What We Lost [Paperback]

Dale Peck (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 12, 2004

Dale Peck, Sr. grew up extremely poor in rural Long Island in the 1950s, sharing a one-room house with seven brothers and sisters, an abusive mother and an alcoholic father haunted by his past. At 14, he was essentially kidnapped by his father and take to his uncle's farm in upstate New York, where his life changed dramatically. Dale grew strong and healthy from the strenuous work on the farm, and developed a loving relationship with his uncle Wallace. For the first time, he knew contentment. But when Dale's mother demanded that he return, he was forced to choose between his broken family and his uncle and land he had come to love. It was a decision that would determine his future and the legacy he would pass on to his own son. In "What We Lost", a story that startles in its immediacy and lack of sentimentality, Dale Peck refracts his father's past through the prism of his own vivid imagination, forging a bridge between generations and revealing the dark secrets at the heart of family.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Accomplished novelist Peck's account of his father's horrific 1950s Long Island childhood is reminiscent of Angela's Ashes both in scope and tone. This stateside reincarnation of a world dominated by an abusive alcoholic father may not leave readers laughing, but it certainly provides a similar lens on a boy's resilience and optimism. The story unfolds as Dale Peck Sr., at age 14, is rooted out of bed by his good-for-nothing father and unceremoniously dumped at an upstate New York dairy farm owned by his kind but unfamiliar Uncle Wallace. Peck Jr. (Now It's Time to Say Goodbye; The Law of Enclosures), writes a description of the journey from one world to another that is so evocative, it's easy to forget he wasn't actually the boy in the passenger's seat. About the frozen banks of a river they drive along, he writes, "The glacial shelves look like teeth to the boy, cartoon teeth breaking apart after biting on a rock hidden in blueberry pie, and the boy laughs quietly to himself when he imagines the river being fitted for dentures like the old man. A trip to the country, he reminds himself, attempting to relax again. A weekend adventure." This weekend adventure unfolds into months, then years, until finally Peck Sr.'s mother disrupts her son's haven by demanding his return to the misery of their overcrowded, impoverished household. The boy is torn, but ends up abandoning the warm web Wallace and his stoic wife, Bessie, have spun around him. He is quickly subsumed by the depressing life he narrowly escaped, and Peck subtly demonstrates how this determined boy will not just endure life, but embrace it.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

Peck's account of his father Dale's horrific upbringing stuns the reader with its juxtaposition of hope, sadness, and loss. In 1956, Dale lives with seven siblings in a small house on Long Island. Their father, Lloyd (the author's grandfather), comes home drunk most nights; their mother regularly beats Dale, her least favorite, with a garden hose. In an attempt to extricate Dale from this dead-end existence, Lloyd "kidnaps" his son and drives him to the Catskills, where Loyd's brother runs a dairy farm. For almost a year, Dale learns how to milk the cows and mend fences; more important, he is enveloped in his aunt and uncle's stable routine and learns for the first time about familial love and respect. He misses his siblings, of course, and when his mother arrives with the others in tow, demanding his return, Dale is faced with a cruel decision. The author, whose novels have been highly praised for their unforgettable prose, again enriches the reader with luminous language, shining like pearls in the midst of his father's wrenching tale. Deborah Donovan
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Granta Books (February 12, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1862076413
• ISBN-13: 978-1862076419
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.4 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.9 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,039,614 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars PICK A PECK..., November 18, 2003

By 

M. G. Jamison (Fairlawn, OH USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: What We Lost: Based on a True Story (Hardcover)

I'm a huge fan of Dale Peck's work, especially LAW OF ENCLOSURES (which has one of the best endings I've ever read). This new book is a memoir--or at least a re-imagining of his father's life on Long Island and in upstate New York--and it's beautifully written. I never expected to say Willa Cather and Dale Peck in the same sentence--except, perhaps, in a sentence like "Willa Cather could beat up Dale Peck,"--but the comparison here seems appropriate. It would be a crime to break this beautiful book down into "literary elements," but Peck is the best maker of similes around. There are so many stunning sentences here; I copied whole paragraphs and passed them out to my high school students as examples for writing. The slim last act of the book expands the focus to include Dale Peck the writer and becomes a meditation on fate and fatherhood and reconcilliation. And maybe forgiveness. I'm surprised there hasn't been more buzz about this book. I'm hoping for a review in the NYT or somewhere that will make people notice it. If not, you have this first review to urge you to read it.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A stunningly beautiful novel, November 18, 2003

By 

Matthew Krichman (Durango, CO) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: What We Lost: Based on a True Story (Hardcover)

"A meditation on the permanence of glancing moments..." A perfect description for this remarkable piece of writing. This book reads like a novel but is actually a true story about the author's father and his experience on his uncle's dairy farm as a child. You'll learn more from this book than just how to milk a cow. This book, in so subtle a way that you might not even notice, teaches a powerful lesson about the irreversible consequences of every decision, both big and small, that we make in life. Every moment of our lives will be with us forever, both in our memory and in the affect that it has on our future. Each step we take not only leads us somewhere but also takes us away from somewhere else.

Dale Peck is a writer of incredible grace. This book is divided into two parts, so extremely different from one another that you have to wonder for the first few pages of the second part whether you are even in the same story. But just as your confusion starts to turn to frustration, Peck ties his stories together in a beautiful and seamless way, building your anticipation and then slowly bringing you back down only to build it back up again even higher. This book is nothing short of masterful.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Keats and Fitzgerald would be very pleased indeed, May 13, 2004

By 

Peggy A. Harper (Los Gatos, CA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: What We Lost: Based on a True Story (Hardcover)

Dales Peck's writing is so beautiful and lyrical that at times you simply stop reading and stare at a phrase or sentence in amazement. Like this little gem at the beginning:

"It is too cold and the factory is six blocks away and the boy can smell little more than a ghost of sugar on the wet air, but in his mind the street is doughy as a county kitchen, and as he inhales he pretends he can sort the different odors of crumb and glazed and chocolate-covered donuts from an imaginary baker's hash of heat and wheat and yeast."

This sentence brings to mind the "valley of ashes" passage in Fitzgerald's GATSBY and is reminiscent, as well, of the first stanza in Keat's EVE OF ST. AGNES. Peck may just be the most lyrical writer we have today.