{"id":4249,"date":"2018-10-10T00:57:25","date_gmt":"2018-10-10T04:57:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/?p=4249"},"modified":"2018-08-28T01:02:56","modified_gmt":"2018-08-28T05:02:56","slug":"book-review-goodbye-vitamin-by-rachel-khong","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/2018\/10\/book-review-goodbye-vitamin-by-rachel-khong.html","title":{"rendered":"Book Review : Goodbye, Vitamin by Rachel Khong"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a>\"\"Title : Goodbye, Vitamin
\nAuthor : Rachel Khong
\nGenre : Contemporary
\nPublisher : Henry Holt & Co.<\/strong>
\nPages: 208
\nRating : 3.5\/5<\/strong><\/p>\n

Goodbye Vitamin is a novel about Ruth, a 30 year old woman, who has moved back home for about an year, after her father has been diagnosed with Alzheimer\u2019s. Ruth has recently broken up with fianc\u00e9 Joel, so this seems to be an opportune time to sidle back into the comforting family fold. Only the fold isn\u2019t as comforting; her parents are at odds with each other, and her brother Linus, who doesn\u2019t live at home tells Ruth things about her father she doesn\u2019t want to believe.<\/p>\n

This is a heartbreaking book. There are no action-packed events here, this is Ruth\u2019s story of her time at home, spending time with her parents, cooking, reminiscing, despairing, weeping. Ruth meets up with her friend Bonnie, becomes friends with her father\u2019s well-wishers from the University he used to teach at as a history professor. They take it a day at a time. Some days are good, when her father is almost normal. Some days are bad, when he flies into rages, and forgets words, and the people around him.<\/p>\n

There is no big beginning or ending, no tumultuous events, except of course the one that begins this novel \u2013 Ruth\u2019s move back home. The book is told in diary format – Ruth\u2019s diary. It is an irregular format \u2013 some entries are large, some are small, some have dates and some don\u2019t. Some entries are banal and some are so very astute. It\u2019s a very stream-of-consciousness style narration, where we get to hear Ruth\u2019s innermost thoughts.<\/p>\n

The interesting thing is that with even this patchwork-style way of telling this story, \u201cGoodbye, Vitamin\u201d works. Through Ruth\u2019s descriptions, Khong builds up the characters of this book very well; I can almost see them in my mind\u2019s eye.\u00a0Khong manages to tell us about family, about the ties that bind and remain strong, despite all the straining, the push-and-pull of everyday life.<\/p>\n

\u201cGoodbye Vitamin\u201d is marketed as a \u201cfunny\u201d book \u2013 and I don\u2019t agree with that at all \u2013 this book is more depressing than anything else. Poignant and tender too, but depressing. I\u2019m guessing the \u201cfunny\u201d comes from some of Ruth\u2019s observations :-). Here\u2019s one I found particularly hilarious:<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve bookmarked a recipe I want to try: patati con agnello scappato, potatoes with escaped lamb. There is no lamb. From now on I\u2019m going to make macaroni and cheese \u201cwith escaped beef\u201d and rice pilaf \u201cwith escaped pig\u201d.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Title : Goodbye, Vitamin Author : Rachel Khong Genre : Contemporary Publisher : Henry Holt & Co. Pages: 208 Rating : 3.5\/5 Goodbye Vitamin is a novel about Ruth, a 30 year old woman, who has moved back home for about an year, after her father has been diagnosed with Alzheimer\u2019s. Ruth has recently broken […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":{"twitter_17000648_17000648":""},"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[152,74,3,69],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4249","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-152","category-3-5_star_rating","category-books","category-contemporary"],"aioseo_notices":[],"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":false,"thumbnail":false,"medium":false,"medium_large":false,"large":false,"1536x1536":false,"2048x2048":false,"post-thumbnail":false,"sow-carousel-default":false},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"amodini","author_link":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/author\/admin"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"Title : Goodbye, Vitamin Author : Rachel Khong Genre : Contemporary Publisher : Henry Holt & Co. Pages: 208 Rating : 3.5\/5 Goodbye Vitamin is a novel about Ruth, a 30 year old woman, who has moved back home for about an year, after her father has been diagnosed with Alzheimer\u2019s. Ruth has recently broken…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4249","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4249"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4249\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4255,"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4249\/revisions\/4255"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4249"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4249"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4249"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}