- Genre:humor
- Sub-genre:Form / Essays
- Language:English
- Pages:180
- Paperback ISBN:9798350993233
Book details
Overview
Originally published in major publications, including the New York Times and Wall Street Journal, these relatable essays about everyday life sparkle with humor, pathos, and optimism. Sollisch doesn't waste a word—or a moment of your time—getting to the point. He pokes and prods every experience until it yields a surprising insight. What's really behind people's obsessions with bucket lists? How did Boomers, who had the best parents, ruin parenting forever? Why do men have to unlearn just about everything they know to become good fathers? Why is there an Encyclopedia of Jews in sports? What's with guys still asking fathers for permission to marry their daughters?
Whether he's explaining how he lost his two-year old son at the mall or revealing the real reason he donated a kidney, Sollisch is a master storyteller and a keen observer of the small truths that make us human. There are odes to basketball, grocery shopping, monogamy, rants against air travel, the death of the family dinner, and bad writing that will have you nodding your head.
Sollisch's voice is distinct and familiar—like someone you meet at a party and instantly feel like you've known forever. Some readers may have heard his voice on National Public Radio's Morning Edition, where he was a commentator reading his own essays for several years.
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From Kirkus Review:
An essayist contemplates family, Cleveland, work, LeBron James, and, to a lesser extent, his donated kidney in this debut anthology.
Despite the book’s title, Sollisch admits in his preface, “This is not a book about kidney donation” but is rather a book about lots of things, from marriage and grocery shopping to Cleveland sports. The author, who mixes humor with sentimental reflections on the simplicities of life, doesn’t dwell on (or brag about) the decision to donate an organ to a friend at age 53.
Rather, the title essay wryly reflects on the author’s recovery, which includes an improved jump shot (you’ll have to read the book to find out why) and frustrating inability to take ibuprofen. Most of the vignettes stem from personal experiences and conclude with an inspirational or nostalgic reflection. A story of momentarily losing his young son at the mall, for instance, ends with thoughtful commentary on finding solace in crowds (whose mere presence means they survived “the slings and arrows…of childhood”). While generally positive, Sollisch probes the difficult events that shaped his life, including his first wife’s decision to divorce him after 14 years of marriage and three kids. “I was devastated,” he writes, “In the wreckage, I clung to my children as if they were life rafts.” Unsurprisingly, parenthood plays a major role in many of the essays, including navigating a blended family with his second wife and “prayer-inducing moments” of teaching his son to drive.
Sollisch spent more than three decades as a copywriter and creative director at an advertising agency, and his professional background, where every word is carefully chosen to draw the consumer’s attention, informs his writing style.
“You can give me any subject,” he notes, “and I can write about it in 500 words.” Indeed, coming in at under 200 pages, the book’s 74 essays blend funny anecdotes and sage life advice into an effectively pithy package. Previously published in national newspapers, including the New York Times, this is an impressive debut.
A layered, frank, and entertaining appreciation of everyday wins.
