Matt Haig's Novel "The Life Impossible"" Mirrors His Life with Depression

Matt Haig's latest novel, "The Life Impossible" is a sci-fi, environmental messaging story that is a guise for the author to exorcize his demons battling with depression. His non-fiction, "Reasons to Stay Alive," is a forthright, honest account of his dark days and pro-active steps he uses and suggests for others. In his charming novel, "Being Human," Haig uses an alien inhabiting a human. The alien's new experiences as a human delights him in simple pleasures to cherish which are overlooked and taken for granted. The use of an extra terrestrial is revisited by Haig in "Life" as an underwater energy source that bestows extra-sensory powers to someone deemed worthy of using its abilities for the benefit of mankind and who will  appreciate the boost to one's senses. This person is Grace, a retired teacher and widow. She and her husband suffered the loss of their adolescent son fatally struck while riding his bike. Grace harbors immense guilt blaming herself for permitting him to ride in the rain that day. Out-of-the-blue, Grace is bequeathed a home in Ibiza from a former acquaintance whom she hardly knew. With nothing tying her in the states, she views this unexpected inheritance as an adventure. but not a permanent move. Upon arriving, Grace is warned to avoid the local eccentric, Mauricio, the town's scuba instructor.  Despite the warnings she seeks him out and ventures on her first scuba-diving lesson. The last thing Grace recalls before waking in a hospital is a glowing light unfurling towards her. Mauricio is bedside and explains she aroused the alien who endowed her with supernatural abilities. He tells her, "The only thing I ask is that you leave a door open in your mind to possibility." However, sticking with the plot asks a lot. It becomes  water-logged in a far-fetched mystery and saturated in an addled, sappy mission to align locals in pushing  back against an evil developer to protect their natural habitats and indigenous animals. Grace's newfound heightened senses brings the world into a technicolor Neverland where she visits with her deceased son and husband and absolved of her guilt and remorse. Dispairingly, too much of the story gets shrouded in Grace's sorrows making the reader gasp for air. "I owed it to the world to feel awful, that had been my logic. And if I didn't owe it to the world, at the very least I owed it to my dead husband my dead child. I have believed that I was simply not meant to be happy."  Haig's mission in "The Life" veered from instilling an uplifting message. The novel is fathoms deep in depression. Grace realizes late in her wayward journey, "Life sings and blazes. Even when we are numb to it, when we hide from it, when it is too loud and painful to experience, when we aren't equipped to feel it-it is there waiting to be cherished," making this novel a struggle and impossible to appreciate.

Lisa Marie Presley/Riley Keough FROM HERE TO THE GREAT UNKNOWN-Memorable Melancholy Memoir

FROM HERE TO THE GREAT UNKNOWN consists of transcripts from Marie Presley (LM) tapes of her recollections that was co written by her daughter Riley Keough and published posthumously. Riley submits her reflections mirroring her mom's accounts which gives credence and gravitas to both their perspectives.. This melancholy memoir is a riveting and sobering look at the turbulence and loneliness of LM's childhood and her struggles as an adult. LM passed away in January of 2023 at the age of 54 preceded in death by the suicide of her son Ben at age 27. There are revelatory shocking descriptions of LM being sexually abused by one of Priscilla's boyfriends, her mother's downplaying of her accounts and reluctance to terminate their relationship. After LM's son killed himself, she kept his body on ice in her home for two months. She left her marriage to the father of Riley and Ben for Michael Jackson. And, although she doesn't delve into her marriage with Jackson she did say, "I was actually so happy. I've never been that happy again...I feel really, really lucky that he let me in. I fell in Leo with him because he was normal, just fucking normal." It was not possible for LM's life to be "normal" with such a famous father. A major take-away throughout is the strong bond and love between LM and her dad. Riley attests to her mom's love for Jackson. "She told me that no one ever came close to being like her dad apart from Michael." Her other 3 marriages, including a brief one to Nicholas Cage, did not receive much in the way of positive or negative feelings except for her first marriage to Danny Keough. "He's always, always been there for me. ...We shared every single family vacation together. We made it really great for them." LM's childhood is interwoven with happy times at Graceland with her cousins and friends. But, she felt torn away from her dad by her mom who she felt never wanted her. "My mom made me live with her again-but again I was miserable, so I was a terror. It was clear she didn't want me there." LM never focused in school and never graduated high school. For a time, LM lived in the Scientology's Celebrity Centre as a teen but gives little insight into this period.  After leaving the Centre LM began getting addicted to pills. LM speaks often of her deep love for her 4 children.  She shared, "I really had no prototype to follow growing up. I had no family life, no home life to be an example, ever. No stability." Kiley differed by saying, "From my point of view, we were a close, normal family." There were a solid two decades where our family felt very normal to me." The following lament by LM sums up the majority of her downcast life. "I don't know who I am-I never really got the chance to uncover my own identity. I didn't have a family. I didn't have a childhood." Though overwhelmingly LM had a despairing life filled with woe, it also shows adversity, grace and empathy to be gleaned from both mother and daughter. 

G McAllister's WRONG PLACE WRONG TIME-Right Idea Slight, Misdirected Ending

Gillian McAllister's time travel, crime mystery has a lot of clever twists to steer the reader through a back-in-time travel for an enjoyable page turner. Jan has been happily married to Kelly for 20 years.  Jen is an attorney, Kelly a freelance contractor and together they have an 18 year old son, Todd. Although legally an adult but still a  teenager, Jen waits up for Todd to return home. Just past curfew she spots her son outside and sees him walking towards a stranger. The unthinkable happens. Todd pulls out a knife and stabs the man. Jen races outside in horror. She can't fathom how or why her son would kill someone. She can't understand a lot more when she wakes the following morning to the day before the crime occurred. The sci-fi scenario of traveling back in time is convincing as is the way Jen responds to her time travels. She seeks help from a researcher in this hard to believe field of study who assures her. "It seems to me that you do, actually already understand the rules of the universe you are unwillingly in. It's theoretically possible for you to have somehow created such a force that you are stuck in a closed time-like curve."  Jen wonders about "time loops, about the butterfly effect, changing one tiny thing. I wonder if I-alone-know something that can stop the murder." This premise turns Jen into a time traveling sleuth who will do anything to prevent her son from committing murder. Each regressive day adds an insight into what led up to the calamitous event. This makes an enticing way to gather insights into what unfolds in the future.  But Jen's assessment of her parenting skills which believes must have contributed to her son's actions were wrong as they were tiresome and detracted from solving the crime. "All the ways she ineffectually mothered Todd crowd into her mind. Feeding him too much so he slept more, upending the bottle while watching daytime television, bored, no eye contact." The mystery deviates with more interest into Jen and Kelly's romance and early marriage as Jen's foreknowledge plays a fun role. Typical yet poignant do overs are the visits between Kelly and her beloved father who has passed. And, the do-over theme got driven home often as Jen muses, "the things in my life that I would just stand and truly, fully witness."  The time I spent with WRONG PLACE WRONG TIME was a rewarding read until the very end which was only slightly surprising and felt too easily realized. I believe some sources needed to be questioned even though I readily accepted the magical premise of revisiting the past.   

Michael Caine's Autobiographical-BLOWING THE BLOODY DOORS OFF-His Advice on Life and Acting

At 94, Sir Michael Caine is a retired actor who's been around the block and come a long way from being just a regular Cockney bloke. Amazed with his own luck in life and his illustrious career, he happily shares his past, work ethics, regrets and what he values most in life.  He'll be the first to tell you it comes from working your rear end off. "Be like a duck; calm on the surface, but always paddling like the dickens underneath." "Confidence comes from experience plus preparation," is another similar note he cheerily  offers in his latest memorable memoirs that's as debonair and disarming as he appears to be on screen. While Caine is generous in his tips he's first to admit what advice he's received from others. He attributes his duck analogy to his mother and his other tried and true acting tidbit is attributed to John Wayne, "Talk low, talk slow and don't say too much." Caine recounts his first time meeting Wayne on his first time to Hollywood (and the States). Caine was staying in the Beverly Hills Hotel to promote the movie "Alfie". The film "Alfie" first garnered Caine international attention. While in the lobby of the hotel, John Wayne landed on the front lawn of the Beverly Hills Hotel in a helicopter before making a grand entrance into the lobby. Caine was starstruck and gobsmacked by Wayne who recognized him from "Alfie" and predicted he would become a big star. " Perhaps, Caine's own simple advice is the best. "Prepare yourself well and turn up on time are my first rules in life." This lively blend of advice, movie memorabilia and self-reflections all add up to a delightful and resourceful read. In part, it's an amazing rags to riches tale but in a more meaningful way his candor and marvel at how his life unfolded is what makes this book so bloody good. Caine is the first to share what's great in becoming a celebrity. "Getting to meet my heroes, and in many cases becoming friends with them, was for me, one of the best parts of becoming a star." Although Caine also warns against becoming too self-consumed. "Take your work seriously, yes, but don't whatever you do get all pompous and start taking yourself too seriously." Caine speaks openly about his love and devotion for his wife and daughters and bemoans the demise of his first marriage. One of the many glimpses into Caine's persona came from what he overheard his wife say in an interview when asked what first attracted her to her husband. She reportedly said, "I liked the way he treated his mother." There are plenty of sound guidances to glean in "Blowing the Bloody Doors Off." Observing Caine through his work on film and having read this book made me wish to have known him personally.  When queried, "Do I believe in God? Yes, I do. When you've had a life like mine, you have to."