Jan 25

Jan 25 Sanctuary: A Memoir

Author: Emily Rapp Black
Publisher: Random House
Goodreads | The StoryGraph

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Note: Trigger warnings are provided for those who need them at the bottom of this page. If you don’t need them and don’t want to risk spoilers, don’t scroll past the full review.

Cover Description

“Congratulations on the resurrection of your life,” a colleague wrote to Emily Rapp Black when she announced the birth of her second child. The line made Rapp Black pause. Her first child, a boy named Ronan, had died from Tay-Sachs disease before he turned three years old, an experience she wrote about in her second book, The Still Point of the Turning World. Since that time, her life had changed utterly: She left the marriage that fractured under the terrible weight of her son's illness, got remarried to a man who she fell in love with while her son was dying, had a flourishing career, and gave birth to a healthy baby girl. But she rejected the idea that she was leaving her old life behind--that she had, in the manner of the mythical phoenix, risen from the ashes and been reborn into a new story, when she still carried so much of her old story with her. More to the point, she wanted to carry it with her. Everyone she met told her she was resilient, strong, courageous in ways they didn't think they could be. But what did those words mean, really?

This book is an attempt to unpack the various notions of resilience that we carry as a culture. Drawing on contemporary psychology, neurology, etymology, literature, art, and self-help, Emily Rapp Black shows how we need a more complex understanding of this concept when applied to stories of loss and healing and overcoming the odds, knowing that we may be asked to rebuild and reimagine our lives at any moment, and often when we least expect it. Interwoven with lyrical, unforgettable personal vignettes from her life as a mother, wife, daughter, friend, and teacher, Rapp Black creates a stunning tapestry that is full of wisdom and insight.

TL;DR Review

A portrait of grief and examination of resilience, Sanctuary is a gorgeously written, vulnerable, insightful memoir of Rapp Black’s experience losing her son and having her second child.

For you if: You like memoirs, especially those that examine aspects of our humanity.

Full Review

“I feel it in me, that uncomplicated, devastating happiness; it is true and tactile as anything I’ve ever felt. But behind that feeling lurks the panic that the world can drop out from beneath your feet at any time, because that’s true, too. Lightning can strike the same place twice, three times; it can strike you all your life. Knowing this, how do we keep living?”

Thank you, so much, to Netgalley and Random House for the review copy of this book. I also listened along with the finished audiobook, narrated by the author. Emily Rapp Black’s memoir is gorgeous, gutting, and one of those books that makes you feel like just by reading it, you’ve inched toward what it truly means to be human.

When Rapp Black’s son, Ronan, was an infant, he was diagnosed with Tay-Sachs disease. He died before the age of three, and her shaky marriage crumbled even before that. During the experience, though, she found a loving partner, who supported her through it, and with whom she had her second child a few years later. Her memoir tells us about all of those experiences as she attempts to examine and redefine our cultural notions of resilience.

The subject matter is poignant enough, but Rapp Black’s incredible talent with prose really brings this reading experience home. Her writing not only carries intense emotion, but also has an impressive ability to evoke emotion. Her similes, especially, I found to be true, sharp, cutting, and beautiful. I underlined so many passages. I loved her selection of chapter inscriptions, and her use of perfect quotations, even in the middle of paragraphs.

I also found her writing on resilience to be deeply moving and reflective. In fact, that is what really takes this book from great to excellent — the craft here of examination alongside memory, insight alongside emotion.

If you have the emotional space to read this book, I urge you to do so. It is a new favorite.

“Watching a splinted butterfly stumble up into the air or an injured bird struggle with a broken wing is uncomfortable for humans. Yet the lack of self-consciousness in the awkwardness or even “incorrectness” of that movement is, for me, the epitome of resilience. It’s less about finding a hidden source of strength and more about softening to the unfairness and beauty of the world, accepting its smooth grace as well as its sharper edges. Pain with benefits. Happiness with blood in it.”