A Review: Elsewhere

Title of Work: Elsewhere
Author: Richard Russo
Format:
Published: 2012
Started:
Finished: 2022-07-07\

Posted: Goodreads
Rating: 4/5

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I would not have taken a chance on this memoir had my sister not recommended it to me. I was staying with her and her family for several months and we often comiserated over our shared blend of neuroses, a particular amalgam of genetics and rearing that only we were fortunate enough to have been… blessed with by our mother. My sister and I found a mutual comrade in Russo. He painted in careful strokes all of the hidden challenges that layer the passage from childhood to adulthood under then alongside a difficult mother. Although our own mother was less codependent and more emotionally aloof than Russo’s, we found the demons of ours reflected in his. We would read excerpts of his maternal memoir to each other across the living room, sharing knowing smiles as shorthand for, “Does that sound like anyone you know?” Russo has such a sympathetic eye for his mother’s quirks, manipulations, and mental health struggles and how they molded him, for better and for worse. I think I understand myself and my own mother better now. I can sense both an improved sympathy for her character and a heightened vigilance over my own inclinations. It is arguable that our mothers will be the greatest single influence in our lives but we are not predestined to suffer their shortcomings, as benign or egregious as they may be.