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Summary
Summary
An unexpected, poignant, and personal account of loving and losing pets, exploring the singular bonds we have with our companion animals, and how to grieve them once they've passed.
E.B. Bartels has had a lot of pets--dogs, birds, fish, tortoises. As varied a bunch as they are, they've taught her one universal truth: to own a pet is to love a pet, and to own a pet is also--with rare exception--to lose that pet in time.
But while we have codified traditions to mark the passing of our fellow humans, most cultures don't have the same for pets. Bartels takes us from Massachusetts to Japan, from ancient Egypt to the modern era, in search of the good pet death. We meet veterinarians, archaeologists, ministers, and more, offering an idiosyncratic, inspiring array of rituals--from the traditional (scattering ashes, commissioning a portrait), to the grand (funereal processions, mausoleums), to the unexpected (taxidermy, cloning). The central lesson: there is no best practice when it comes to mourning your pet, except to care for them in death as you did in life, and find the space to participate in their end as fully as you can.
Punctuated by wry, bighearted accounts of Bartels's own pets and their deaths, Good Grief is a cathartic companion through loving and losing our animal family.
Author Notes
E.B. BARTELS is a former Newtonville Books bookseller and a GrubStreet instructor, with an MFA from Columbia. Her writing has been published in Catapult, The Rumpus, The Millions, and The Toast. She lives in the Greater Boston area.
Reviews (4)
Publisher's Weekly Review
In this offbeat yet heartfelt debut, essayist Bartels digs into the fraught topic of pet death, exploring the rise of pet cemeteries and other formal ways to recognize a beloved animal's passing to the mythical "Rainbow Bridge." Taking readers on a colorful tour of pet commemorations throughout the world and history--from the final resting place of Mariah Carey's 18-year-old cat in Hartsdale, N.Y., to the "lavish" 1787 memorial Mozart hosted for his pet starling, where mourners were all "heavily veiled"--Bartels demonstrates that such consideration of animals is not a new thing, nor is it confined to the U.S. Indeed, as Bartels writes, "ancient Egyptians treasured intimate relationships with their pets; it wasn't uncommon for an entire household to go into mourning when a pet cat died." Taxidermy, cloning, and mummification may be extreme, but Bartels covers these often exorbitantly priced rituals (mummifying a pet can set one back $28,000) with pathos and wit, and lends her narrative a touching personal spin by documenting the demise of her scaled and feathered childhood companions, including, among her many "temporary pets," an unfortunate goldfish--"the flushing/reanimation trauma was acute enough that for all future fish deaths, I switched to burial." Animal lovers shouldn't pass up this illuminating and thoroughly charming work. (Aug.)
Kirkus Review
A pet dies. Then what? "When we open our hearts to animals," Bartels observes, "death is the inevitable price." At the age of 5, she grieved for her first pet: a fish. A bird died when she was 9; a friend's hamster, in her care, unexpectedly succumbed; another fish died when she was in college; and she's mourned many other animals, too, including several dogs. In her appealing debut book, the author examines the process of grief that follows the loss of a pet, recounting her own experiences; talking with veterinarians, ministers, archaeologists, and many pet owners; reading pet owners' memoirs; and looking at ways that other cultures deal with animals' deaths. She also recounts her visits to pet cemeteries, some of which allow humans and pets to be buried together. Japan has established hundreds of pet cemeteries, many operated by Buddhist temples. At Dog Mountain, in St. Johnsbury, Vermont, founded by an artist known for his woodblock prints of his black Lab, a small chapel welcomes pet owners who come to "reflect on and memorialize and remember their pet" with photographs and written tributes. Although Bartels acknowledges that pet ownership falls largely to White Americans with disposable income, she discovered that attachment to pets has a long history. For example, an Egyptologist specializing in animal mummies told her that some mummified animals surely were beloved pets. Grieving pet owners have resorted to taxidermy and even cloning to keep some physical evidence of their pet's existence. At a cost of $50,000, though, cloning is a choice most people can't afford. Bartels warmly describes her connections to all of her pets, even her first fish. Pets, she writes, "bolster your emotional state," accept your hugs and kisses, listen to your most intimate confidences, and provide "companionship, completely without judgment." Because sadness over an animal's death is rarely shared, the author hopes her book will help grieving pet owners find solace. A warm homage to a special bond. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
These deeply personal and heartfelt stories will affect anyone who has had a pet and those that haven't will better understand the bonds of those who do. Each chapter relates stories of Bartels' pets throughout her life, as well as how humans deal with the loss of a pet. In her first chapter about losing her pet fish, she learns that "laying out offerings, creating tombstones, and burying a pet . . . people have been doing this since at least 3000 BCE." She also describes ways in which people honor their pets whether through mummification (which is done today by a group called the Summum in Utah), pet burials, taxidermy, or cloning. She talks to owners about the grieving process, including owners of guide dogs, whose life spans are often shorter than other dogs due to stress. In other chapters, Bartels relates stories from vets about euthanasia and how to decide when the time has come to discuss this with owners, as well as providing emotional and sometimes monetary support for them. Providing touching and sometimes funny stories about pet love and loss illuminates our human desire to bond with and honor our fellow creatures.
Library Journal Review
Bartels has had more pets than most, with animals ranging from fish to birds to dogs, and everything else in between. While we have rituals and traditions to mark the passing of humans, we do not always have those for our beloved companion animals. And, often, the grief for a pet is seen as less than that of grief for a human loved one. Bartels explores the various traditions and beliefs that cultures around the world have for pets. She also shares stories of her beloved animals. Narrator Eileen Stevens gives a nuanced performance, skillfully conveying the more poignant moments of the book as well as the lighter sections, making this potentially heavy topic more accessible. Bartel shows that grief transcends not only time and space, but also species, and that our grief for lost animals is just as real as it is for our human family. VERDICT Bartel's debut is sure to appeal to animal lovers. Recommend to fans of Caitlin Doughty's Smoke Gets in Your Eyes and Mary Roach's Stiff.--Elyssa Everling
