Drawing on her life experiences, Domenica Ruta delivers a thoughtful exploration of what addiction means in our lives, and how the startling truths they reveal have the power to change us. We were all incredibly impressed with Domenica this week, and it was an amazing treat to have her on campus. The students and faculty all responded positively. She was more than welcome at College of DuPage. Everything was great. Domenica was super with the students. They were very engaged.
The evening reading went well also. She had lots of really great advice. It was a successful day. It centers on May 28, a day celebrated throughout the world as "Last Day", ie: the world will literally end.
Despite the world going on, this day has been a holiday throughout different cultures for thousands of years, and Ruta does a nice job of exploring how different parts of the world observe it. Many do irresponsible things, and Americans usually have a big bonfire, everyone burning something symbolic.
The book bounces between characters, and while at first they seem random, their interconnectedness surfaces in interesting degrees. However, I had major issues with the ending, both the actual story, and how the story is written, that really reduced my enjoyment of the book. Feb 20, Ashley rated it liked it Shelves: arc. I was drawn in by the premise I love a good old apocalypse and especially by the comparison to Station Eleven. While I did enjoy the prose, I never felt a connection to any of the characters, so most of the story felt like it was dragging on while I was just trying to find out what happened next.
I didn't really care what happened to any of these people. Station Eleven this is not -- the comparison stops at the apocalyptic theme. That said, since I only finish about 2. May 09, Ian Mond rated it really liked it. My review of this novel is published in the July issue of Locus. Shelves: fic , realistic-fic , drama-family , fic-gen-lit , stand-alone-bk , form-print , sci-fi-and-futuristic , dystop-and-post-apoc , contemp-and-modern , arc-adv-rdrs-copy.
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. I'm not going in to all the details of the book however I might inadvertently give away some things just by sheer connecting the dots with the review. I know I know. I will say Just wow In very broad, general words, the book follows a group of individuals up to - and including - an annual, global event called "Last Day".
According to the book, it is based on an "ancient holiday" - supposedly back to Babylonian times, according to a report by one of the characters - which marked the belief of the end of the world. You follow these people through their days, and the way they see this celebration "in" and "out" of their lives, firmly believing that - as always - life will go on.
Each human being has their own views of the world, of people, of how things "work", their own obstacles and short-comings and even lessons learned and to be learned. For the most part, the story is an easy, straight-going read.
The author does a good job of helping the reader feel and understand what each person is experiencing and thinking and wondering. What was also interesting to note - and it isn't noticeable at first, and even when it is, it is so subtle and takes a while to piece together - is how each person affects the other - sort of like the "six degrees of separation" concept. I thought I saw the eventual outcome of the story however The way the bulk of the book had been heading, I did not really see it coming.
I will say that what is more disturbing - or maybe more like troubling? I think, besides the act of telling a story, the book is also a lesson - or maybe a warning? Our existence, our loves, the planet we call "home" Because at any given point, any of them might just say "enough". Jan 02, Kristi rated it it was ok Shelves: fiction.
First off, what a horribly depressing book. All of the characters were pretty miserable in their own lives and made decisions that did not improve their quality of life. I kept waiting for interaction between the three main stories, but there was none. Then near the end of the book, Ruta throws in a few paragraphs of rando First off, what a horribly depressing book. Then near the end of the book, Ruta throws in a few paragraphs of random people right before the world ends One of the few saving graces of this book is that the writing was quite good.
I just wish the content had kept up. I suggest reading those two books instead of this one. May 02, Annie rated it liked it. On the night of May May 28 on an alternate earth, people around the world celebrate Last Night. The holiday has ancient roots. All of the characters are isolated from their friends and families for a variety of reasons. All are seeking something—a sense of connect On the night of May May 28 on an alternate earth, people around the world celebrate Last Night.
All are seeking something—a sense of connection, most of all—and all of them struggle to relate to the people around them. In addition to all this is the lingering question: what if this Last Night is the Last Night? Read the rest of my review at A Bookish Type. I received a free copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley, for review consideration.
Last Day by Domenica Ruta describes how different people "celebrate" the Last Day, a yearly holiday in anticipating of the end of the world. Focusing on several characters, including a team on an international space station, a tattoo artist, a teen girl, Ruta depicts existential dread in various forms and flavors. I really liked the different characters, and the ending definitely stuck with me. It's very bleak and dark with unlikable characters, which worked for me in this book though I don't a Last Day by Domenica Ruta describes how different people "celebrate" the Last Day, a yearly holiday in anticipating of the end of the world.
It's very bleak and dark with unlikable characters, which worked for me in this book though I don't always enjoy it in other contexts. Unlike other reviewers, I somehow missed the comparison to Station Eleven, which is probably for the best. May 27, Robin rated it really liked it Shelves: fiction , end-of-the-world-or-not , Every May 28, people around the world celebrate Last Day. Each culture, in their own ways and rituals, gather to spend the day as their last. In this story we meet several characters interwoven throughout the book.
Three astronauts on the International Space Station, a tattoo artist, and a Jehovah Witness woman, are just a few people we meet celebrating this ancient holiday.
I love books and movies exploring the end of earth. This book is a good addition to the genre. I liked the writing, the c Every May 28, people around the world celebrate Last Day. I liked the writing, the characters were interesting, and the ending, well Great move to publish on May Thank you NetGalley. Sep 14, Shawn Ingle rated it it was ok. Good writing, ok story. The characters were somewhat interesting but none particularly likeable and failed to make me feel invested in their journeys.
May 22, Leighellen Landskov rated it liked it Shelves: read-in This is a really interesting and unique novel. A part of me wants to mull it over for a week or two before writing my review, but I decided to write while it's all still fresh in my head and I'm a little unsteady about the whole thing. The concept pulled me in - all across earth, people from around the world are celebrating a holiday called Last Day.
It was predicted long ago that the world would end on a certain day, so every year on the day before it is supposed to happen, people gather in pre This is a really interesting and unique novel. It was predicted long ago that the world would end on a certain day, so every year on the day before it is supposed to happen, people gather in preparation.
Every culture honors it a little differently. Some people go around asking for forgiveness or redemption. Some people burn items of importance. Some towns host parades. This isn't a linear story or a traditional novel with a protagonist and a problem to solve. This book has MANY stories and follows several main characters.
It reads more like multiple short stories, with all stories focussing on the theme of how they each chose to honor Last Day. It can be tough in the beginning since each character is so vastly different - from a middle aged astronaut at a space station to a teenage girl at home with her family and everything in between - and you wonder how it all comes together. I ended up making a chart to keep track of who was who.
This helped me as the novel progressed and bounced around from each location. What works with this format is the authors ability to look at traditions and superstitions. By swapping viewpoints throughout the novel, the author is able to cast a bigger picture of how Last Day works and allow us to get a feel for overall society's mindset at this time and space. What results is deep dive into each characters while still getting a birds eye view of the entire world.
It reminded me somewhat of There There but with less emotional attachment to the characters. In this book, however, the individual character maps don't ever cross each other. They aren't meant to come together but rather form your perception of Last Day and make you think - what would YOU do? I loved the historical markers throughout the novel where the author explained how certain traditions came about throughout time or how some were changed and why.
It allowed the author to make us think about several social issues, religion, and culture without it becoming a book focussed on those issues. The exploration of all these things rises organically out of the characters living their lives, and is never preachy or judgemental. It does make you ponder why we do what we do culturally - how did Santa come about from baby Jesus?
This book is unsettling, but I think it is supposed to be. Not all of the characters are likable and neither are their Last Day choices - but I think that's the point. Some people seek redemption in the end while others want one last hoorah. Would you recommend writers pursue an MFA? Not unless it is fully funded. Read every single interview in the Paris Review instead; you will learn there are as many different ways to write a book as there are writers.
Read widely across genres and write terrible drafts of things you are ashamed of. But if an MFA program is fully funded, then definitely go. I am human and flawed and this is never more evident than when I see it spelled out in my words on a screen or a sheet of paper.
That is the craft. That is what makes a writer: the willingness to rewrite a thousand times if necessary. Ten Questions. Domenica Ruta, author of Last Day. Domenica Ruta broods. She wallows. And doesn't shut She doesn't seem to get the fact that having bad shit happen to you doesn't make you special, it just makes you normal.
And that's boring. Two stars for the couple of well-written sections, but, overall View all 13 comments. Mar 07, Victoria Weinstein rated it liked it. I would classify this as a parasitic memoir where the author isn't a very interesting character at all, but serves up a charismatic abuser for public consumption with no sense of respect for that person's privacy or complexity.
Domenica Ruta is a good writer but she has nothing to reveal about herself that isn't intimately connected to, and blamed on, her toxic mother Kathi. The chronology of the book is a mess -- either tell a story in order or chuck that structure out the window!
I don't think I would classify this as a parasitic memoir where the author isn't a very interesting character at all, but serves up a charismatic abuser for public consumption with no sense of respect for that person's privacy or complexity.
I don't think Ruta has the necessary distance, time or insight to do anything original in the genre. I was left totally perplexed as to how she earned her scholarships and grants for writer' workshops -- there has to be more there than "I was smart" or "I drank a lot and wrote.
WHY did she write? I wanted to hear much more about the inner life of an artist who is in so much pain and so drug addled and still able to function well enough to earn grants and scholarships and invitations to writing workshops. What was with the long, strange tacked on chapter about her dog?
There's a lot of craft here but no real insight. A lot of blame and showcasing of mom's craziness, but no writerly voice. I also admit that I think it's a nasty bit of business to author a ripping condemnation of one's mother while she's still alive. It feels like a really tacky bit of exploitation and revenge. I live in the Boston area and really appreciated Ruta's ability to capture the area. I loved her description of working in the nursing home -- it was the only truly clear-eyed bit of the book.
The rest of her story needs more time to marinate. I am guessing, for instance, that not "all" of the students at Andover had Laura Ashley bedspreads and that not "all" of the students at Oberlin were stoners.
Only time can lend Ruta some perspective. I'd appreciate hearing her revisit this complicated material again in 20 years. Jan 16, Regina rated it it was amazing Shelves: 80s-nostalgia , growing-up , broke-my-heart , beautiful , arc-publisher-netgalley-edelweiss , crazy-stuff-i-didnt-know-existed , non-fiction , memoir.
Although the subject matter is ugly and disturbing, Ruta writes it in such a beautifully and addictive way. I could not put this book down. I felt like crying and I did laugh out loud multiple times.
Ruta has a gift for taking the reader where she wants and giving the reader an experience of a new and different life. Domenica often goes to school in dirty, worn out clothes and describes herself unfairly to be an unattractive young girl. Both parents are unprepared to parent, not entirely unwilling to parent, but unprepared.
Pride like this is both tyrannical and tragic, for the chief function of pride is to usher in the fall. Dominica grew up in a household where she was repeatedly told that she was unattractive, was strewn with garbage and drug paraphernalia and yet, she loved to read, she loved to learn and she was driven to succeed.
How does this happen? How does a drug running and drug-using mother raise an author? She learns about boarding school, ballet lessons and makes these happen for her daughter. Despite living in poverty and being relatively uneducated herself, she is determined to give her daughter these opportunities.
She seemed relieved. Stories about mothers and alcohol abuse are usually not my thing, but I loved this book. If you like to read and experience something different from who you are, this book will take you there. View 1 comment. Dec 12, Meghan rated it did not like it. Although this memoir manages to keep the reader interested, it lacks conviction and reliability. Perhaps the backlash surrounding James Frey's Million Little Pieces biased me while reading, but Nikki's story just didn't seem to add up.
As things such as university enrollment and graduation can be fact-checked but le Although this memoir manages to keep the reader interested, it lacks conviction and reliability.
As things such as university enrollment and graduation can be fact-checked but level of drug abuse cannot, there was a sense of exaggeration for dramatic affect when it came to her substance abuse.
Her story just didn't feel believable. The author's tendency to gloss over events was also problematic.
There are no rules that require an author to include every single moment in a memoir, it's okay to leave out parts of one's life. But if an author does include something, they need to commit to it.
Otherwise, it tells the reader "I don't trust you or care about you enough to tell you the truth'- not something one's reader should feel if you want them to care about the story. Another hindrance was the lack of narrative flow. She does state that for recovering addicts, memories return in no particular order. This may be true, but it doesn't make for a strong piece of writing. The author jumps from one time period to another, within the same chapter and even section of a chapter, without any reasoning or even connection.
There isn't enough direction to feel like a real story but the disjointedness does not seem purposeful enough to be a piece of stream-of-consciousness writing. Stories, thoughts, and ideas are half-formed but not in an artistic or meaningful way- or in a way that makes it clear the half-formation is intentional.
It reads like an ENGL paper where the writer has some good ideas but either doesn't know how to develop them or doesn't care to and believes they can get a good grade with half-assed work.
I ended up with the feeling that the author's process was to sit down and make a list of memories as they came into her head and then just stick in some sentences around them. This is too bad. There is a potential for a powerful memoir in this book but it doesn't make it. I am a bit surprised this memoir reached publication, to the point where I wonder if perhaps someone felt asking a recovering addict to re-edit their life story was inappropriate.
But a published memoir isn't an AA soliloquy; it should be a piece of strong literary work and Ruta's book just isn't at that point. Criticisms aside for the moment, this is an enjoyable enough read to kill some time. However, I wouldn't recommend it and will most likely forget I read it as soon as I finished.
Nikki Ruta may have some potential as an author, but she will need to refine or at least select her style and engage in more rigorous editing. May 28, Deborah Bluminberg rated it it was ok. This book has such great reviews, and I heard the author's interview on NPR, so I was eager to read this book, and now that I have, I can't figure out what all the hoopla is about.
The writing is very good, almost lyrical in some places. The story, however, is a very different story. Nikki's mother is an alcoholic and drug addict. They live a totally chaotic, dysfunctional life. The house is a run down shack filled with trash and a steady stream of drug addicts coming and going.
Nikki falls into This book has such great reviews, and I heard the author's interview on NPR, so I was eager to read this book, and now that I have, I can't figure out what all the hoopla is about. Nikki falls into the same substance abuse habits of her mother, yet, she manages to excel in a private prep school, she gets into Oberlin College, gets accepted into a Master's level writing program at the University of Texas.
Meantime, her mother, with a heavy drug habit, takes over a failing cab company and turns it into a million dollar business. Nothing in this book makes much sense. And it's repetitive--the mother is high and neglectful, Nikki is lonely and miserable and makes bad choices, over and over and over. And, at the end, there is a section that talks about the dogs the various family members have owned over the years. What the hell was that??? The good prose of this book does not make up for its poor story line.
View all 5 comments. Feb 26, Julie G rated it really liked it Shelves: reviewed. It only took a few pages of With or Without You: A Memoir, before I needed to flip back to the beginning, and remind myself that this wasn't fiction. First, because it is incredibly well-written; far better than any memoir and some fiction I've ever read. Last, because it is incredibly awful; the situation, not the book. One wonders how someone - anyone - could go through what Ruta does and come out sane or sober.
Though, for several years, it appears she embraced little of either. Which is not It only took a few pages of With or Without You: A Memoir, before I needed to flip back to the beginning, and remind myself that this wasn't fiction. Which is not surprising, when you consider that one of her favorite activities with Kathi was acting out scenes from 'Mommie Dearest'. What a field day Freud would have had with this mother-daughter duo. It is difficult to imagine that such an ugly story could be so compelling.
I think what kept me from putting this book down, beyond the amazing writing, was hope. In the face of overwhelming addiction and hereditary dysfunction, I kept hoping that Kathi would get it together; that she and Nikki would both grow up and forge a healthy relationship.
I don't know if I was projecting my personal desires or channeling young Nikki's. And I certainly won't tell you if I got my wish. That would be cheating. I will tell you that this was a difficult review to write, without indulging in an emotional purge. I found myself identifying, heavily, with certain passages.
So much so, that it took me a while to step back at the end. With or Without You - were it fiction - would be a worthwhile addition to any library. As the dark, almost macabre, true story of one girl's struggle to understand and survive her own life, it is a must-have. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. Nov 12, Judy rated it it was amazing Shelves: memoir. This memoir came into my hands in advance reader's edition form. It will be released in February, I devoured it in one gulp.
It came with high praise from Amy Bloom and Gary Shteyngart. The marketing person compared it favorably to The Glass Castle. All good.
But for at least 50 pages I was underwhelmed. Where was the lyricism of The Glass Castle? Where was the "darkly hilarious" tone? I admit those 50 pages went by in a flash but couldn't say why.
So yes, bad mother on drugs, poverty, crazy This memoir came into my hands in advance reader's edition form. So yes, bad mother on drugs, poverty, crazy unstable life, addiction, blah, blah, blah.
The kid turns out to be a reader, the mom does a couple actual helpful things, and this girl, who by middle school was hooked on OxyContin, managed to graduate with good grades from high school and college, while getting into a prestigious MFA program.
Did I mention that she also became an alcoholic? Try as I might to analyze what happened, all I know is that I got hooked on Domenica Ruta's deadpan, affectless prose.
Then when she finally figured out that to survive she needed to lose the mom, I had to find out how she did it. Because the truth that makes this memoir real is that we love our mothers no matter who they are or what they do. Even the best, most perfect moms can haunt you; the poisonous ones are an addiction in themselves.
Final analysis: With or Without You is powerful, possibly a classic in the memoir genre, and does not sugarcoat the damage done nor what it takes to live with said damage. Not exactly inspiring, definitely sobering no pun intended. Apr 07, Diane Yannick rated it really liked it.
Domenica Ruta survived a brutal relationship with her single mother, Kathi. The kind where pot was given as a Christmas present and endless supplies of Oxycontin were shared. The kind where Domenica was encouraged to stay home from school and watch good movies and eat ice cream for breakfast. Kathi was described by her daughter as "a narcotic omnivore" and having a "spiritual autoimmune disease".
Pretty accurate descriptions from what she told us. Her mother paid her tuition to parochial school Domenica Ruta survived a brutal relationship with her single mother, Kathi. Her mother paid her tuition to parochial school by selling a brick of cocaine, and later insisted that she apply to Andover. Yet after she was there she tried to get her to drop out and get pregnant.
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