MARC Record from Library of Congress

LEADER: 03406cam a2200433 i 4500
001 2013045780
003 DLC
005 20141230080455.0
008 140224s2014 nyu 000 0aeng
010 $a 2013045780
020 $a9781476761213 (hardback : alkaline paper)
020 $a9781476761220 (paperback : alkaline paper)
020 $z9781476761244 (ebook)
040 $aDLC$beng$cDLC$erda$dDLC
042 $apcc
043 $an-us---$an-us-pa
050 00 $aCT275.M4923$bA3 2014
082 00 $a920.09748/11$223
084 $aBIO026000$aBIO007000$aSOC036000$2bisacsh
100 1 $aMeredith, Andrew,$d1975-
245 14 $aThe removers :$ba memoir /$cAndrew Meredith.
250 $aFirst Scribner hardcover edition.
264 1 $aNew York :$bScribner,$c2014.
300 $a179 pages ;$c24 cm
336 $atext$2rdacontent
337 $aunmediated$2rdamedia
338 $avolume$2rdacarrier
520 2 $a"A dark, poignant, and emotionally brave coming-of-age memoir: the story of a young man who, by handling the dead, makes peace with the living. For almost twenty years I mistook my father's downfall as my own. But it wasn't. It was not my sister's either, nor my mother's. A literature professor at La Salle University, Andrew Meredith's father was fired after unspecified allegations of sexual misconduct. It's a transgression Andrew cannot forgive, for it brought about long-lasting familial despair. In the wake of the scandal, Andrew's parents limp along, trapped in an unhappy marriage. Meanwhile, Andrew treads water, stuck in a kind of suspended adolescence--falling in and out of school, moving blindly from one half-hearted relationship to the next, slowly killing the nights drinking beer and listening to music with his childhood friends. Broke, Andrew moves back home to his childhood neighborhood in northeast Philadelphia and takes a job alongside his father as a 'remover,' the name for those unseen, unsung workers who take away the bodies of those who die at home. He describes, as only a professional can do, the intimate, horrific, poignant, and occasionally morbidly comedic aspects of handling the dead. Just how do you carry a 500-pound corpse down winding stairs? What actually happens to pacemakers, tooth fillings, surgical screws, artificial hips, and anything else that the deceased has within his or her body? Andrew begins to see his father not through the lens of a wronged and resentful child, but as a sympathetic, imperfect man who loves his family despite his flaws. Eventually the chip on his shoulder starts to lose its weight. Poetic without being florid, and with the literary ability to transform the naturally grotesque into the exquisite, The Removers is a searing story of a young man who finds in death a redemptive path toward the forgiveness of the living, including himself"--$cProvided by publisher.
600 10 $aMeredith, Andrew, 1975-
600 10 $aMeredith, Andrew, 1975-$xFamily.
650 0 $aYoung men$zUnited States$vBiography.
650 0 $aFathers and sons$zUnited States.
650 0 $aComing of age.
650 0 $aForgiveness.
650 0 $aCorpse removals$zPennsylvania$zPhiladelphia.
651 0 $aPhiladelphia (Pa.)$vBiography.
650 7 $aBIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / Personal Memoirs.$2bisacsh
650 7 $aBIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / Literary.$2bisacsh
650 7 $aSOCIAL SCIENCE / Death & Dying.$2bisacsh