Losing motivation,
losing opportunities,
losing memories – forever?
Before Alzheimer’s takes everything away from his grandfather, Ted promises to get him back East, to where Gpa and Gma were married – even though the teen poet can’t drive and Gpa must stay at Calypso. Enter guitar-playing Corrina yearning to escape her adoptive parents’ demands to conform – road trip time!
(Today, I’m at a funeral for yet another person whose time with children and grandchildren was stolen away by this terrible disease, despite all their love and excellent care… )
What’s your favorite road trip story?
**kmm
Book info: The Last True Love Story / Brendan Kiely. Margaret McElderry Books, 2016. [author site] [publisher site] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.
My book talk: Teddy would do anything for the grandfather who raised him, but a roadtrip to the church back east where Gpa and Gma were married is impossible, until Corrina says road trip and the teen poet says yes.
Of course, they can get to Ithaca from Los Angeles before Alzheimer’s takes away Gpa’s memories of Gma his true love, with the help of Ted’s hard-rocking classmate Corrina (who can drive) and Mom’s car (she can’t use it when overseas for business all the time) and the magic of GPS.
Some days on the road are good, like when Corrina plays the music that Gpa and Gma loved when he was a Marine in Vietnam or when she opens up to him about being adopted from Guatemala and not meeting her white parents’ career expectations.
Other days aren’t so good, like when Gpa thinks Teddy is not his grandson, but his son who died in a car crash near Ithaca, leaving behind his California wife, child, and bitterness.
Can Teddy capture this last story in the Hendrix Family Book so he can tell it to Gpa again and again?
Will Corrina’s guitar or Teddy’s poetry keep them safe?
Can they really get to Ithaca before a Silver Alert gets them?
Love and family, truth and half-truths, a road trip worth every bump and mile. (One of 6,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com)
