The Longest Trip Home: A Memoir
by John Grogan
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Book Reviews of The Longest Trip Home: A Memoir
Book Review: Readers will be grateful for this poignant treasure chest of moments that stuck for John Grogan --- and to him for sharing them
Summary: 5 Stars
Many of us feel we know and love John Grogan's rambunctious dog Marley and, by extension, Grogan himself. The author treats us to more of his hilarious and heartbreaking storytelling in this memoir centered on his beloved parents.
The senior Grogans lived their lives around the Catholic Church. They attended mass, collected and displayed religious objects in their home (at one time, John counted 42 Virgin Marys alone) and entertained priests. On vacations, they trekked to holy miracle sites. John's parents were deeply religious, always guided by the Church. Immaculate Conception was a fact, and each of the Grogan children honored that miracle in their names: Mary Josephine, Timothy Joseph, Michael Joseph and John Joseph.
Young John was a rambunctious handful who had a hard time even sitting still. He recalls his young boyhood as a "dreamy, wondrous time," filled with his warm, loving parents, his siblings and his many neighborhood pals. The setting for his childhood was the marvelous Harbor Hills near Detroit, where the boys congregated on The Outlot, a grassy field surrounding a boat basin. In the summer, John and his buddies swam in the lake. But no matter what the Grogan children did, they realized they were first and foremost Catholics. That knowledge comforted them when they were very young, but it came along with an expectation that would haunt John his entire life. The elder Grogans dreamed that their kids would grow up as deeply believing, practicing Catholics. And that turned out to be a problem.
Even as a boy, John had issues with Catholic expectations. In 1964, the nuns at his Our Lady of Refuge school began preparing his class for a milestone: their First Holy Confession. John was just a second-grader but already had lust issues. He was smitten with the next-door neighbor, Mrs. Selahowski, who spent every sunny moment working on her tan in a tiny two-piece bathing suit. John knew that coveting his neighbor's wife was a grave mortal sin. Yet he managed to top it by imagining a bit of a strip tease performed by his teacher, young Sister Mary Lawrence. Although the disrobing was only in his mind, the physical effect was quite visible to all when he was called upon to stand and read. How could he discuss his rides on the "Mortal Sin Express" in the confessional? John soothed himself with the reminder that confessions are anonymous. But on the big day, a mishap made it all too obvious to the priest that it was John Grogan in the confessional, resulting in yet another side-splitting episode.
THE LONGEST TRIP HOME follows John's life and his relationship with his mom and dad up to the present. When John leaves home he also leaves the church, which puts him deep in a quandary regarding his parents and their beliefs. The resulting rift will continue to trouble him as he marries a woman who isn't Catholic, has children he chooses to guide in his own way, and then sees his parents decline into age and ill health. His yearning to fulfill their ultimate dreams is always hopeless and sometimes heartbreaking.
This real-life coming-of-age story is a tender and touching tribute to parents Grogan loves and respects. Many anecdotes are hilarious. Some may well move readers to tears, such as when his super-conservative parents express pride in him for publishing a subversive underground newspaper. He displays his knack with comical descriptions to great advantage (he likens making out with an orthodontically challenged girl to "French kissing with a power tool") while giving us much to ponder.
At one point, after a disastrous sail with his father in which he realizes Dad is getting old, Grogan says that "there are moments in life that fade from memory so quickly they are gone almost before they are over. Then there are those that stick, the ones we carry with us through the years like parcels of clarity stitched close to our hearts, becoming part of who we are." Readers will be grateful for this poignant treasure chest of moments that stuck for John Grogan --- and to him for sharing them with us.
--- Reviewed by Terry Miller Shannon
Book Review: A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Disappointment
Summary: 1 Stars
If you don't have time to read this whole review, here's the summary: If you love our Catholic faith, don't read this. You will be sorely disappointed at the story of a man who casts aside what is most important to his parents with hardly any consideration. If you want a great memoir about a young Catholic man who has come to appreciate the richness of Catholicism (and a book written with much more soul and humor) I highly recommend Matthew Lickona's Swimming with Scapulars. If I can convince just one person to pass on this book, I can feel I've accomplished something.
I loved Marley and Me. So obviously when I saw Grogan's follow-up had been released, I was intrigued. When I looked over the bookflap and the black and white photos on the cover, I was excited about the possibility of a memoir delving into the idiosyncracies of growing up in a Catholic American home. When I read the first 2 chapters, I was enthusiastic-a very promising start, a wrestling with the question of faith. From there, it became one of the most frustrating reads of my adult life. I am cursed with an inability to put down a book I've started. This was a very agravating read, my heart just dropped reading parts of it.
I wonder if this book is an agent's fault? I can imagine the conversation: "Marley and Me is doing great! What are you going to write about next!? We need to strike while the iron is hot!" "Oh, I don't know. Maybe I could write about growing up..." "Yes! Yes! That sounds great!" But it is not great. The beginning and end are good writing, but there is a lot of mediocre in between. Grogan desperately needed a friend to critique this melaise, but instead an editor allows sentences like "Family stories had always been the thread that stitched together the tapestry of our lives" to pass by unopposed and receive publication. Wow. That is profundity worthy of a Hallmark card. The story chronicles your typical adolescent searching for identity, but the problem, and it is a BIG problem, is that Grogan has apparently not matured in the following 30+ years and feels little to no remorse for oh, say...losing his virginity outside to an almost stranger after his dad tracks him down with a flashlight and says "Your mom is worried about you. Why don't you two come back to the house?" "Sure, Dad, we'll be there in 20 minutes." There is just so much lying, and it is all relayed with the bragging swagger of a college freshman, not a man who has kids of his own. Then he has the audacity to entitle Part 2: "Breaking Away" a pages later. I wanted to scream: YOU HAVE ALREADY BROKEN AWAY! HOW ELSE COULD YOU POSSIBLY BREAK WITH WHAT YOUR PARENTS UPHOLD!
As the end of the book approached, I began to hope that his parents would die before the end, just to have the consolation that they would not have to read his words of disrespect for what they treasured most. Whether it is him sharing how he received the Eucharist after his father's death, even though he knew it was against church law: "I didn't care...it was something I wanted to do" or being indignant when his parents weren't ecstatic after he joyfully told them he was moving in with his girlfriend. It is just baffling that a son could lack such a basic understanding of his parents even in hindsight. Grogan's wife displays blatant intolerance of religion, at one point recoiling from his mother's innocent blessing on the forehead with holy water. If Grogan's mother were a Jewish woman inviting her daughter to break matzo at a Seder meal, we would think Jenny cruelly insensitive and rude for refusing. But here, it's fine. The most heartbreaking scene in this book is the two sons praying the Our Father with their ailing dad, forgetting the words, and then beginning to snicker and giggle as they mumble their way through the prayer. "Dad just looked at us with tired resigned eyes."
Book Review: Touching memoir
Summary: 5 Stars
How do you follow a wonderful story about an unforgettable dog named Marley? Somehow John Grogan manages to do just that in his memoir about growing up, breaking away, and then bridging the gap between him and his parents. Grogan had a happy childhood, growing up in a strict Catholic family where attendance at Mass and performing other religious duties was mandatory. Despite his parents' vigilance, Grogran managed many mischievous incidents where he pulled the wool over his patient and loving parents' eyes. He also recounts awkward years when he was a pudgy, bespectacled teenager who longed for a girlfriend and recognition from his peers. He eventually attracted a girlfriend and became notorious for creating an underground newspaper in high school, neither accomplishment meeting the approval of his parents.
His relationship with his mother and father became very strained when he met and fell in love with a Protestant girl, and later moved in with her. His parents' disapproval was evident, and Grogan was torn between loyalty to his parents and his desire to be his own person.
It was not until his parents began aging and experiencing serious medical problems that Grogan began to fully appreciate them as people and put away old hurts and remorse. The theme of this book is a universal one and it is told with a wonderful mixture of humor and pathos. John Grogan has an easy and readable writing style and he creates another winner in this book about growing up, breaking away, and then taking the "Longest Trip Home".
Book Review: Grogan has remaining issues
Summary: 2 Stars
Interesting critique from my father:
I just finished the book by Grogan yesterday. I kind of got into it the last two days. He's an engaging writer and probably a good one. He writes of warm family relationships and I think he loves his family but he's a deceitful crud. No boys tell their parents everything they did as kids, but he was beyond that.
I felt there's a void in his life, though he professes life is great. I got the feeling near the end that he was very rueful of the way he'd deceived his parents over the years (and maybe sorry he'd lost any faith he ever had).
His working for the Herald -Palladium in St. Joe was interesting. I thought the way he accepted advancement(s) without discussing it with his girl friend showed what the guy is really like (self-centered...I think that showed throughout the book. He probably isn't even aware of it).
His treatment of many things sacred to Catholics, turned me off. His wasn't a light hearted "Black Patent Leather Shoes Shine Up". His angle was to demean the church, ultimately justifying his lack of faith by regurgitating the sex scandals among bishops and priests.
His parents were a little over the top but far better that way than to have nothing, faith-wise. To me, the writer is a talented guy who had a great success with "Marley and Me" but there is something missing in his life and he knows it. He's raising three kids with no religion. I wouldn't want that on me.
Anyway, I enjoyed the read. Thank you.
Book Review: Wonderful story of a family's love
Summary: 5 Stars
John Grogan is the youngest of Richard and Ruth Grogan's four children. The Grogans were devoted to each other and their Catholic religion. In The Longest Trip Home: A Memoir, John shares what it was like to grow up in this wonderful family. I laughed through the first half of the book as I read about his childhood exploits - setting off fireworks in a neighbor's yard; sneaking peeks at his father's photography magazines to see topless women; learning to smoke cigarettes, etc. - because his writing reminded me of what it's like to be young.
The middle of the book made me smile. After college, John met and fell in love with a woman who was not Catholic. His parents found this difficult to begin with, but learned to accept it. John's relationship with his wife forced him to be more honest with his parents and show them the man he is, and not the man he thought they wanted him to be.
I sobbed through the last part of this book as John and his siblings cared for their aging parents and coped with their father's death. This part of the book is a very moving tribute to his parents.
I adored this book. Maybe it's because I am about the same age as John and I remember the times he describes while growing up. Maybe it's because my parents are older and my sister and I are beginning to face some of the things John and his siblings did. Or, maybe it's just because it's a wonderful book. The Longest Trip Home: A Memoir is published by William Morrow and will be released on October 21.