Solace : Rituals of Loss and Desire

Rating:
Summary: and yet another indulgent memoir
Review: The most compelling aspect of this rather indulgent memoir is Sojourner's retelling of her life and times with her ill mother. You really feel a sense of the anguish. Otherwise, the book unveils itself in a series of incomplete vignettes that are packaged like second-rate newspaper columns at best, and generally self-righteous and lacking in introspection.

Sojourner is a real stalwart in Flagstaff; she manages to raise ver voice the loudest at most rallies. In truth, though, she doesn't live in the woods, as the marketing would like to present, but right off a paved highway in a cluster of cabins for tourists, two minutes from your local Walmart. And her rants against the corporatization of publishing now ring hollow given that she avidly sought to be published by a corporate juggernaut like Simon Schuster (and its Scribner imprint), instead of a truly independent press like Seal. Bottom line: so much for taking a stand; take the money and run.