Memorial Days

by Geraldine Brooks ★★★★☆

In 2019, Tony Horowitz, the fellow author and husband of Geraldine Brooks, unexpectedly died while on a book tour in Washington, D.C. Brooks wasn't with him—she was at their home on Martha's Vineyard—and Memorial Days is her account of the moments and days surrounding Tony's death, but also how she eventually made space for herself to properly grieve her husband of 35 years.

As Brooks puts it, "I have written this because I needed to do it. Part of the treatment for 'complicated grief' is to relive the trauma of the death, returning to the moments again and again, striving each time to recall more detail. That is what I have tried to do." Brooks didn't have the opportunity to properly grieve Tony in the moment. With mountains of paperwork and processes to work through to handle the unpleasant practicalities of an unexpected death, Brooks was forced to take action versus taking time for herself. Like so many others in these situations, she found she had to compartmentalize and suppress her need to feel in order to continue to move forward with her life. It was not until 2023 that she gave herself the time she needed, with a solo stay on remote Flinders Island in Australia. "When I get to Flinders Island, I will begin my own memorial days. I am taking something that our culture has stopped freely giving: the right to grieve. To shut out the world and its demands. To remember my love and to feel the immensity of his loss."

The memoir is part factual recounting of the events in the days surrounding Tony's death, and Brooks' attempt to process what she was thinking and feeling during those moments. It's part eulogy and celebration of Tony's life and the couple's love for each other. It's also a no-punches-pulled rebuke of the medial-forensic establishment in the United States, and some of the insensitivity that Brooks dealt with around Tony's death. From the harried call from the emergency room breaking the horrible news to her, to the paperwork and red tape that accompanied things like the identification and retrieval of his body or the processing of his will, Brooks could not be more disappointed with the perceived callousness she dealt with. Even four years after the events, Brooks' anger is palpable at what she characterizes as "inhumane practices".

It feels cruel to give such an open and raw account of the most devastating moment of the author's life anything less than 5 stars, but here we are. I think there are useful lessons in the book for anyone dealing with "complicated grief", as she puts it, and there are some glowing nuggets sprinkled throughout, turns of phrase or astute observations that resonated with me. But this was also an exercise in healing for Brooks first, and written with only a "faint and modest agenda". Perhaps because of that, there are bits of disjointedness—bouncing between the days surrounding Tony's death and Brooks' time on Flinders Island, departures to discuss grieving rituals from a smattering of religions and ethnic groups, or Brooks recounting her early days as an activist in Australia. When the plans for a full life are cut short, it's natural to wonder what might have been, and interestingly Brooks looks both backward as well as forward. As someone who primarily reads fiction, perhaps I'm also too jaded by the possibility of perfection when you, as author, control the story. Life is rarely so tidy as we make it in the stories we create, and while Brooks' memoir may lack some tidiness, it makes up for it with honesty and raw candor. It's what she needed to move forward in her grief, and for that reason it was a success upon completion.