Reading this book is like having a conversation with an intelligent, wise*, interesting, very open person. A conversation, because some of the things the author says resonate despite our differences in age, upbringing, and nationality. For example, she describes how while falling asleep she imagines herself drifting on a raft at a dark sea. For me, it is a canoe and a large, Amazon-like river at night.
But the book of an octogenarian author, who became famous in her seventies about life and death is better than a conversation because a dialogue is fleeting like a rainbow, but the book remains – to be shared. The prose is beautiful as well as befits to a long time editor.
I wish my local library had more books by Diana Athill.
Go Yeast 