can eat), bathing her, keeping her apartment bright and cheerful, sharing memories and confidences. She is joined in the watch by a trio of friends who relieve the tension with humor and abrupt little squabbles sparked by jealousy and fear. Life surely goes on, Berg seems to say, but we do miss our dead. Donna Seaman
From Kirkus Reviews
Berg (Durable Goods, 1993) offers a sappy tale about a woman witnessing the death of her friend from breast cancer. Ruth is a 43-year-old artist whose cancer metastasizes to her brain, her lungs, her kidneys, so that it's only a matter of time, ``weeks to months, depending on what `fails' first.'' Ruth has around-the-clock surveillance from a group of close women friends, the most important of whom is her best friend, Ann. Ann has virtually abandoned her family to share these remaining days with the only person she has ever really been able to get close to, and during this vigil she recounts their history. It turns out that Ann's life looks much like Ruth's when they first meet. Both are married, both have a child, both are unhappy, both want out. But it is Ruth who gathers the courage to leave her cold and unsympathetic husband, get her own apartment, and make a fresh start. And Ann envies her until she stays over at her place one night, discovers a perfectly ordered underwear drawer, and decides that it is ``not an obsessive kind of neatness, but loneliness,'' and goes home. This conclusion seems based on fear--because Ann can't yet make that same leap. But when Ruth, on the next page, reveals that she wants to go back to her horrible husband, the weakness of these women, in a book that purports to be about women offering each other strength, proves too unbelievable. Ultimately, Ruth does die, and when Ann returns to a husband who has the compassion to ask things like ``do you have any idea how long this might take?'' as Ruth gasps for breath in the other room, we're left wondering why Ruth bothers to say ``don't wait anymore...seize the moment.'' Sentimental, disappointing. All talk. (Author tour) -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
Review
"You'll want to give a copy to every good woman friend you have." -- The Charlotte Observer
"Entertaining, finely crafted Elizabeth Berg tackles serious issues with grace" -- San Francisco Chronicle
"Tender and irreverant by turns, it offers mature intelligent and buoyant spirit, like a very good friend." -- Houston Post
From the Paperback edition.
Review
"You'll want to give a copy to every good woman friend you have." -- The Charlotte Observer
"Entertaining, finely crafted Elizabeth Berg tackles serious issues with grace" -- San Francisco Chronicle
"Tender and irreverant by turns, it offers mature intelligent and buoyant spirit, like a very good friend." -- Houston Post
From the Paperback edition.
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