The Weight of Heaven by Thrity Umrigar
This was another treasure of a book I found on the shelves of a local Goodwill.
This author has been recommended to me many times over—and I can not remember who it was who did so 🤦♀️.
Whoever you were out there, let me just say THANK YOU.
Wow. This was a searing, emotional, impactful and heart crumbling book….and this author is just INCREDIBLE.
Yall know some of my most favorite types of books are those that not only get all up in your heart and make you feel all kinds of feels, but also get all up in your brain and make you think all kinds of thoughts.
Definitely a heavy read but truly a great one.
Also the first read I have completed while I am quarantining. The damn Covid finally arrived in our house and I am the first victim to the germs.
Thankfully, we are all vaxxed and boosted as much as we can be, so science is doing it’s job and my symptoms are only that of a typical cold.
So far, nobody else in the house is positive and nobody else has symptoms, but I’m isolating in my room away from everyone for a few days until they can retest.
Netflix and books and my cat have been my companions thus far.
Let’s get back to what you came here for—a dang book review 📚😃
Here is the official summary:
“When Frank and Ellie Benton lose their only child, seven year old Benny, to a sudden illness, the perfect life they had built is shattered. Filled with wrenching memories, their Ann Arbor home becomes unbearable, and their marriage founders.
Then, an unexpected job half a world away in Girbaug, India, offers them an opportunity to start again.
But Frank’s befriending of Ramesh-a bright, curious boy who quickly becomes the focus of his attentions-will lead the grieving man down an ever-darkening path with stark repurcussions.
A devastating look at cultural clashes and divides, this novel is a rare glimpse of a family and a country struggling under pressures beyond their control.”
Frank and Ellie’s loss of their son was SO hard to read about in these pages. The author writes so vividly and is able to describe their emotional and physical reactions so well that the reader can truly FEEL their pain and sorrow dripping off of the pages.
They are living every parents WORST nightmare….a tragedy that is just so inconceivable to understand.
As a mom to two kiddos myself, I kept putting myself into their narrative as I read thru their journey.
Would I feel guilt the same way Ellie did? Would I feel constant anger as Frank did? Would I be able to move on like they tried to do?
Ohhhh…yall.
When I say it got me in all in the feels, I wish I could underline that about 10 times.
It was so difficult to read as I saw and felt their grief and then watched how their journey continue to unfold as they tried to start anew.
But, this story is not just one about grieving parents and how each one processes the loss of their child, but also about the dangers of globalization, classism, and whiteness as well.
It shows how deep white supremacy runs in the veins of Americans…even those who are self professed “progressive liberals”…how truly ingrained ideas of superiority, biases, and stereotypes are within and how toxic and damaging they can be not just to individual human beings, but also to entire communities and people groups.
What struck me the most is how accurate the individualism and willful cultural ignorance of Americans (ESPECIALLY white Americans) is portrayed in this story.
How even those who are quite vocal about their lofty ideas of equality and unity from afar at protests and political rallies and dinner parties can so quickly weaponize their whiteness when it can affect and benefit their personal lives.
Being an ally for the oppressed turns out to be just empty words when power or status or livelihood is threatened or changed.
Whew.
She seriously personifies ALL OF THIS in Frank, Ellie and the other white Americans in these pages.
In the back of the book, there is are a couple pages where the author explains WHY she wrote this book:
“…it became obvious to me what issues I was interested in tackling in this novel: One, I wanted to write about grief and how different people, even within the same family, react differently to it. About how one can be enlarged by grief or shrunk by it.
Two, I was interested in exploring the workings of the new India of the twenty-first century, a country that has opened itself up to foreign investments and is very much a player in the new economy. I wanted to tell the story of globalization from the point of view of ordinary people whose way of life is often destroyed by it. I wanted to see what would happen to a rural, indigenous place like the fictional Girbaug when an American company opened a plant there.”
“I deliberately made Frank work for a small, alternative health company and gave him liberal politics because I wanted to say in sharper relief: that when even good hearted, well intentioned people enter an enviornment where the gap between the haves and have nots is immense, they will end up doing harm”
The thing about this story is that it is FILLED with so many deep and poignant meanings.
How good intentions can quickly turn into harmful actions.
How blissful ignorance can quickly turn into stubborn self righteousness.
How innocent affection can quickly turn into dark obsession.
And so so so so many more gut swirling, tear inducing moments.
So much insightful storytelling and profound cultural commentary.
I am going to be thinking about this book for many, many days to come.
Highly recommend this book…but not if you’re looking for a “light” read. Save it for when you have the brain power to really pay attention and really let the words seep into your soul.
It’s absolutely worth it.