notanotherbookreview

  The “good death” may seem elusive, or even impossible, but novelist Alison Jean Lester chronicles just that in her new memoir, Absolutely Delicious: A Chronicle of Extraordinary Dying (Bench Press, 10/22/20).   Lester reports surprising facts:  " My mother, Valerie Lester, died on the morning of June 7, 2019, of metastatic melanoma. I’m driven to write about it because her death was, by all the standards I can imagine, a good one. Not only was the moment of her death good; the weeks of decline leading to her death were good. And not only that; the eighteen months between her first dire prognosis and her death were some of the happiest months of her life. Her final moment was, I suppose, ordinary – she drew a last breath, devoid of drama, when her body could no longer maintain itself.  Her approach to dying, though? That was amazing" Valerie, a Pan Am hostess, met Alison's father on a plane, returning from the first American expedition of Mt. Everest. She later be...