All My Puny Sorrows

Starred review from September 15, 2014
Elfrieda’s a concert pianist. When we were kids she would occasionally let me be her page-tuner for the fast pieces that she hadn’t memorized.” This sentence, in the voice of the younger Yolandi, crystallizes the dynamic of the two sisters in Toews’s (Summer of My Amazing Luck) latest novel. While Elfrieda is the genius and the perfectionist, it is the practical, capable Yolandi on whom she depends. Over the course of this tender and bittersweet novel, Elf tours the world while Yoli stays put, has two kids with two different men but stays with neither of the fathers. It is Elf’s debilitating depression and suicidal tendencies that keep the two urgently close as Yoli, for decades, does everything she can to help Elf ward off her psychological problems. The prose throughout the book is lively and original and moves along at a steady clip. Though there are some underdeveloped aspects (their upbringing in a Mennonite household, Yoli’s experience of motherhood), the novel is a triumph in its depiction of the love the sisters share, as Yoli tries, just as when she was a page turner, to stay a few beats ahead.

Starred review from October 1, 2014
A Canadian writer visits her older sister, a concert pianist who's just attempted suicide, in this masterful, original investigation into love, loss and survival. "She wanted to die and I wanted her to live and we were enemies who loved each other," Yolandi Von Riesen says of her sister, Elfrieda. Toews (Irma Voth, 2011, etc.) moves between Winnipeg, Toronto, and a small town founded by Mennonite immigrants who survived Bolshevik massacres, where the intellectual, free-spirited Von Riesen family doesn't share the elders' disapproval of "overt symbols of hope and individual signature pieces." Yoli looks back over time, realizing that the sisters' bond is strengthened by their painful memories. The girls' father baffles neighbors by supporting Elf's creative passions and campaigning to run a library. His suicide and absence from their adulthood make him even more important to his daughters as their paths diverge. Elf travels around Europe, emptying herself into Rachmaninoff performances; Yoli writes books about a rodeo heroine, feeling aimless and failed. Elf's husband appreciates her singular sensitivity as a performer, but this capacity for vulnerability dangerously underpins her many breakdowns and longstanding depression. Yoli's men are transient, leaving her with two children. Toews conveys family cycles of crisis and intermittent calm through recurring events and behaviors: Elf and her father both suffer from depression; Yoli and her mother face tragedy with wry humor and absurdist behavior; and two sisters experience parallel losses. Crisp chapter endings, like staccato musical notes, anchor the plot's pacing. Elf's determination to end her suffering by dying takes the form of a drumbeat of requests for Yoli to help her commit suicide. Readers yearn for more time with this complex, radiant woman who fiercely loves her family but cannot love herself. "Sadness is what holds our bones in place," Yoli thinks. Toews deepens our understanding of the pain found in Coleridge's poetry, which is the source of the book's title.

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Starred review from November 1, 2014

Sisters should always want what is best for each other, but what if what one sister really wants is to end her life? This is the dilemma Yoli faces when her ethereal sister, Elf, attempts suicide. The beautiful Elf is a world-renowned pianist who's in a loving relationship and about to start an international tour, but having it all doesn't matter to her when she is drowning in despair. Yoli, as she rightfully points out, is the one struggling; she's twice divorced, with children by two different fathers, and after having achieved some success as a YA series author (though she has nothing like Elf's gifts), her career has stalled. But though she and Elf are close--the bond they forged while growing up in a conservative Mennonite town in Canada is central to the narrative--depression is hard to understand from the outside. VERDICT Despite the topic, this is not a dark novel. In fact, its gloom comes in the form of dark humor, and Toews (Irma Voth) does a wonderful job with her characters, none of whom are perfect, which makes them all the more real. It requires a talented author to take a serious subject and write such an engaging, enjoyable work.--Shaunna E. Hunter, Hampden-Sydney Coll. Lib., VA

Copyright 2014 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

October 1, 2014
What makes one person survive a difficult life and another, with seemingly more gifts, feel the need to end it? Toews' (Irma Voth, 2011) latest novel tells a tale of two sisters raised in a family of outliers in a strict Canadian Mennonite community. The older sister, Elfrieda, a world-famous concert pianist married to a devoted, brilliant husband, has attempted suicide many times. Yolandi is a mess, with two children born out of wedlock, no substantive career, and a pending divorce, yet she manages to soldier on with a fierce sense of humor and hope. Yoli triesoh, how hard she triesto keep her sister alive. Much of the story has Elf in the hospital recovering from various attempts to kill herself, while Yoli pleads with her, badgers the staff, and tries to plan for a future. Toews writes with a sharp and piercing eye, offering characters and descriptions which are so odd and yet so spot-on that the reader has to laugh, albeit reluctantly. Though not exactly a happy book, it is one that deserves to be read.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)