Customer Reviews

The Center of the Universe: A Memoir

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4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(1)
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An ironic, hysterically funny account of life with a crazy mother, an inept father and ancestors including a chief rabbi who went to jail for selling kosher wine during Prohibition. Nancy Bachrach's memoir revolves around her father's death from carbon monoxide poisoning and her mother emerging from a coma with severe brain damage. But the real story is how Bachrach and her siblings heal from years of neglect and abuse while helping their mother fight an agonizing battle to regain her mind and rebuild her life. This story carries you to the end with laugh out loud scenes, pages of brilliant wit and a wonderment at how it will all turn out. It's really terrific and needs to be read and enjoyed.

Nancy Bachrach is a fabulous storyteller, and she has a dramatic, harrowing, hilarious story to tell. But unlike most authors these days, Nancy does not waste a single word. She strings her thoughts together like a diamond setter places stones in settings...carefully, meticulously and magically.

From the moment she gets a phonecall telling her that her father has died in a boating accident and her mother is in a comma (typo made on her chart by someone in a tiny rural hospital) Nancy leads the reader through her family saga with wit, compassion and a clarity of thinking that left me awestruck. Many of us have crazy families. But how many of us could live with our families, observe their madness and motives, analyze them with sensitivity and intelligence, and then tell their stories in a way that makes this book impossible to put down?

This was without a doubt one of the best memoirs I have ever read. People will fall in love with Lola, Nancy's mother, who sports a "red beehive that turns into cotton candy or the hair of a troll doll" after a ride in a convertible with the top down. This whole book is like a wild ride in a convertible -- thrilling, full of life, scary, dangerous and life affirming.

After one particularly harrowing curve in the road, the author states that she has been "dealt a new hand and I have no idea what will turn out to be wild."

The same could be said for anyone who picks up this wonderful book, fastens their seat belts and enjoys the wild ride. Nothing in life is predictable. Thank goodness this author shows great judgment when she holds our hand and takes us on her wild ride.

This mom-moir will grab you and not let go. It is both insanely funny and yet, because it is true, utterly insane. You get a wild ride and wildly likeable characters... a real requirement for me to enjoy a book. Based on real events in Jewish history, pleasure boating and antiperspirant advertising (I doubt you will hear those three in a coherent sentence anywhere else), you will find laugh-out-loud enjoyment, fascination, sharp observation and wit that can kill. Have a great read. Buy it for Mom. She will feel loved and sane.

The incredible story of a family overcoming a tragic accident that kills their father and leaves their mother in a coma. A multi-generational tale of insanity and genius told with dark humor and a true sense of how absurd life can be. Bachrach is a fantastic writer whose memoir reads like a funny beach book, but then leaves you emotionally satisfied and grateful that she had the courage to share this unique journey with us.

Like a modern alchemist, Nancy Bachrach has used the magic of language to transform a family tragedy into high comedic art. With "The Center of the Universe," she has created an engrossing 24-karat memoir that gleams with wry wit, warm compassion and stiletto-sharp observations on human foibles, professional posturing and corporate mishigass. (Sell deodorants to the French? Come on: who needs Secret when you have Chanel). "The Center of the Universe" provides page after page of rich rewards, including portraits of a family whose genes seem to have gone astray and a madcap heroine who will absolutely win your heart. If nothing else, "The Center of the Universe" will stir your emotions and make your own family seem almost normal.

Everyone remembers that Mark Twain said "Truth is stranger than fiction," but few remember the second part of his thought, "but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn't."

Nancy's life would seem to be filled with so many improbablities (freak accidents, mental illness, a child prodigy, coma, a lost and forgotten cat) that it would seem impossible to happen to one family. Nancy brings to her own very specific and very peculiar truth a wry sense of humor, vivid detail, and, ultimately, a hard-earned sense of grace and peace. It's an absorbing tale.

What a ride! This book is just outstanding. Gripping from the get-go, engaging, surprising, and witty beyond description. At some level, we can all relate to the topic at hand: mothers we love and fear at the same time. (Well, it's about much more than that!) I'll refrain from phrases like "beautifully written" because Nancy Bachrach defies simple labels. Hunter S. Thompson keep flashing in mind as I read Nancy's hilarious, often outlandish descriptions of her mother's curious -- if not perplexing, if not "from another planet" (yet always endearing) -- behavior.

But beyond the "laugh so hard it hurts" wit, this book is deep....and smart...and grounded in Bachrach's impressive if not humbling landscape of personal experience and intellectual firepower -- from a Brandeis PhD in Philosophy to being one of the advertising industry's most accomplished executives (a point she severely understates or, in the rare case where she opens up about her trade in selling packaged-whatever, mocks with self-depricating jabs).

I read this entire book in one sitting. It's hard to put to down. I expect to read it again, or perhaps reference it for counsel next time my aging (yet indefatigable) mother throws a curve ball my way.

This is one of the most well written books that I've read in a long time. Ms Bachrach is an exceptional story teller. Her humor is priceless and fresh! For most of us who have family "problems", it's reassuring to know it could be worse - and the author's attitude is what we all need to survive. A thoroughly enjoyable book.

I can't remember laughing and crying my way through a truly tragic mother/daughter memoir the likes of Nancy Bachrach's amazing "The Center of the Universe."

This rarest of delicious summer reads is all the more touching for Ms. Bachrach's brilliant comedic timing of a latter-day Dorothy Parker. I could not put it down, and neither could my wife.

Hunter Yager

I loved this book! A darkly humorous, totally engrossing story that drew me in from the very first page. Nancy Bachrach is such a vivid author, she makes the reader feel as if they are watching everything that happens just over her shoulder. She draws the reader in from the very start, and this is one wild roller coaster ride from start to finish. You don't know whether to laugh or cry, or sometimes both! Nancy has written a wonderful, very interesting, completely absorbing book. A must-read for anyone who wants to be engrossed. Couldn't put it down.