Synopses & Reviews
From the bestselling author of
A Three Dog Life, which “shines with honest intelligence” (Elizabeth Gilbert): a fresh, exhilarating, superbly written memoir about aging, family, creativity, tragedy, friendship, and the richness of life.
What comes next? What comes after the devastating loss of Abigail's husband, a process both sudden and slow? What form does her lifelong platonic friendship take after a certain line is crossed? How to cope with her daughter’s diagnosed illness? Or the death of her beloved dog? Is life worth living without three cocktails before dinner? How do you paint the ocean on a sheet of glass?
And how to like it? How to accept, appreciate, enjoy? Who are our most trusted, valuable companions and what will we do for them? Instead of painting an ocean, paint a forest, turn it over, scrape the surface, and presto: there is the ocean. When you’ve given up, when you least expect it, there it is.
What Comes Next and How to Like It is an extraordinarily moving memoir about many things, but at the center is a steadfast friendship between Abigail Thomas and a man she met thirty-five years ago. Through marriages, child-raising, the vicissitudes and tragedies of life, it is this deep, rich bond that has sustained her. Readers who loved “the perfectly honed observations of a clear-eyed and witty writer” (Newsweek) in Thomas’s “spare, astonishing” (Entertainment Weekly) memoir, A Three Dog Life, will relish this beautiful examination of her life today — often solitary, but rich and engaging, with children, grandchildren, dogs, a few suitors, and her longtime best friend.
Review
"This episodic memoir is full of love and life. Readers will identify with the feelings and the people even as they realize how different they are, how wondrous." Booklist
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“A former book editor and memoirist's account of the remarkable 35-year friendship that sustained her through the trials and tribulations of adult life.…A moving and eloquent memoir.” Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
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“Irreverent, wise, and boundlessly generous." Vanity Fair
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“A keenly observed memoir…[Thomas] writes of the changes aging brings us all and of coping through love: of family, dogs, a well-turned phrase. She is superb company."
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What Comes Next and How to Like It is plain-spoken and wise. Thomas's chapters are brief (some just a paragraph, none longer than three pages), but they feel complete and full. She says what she means and no more. (But she says it beautifully.)” Minneapolis Star Tribune
Review
"A nearly unforgivable betrayal in the middle of [a] long friendship somehow didn’t end it… and it’s this spirit of stalwart love and loyalty that makes Thomas’s work so moving....The result is a book that reads very quickly, but lingers long after." Boston Globe
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“Abigail Thomas knows adversity and how to make some kind of joy out of it… a meditation on aging and family that brings to mind Anne Lamott or Anna Quindlen… her gift is to never ponder too long on life’s woes." The Washington Post
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“Hilarious, wise, generous…full of interesting places and people and art and feeling and moment and thought." Los Angeles Review of Books
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“[Thomas] is in total control of the narrative even when she feels that she’s not—a string of tragedies pieced together with undeterred grace.…each scene feels fresh and alive.” Kirkus Reviews
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“The astonishingly rhapsodic What Comes Next and How to Like It is this master stylist's best work yet.…One of the many gifts of What Comes Next is the news Thomas brings us from the front lines of old age, peppery and witty, neither romanticized nor denied." Chicago Tribune
Synopsis
In her bestselling and beloved memoir A Three Dog Life, Abigail Thomas wrote about the tragic loss of her husband. In What Comes Next and How to Like It, she writes about aging, family, creativity, tragedy, friendship, and the richness of life. And it is exhilarating.
What comes next? What comes after the devastating loss of a spouse? What form does a lifelong friendship take after deepest betrayal? How does a mother cope with her child s dire illness? Or the death of a cherished dog?
And how to like it? How to accept, appreciate, enjoy? How to find solace and pleasure? How to sustain and be sustained by our most trusted, valuable companions?
Exquisitely observed, lush with sentences you will underline and reread, What Comes Next and How to Like It is an extraordinarily moving memoir about many of life s greatest challenges and inimitable rewards. It is also the story of the friendship between Abigail Thomas and a man she met thirty-five years ago. Through marriages, child raising, and the vicissitudes and tragedies that befall them both, this rich bond has helped her face whatever comes next with courage, exuberance, and grace."
About the Author
Abigail Thomas, the daughter of renowned science writer Lewis Thomas (The Lives of a Cell), is the mother of four children and the grandmother of twelve. She is the author of six previous books, including the memoir A Three Dog Life, which was named one of the best books of 2006 by the Los Angeles Times and The Washington Post. When Thomas can’t write, she paints. She teaches writing and lives in Woodstock, New York, with her four dogs.