Dad: A Novel

Rating:
Summary: Bowled over
Review: Dad snuck up and bit me. I found it uneven. It is a book to be taken apart and studied in chunks. The sequence of the son caring for the parents was incredible; gritty and raw. So many questions raised: what IF you can't stand your own mother but you still have to live with her? What IF there is another and better dimension for your beleagured father? What do you do if you find your father has pooped his drawers? What if there is no nurse to bail you out? (The image of a middle aged man tranking out on pilched oxygen haunts me) Read this book and weep: this could be you and your life in a few years. Take what you have now and hug it tight. You will slowly but surely become your father. Wharton digs in and hands you the goods. No holds barred. I am a better though sadder person since I read his work.

Rating:
Summary: All-Time Favorite
Review: In 1987, I read what is still one of my all-time favorite books--DAD, by William Wharton. When first his mother, then his father, become ill, John tremont attempts to sort out their affairs and obtain the best care he can for them. But the book is about so much more than that; it's about the relationships between fathers and sons, about coming to terms with a parent's infirmity and mortality, about letting go, accepting new roles within the family, and realizing that, when all's said and done, your parents are just people with flaws like everyone else. but most of all, DAD is about the final days of Jack Tremont, John's father, and how much John, and everyone else, loved him. Jack was portrayed so well that I loved him too, and I could tell John loved him the way I loved my Grandpa. Grandpa was diagnosed with cancer around the same time I read DAD, and I really identified with John and his feelings of grief, frustration, anger, helplessness, and his incredible love for his dad. It was the kind of book I wished would never end. A real tear-jerker!

Rating:
Summary: A wonderful novel about family and America.
Review: In the novel Dad, an uncommon family deals with the common struggle of rediscovering itself. Much of the story focuses on a man's desperate and loving attempts to care for and rehabilitate his elderly and ailing father while also trying to redefine his own relationship with his college-age son. Though many of the characters are genuinely unique and eccentric and many of the escapades are fantastic, Wharton wonderfully depicts those aspects of family life that almost all will recognize. And beyond the family, Dad also is a stunning portrait of America as painted by an expatriate native son.

Rating:
Summary: Underestimated book
Review: This is a book that makes you think, the characters are not described within a few lines, divided into good and bad, like it's so often true in books selected for clubs across the country. Snip: (...)

Rating:
Summary: upsetting and brilliant.
Review: This was a great book and i would recommend it to everyone. It's deeply upsetting, emotional but not whimsical or sloppy like other novls of this genre. This book steers clear of the protentious narrative [stuff]that we often find ourselves bombarded with. It's funny, sad and clever and should be read by all.