From One Book Lover

Precious: that is how Marion Winik sees the people whose lives she remembers in The Baltimore Book of the Dead , a modest collection of vignettes about unforgettable people in her life who have passed away. Some of her subjects are identified: mother, aunts, cousins — never by name, but always by characteristics and personality. She goes farther afield and remembers colleagues, childhood friends, casual acquaintances, and friends of friends who made impressions on her. Other times she tells the truth but tells it slant: a well-known Southern author, for example, or a public figure from her crowd. I had to scour the clues in her tales to know who she knew, and on more than one occasion spend more time than I ought collecting words to include in my Internet search. (Yes, I was successful. Neither Winik nor the Internet failed me.) But it's not the who that is most intriguing. We all have people in our lives precious enough to us to remember. It's the details, the truth, ...