The story unfolds through journal-like entries, which is really effective in offering intimate glimpses into Ruth’s state of mind. It informed my writing, but wasn’t the reason I wrote this book. But I’m hesitant to place too much emphasis on it, because though it resembled Howard’s at times, her experience was very different, and our relationship was nothing like Ruth and Howard’s in my book. I’m often asked if I have personal experience with Alzheimer’s and I do-my late grandmother had Alzheimer’s. But I do know about career-related ambivalence, about heartbreak and about anger. My father doesn’t have Alzheimer’s, I’ve never had a fiancé break up with me, and I’ve never spent a year at home being a caretaker. How much of this story is drawn from your own life experiences? Khong, the former executive editor of Lucky Peach magazine and the author of All About Eggs: Everything We Know About the World’s Most Important Food, makes us laugh once again as she shares the secret behind her first novel’s diary style and shakes her fist at memory. In poignant and often hilarious journal-like entries, Ruth charts the joys and sadness of her days at home and ultimately her journey through grief. Rachel Khong makes her fiction debut with the small-but-mighty Goodbye, Vitamin, the story of 30-year-old Ruth, who moves home to help care for her aging father, Howard, who was recently diagnosed with Alzheimer’s.
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