Anne-Marie Oomen

The title, AS LONG AS I KNOW YOU, was her mother's answer when Anne-Marie Oomen asked her how she would know if her quality of life was still okay, still bearable. Because this, her latest memoir, acts, in fact, as her long goodbye to her mother, who died at 99, alone, in a nursing home in 2020, in the lockdown phase of the Covid pandemic. Their relationship was never an easy one, and Oomen doesn't cut herself any slack, as she details their ups and downs, from her rebellious teen years to the guilt-ridden last years of her mother's life, as Ruth Oomen slipped ever deeper into the not-knowing that is dementia.

This is a deeply personal book, as are all of Oomen's memoirs. There is humor here, but not a lot. The prose, as always, flows like poetry, telling the story of a very complex, often troubled mother-daughter relationship. I'm a guy, and had a good relationship with my mother, but (and I hate to use this cliche) I could feel her pain. And her story is so compelling ... Well, more cliches, dammit.

I'm not going to try to pick out any particular parts or passages to dwell on. I can't. It's all just too much of a piece to try to parse. And there is too much pain involved.

My mother died in a nursing home too, at 96. I wasn't there. The guilt and the sadness still haunt me, nearly a decade later. So, even though I knew how this book would end, I read its last pages through tears. I get it, Anne-Marie. I get it. It's about loss, guilt, regret, grief. But mostly it's about love. And as the song said, sometimes "love hurts." I can't imagine how hard it must have been to write this book. But I am so glad you did. It is a beautiful thing you've made, Anne-Marie. This Mom Book. This love letter to mortality. My very highest recommendation.

- Tim Bazzett, author of the memoir, BOOKLOVER… (mer)

HOUSE OF FIELDS, by Anne-Marie Oomen.

I've had this book on my shelf for several years now, and read it with great enjoyment when it was new, back in 2006. Having just read and - and liked - Oomen's book of poems from that same year, UNCODED WOMAN, I thought I would revisit this elegant collection of memories from her childhood on a west Michigan farm near Hart. I found it every bit as delightful this time through as the first time, perhaps even more so, having now met the author a few times at readings and book signings.

In HOUSE OF FIELDS, Oomen takes us on a journey through her elementary school years, which began with kindergarten in the one-room Kelly School just down the road from her family farm. It was to be the last year for that school, and many others like it, as rural school districts began to "consolidate." She spent a few years in a new consolidated public school, then went on to a Catholic school taught by Dominican nuns.

Although Oomen builds her memories around her early educational experience, there is also much here about her parents - hard-working Catholics struggling to do the best they can to raise five kids. (Anne-Marie is the oldest.) And her own interior life is front and center as she tries to figure out how the world works, has problems initially learning to read (which finally "clicks" in the third grade, when she suddenly becomes a "reader"), witnesses the sadness and mystery of deaths among her family and friends, and wonders why she often feels "alone" - until she figures out that maybe this is normal.

An extremely curious child, she struggles with "being good," and tells of childhood injuries and scars - two physical and one emotional and more traumatic, this last described in an essay called "Harm," which is perhaps the most moving piece in the whole book.

Bottom line? I loved this book. The gender difference was no obstacle. Having grown up next door to my grandparents' farm, and having gone to a one-room school, then Catholic school, I could relate. But what makes this book so enjoyable is that it is simply beautiful writing, chock full of wonder, wit and wisdom. Very highly recommended to anyone who loves books and good writing.… (mer)