"It can be too sad here. We often lose our way." Anne Lamott's latest musing on faith focuses on the thorny parts of life and love—grief, anger, pain—and how to keep living throughout it all. Stitching together the ripped shreds of ourselves, she says, is the answer. Community, faith, music, even something as mundane as replacing smelly, stained floorboards—all of these help us sew our lives together and move on, stronger for the scar tissue that has knitted us whole again. Like many of Lamott's works on faith, Stitches blends deep and insightful theological musings with personal (and often funny) anecdotes from the writer's own life, managing to cover tropical vacations, cancer and wildfires in one slim volume.
Fans of Lamott (like myself) will love her latest foray into personal essays and her always profound mediations on life. However, when I say this is a slim volume, I mean it—the book clocks in at less than a hundred pages, and at times it feels like even that could be tightened up. But for readers willing to endure a little drifting and repetition, Stitches offers up gems worth ruminating on for weeks. Excellent for readers of faith and memoir writing, especially fans of Anna Quindlen and Sue Monk Kidd.