Sitting Practice

Book: Sitting Practice
Author: Caroline Adderson

Grade: C-

Young love. Paralyzing accident. Twisted familial relations. Infidelity and theft......

If this strikes you as an overload of emotionally wrought topics for a single novel, you would unfortunately be correct. "Sitting Practice" is the story of a young newlywed couple dealing with the aftermath of devastating car accident that left the female protagonist (Iliana) wheelchair bound.

Adderson does a phenomenal (if at times, hard to follow) job of vividly chronicling the way one event can rip through the thread that binds our lives together and what happens without that thread to keep everything in its place.

Ross (the male protagonist) moves his paralyzed wife out to country to lead a more austere life owning a bakery. His mentally unstable sister and her son follow suit since she would be incapable of functioning without her brother's help. Slowly, if barely noticeably, the once passionate love between Ross and Iliana turns into a familiarly platonic co-existence. Iliana, feeling neglected sexually, turns to the village rebel (quite stereotypically described) for the loving that she so desperately craves. In the midst of this mayhem, Ross's sister stages a half-assed suicide attempt mainly designed to add another chapter or two to this book (as far as I can tell). Ross finds out about the affair. Big fight between him and the rebel adulterer. Ross and Iliana reconcile and finally make love for the first time. The sister seems to get her shit together - but my confidence in that lasting is slim to none.

Overall.... an interesting read - when your not scratching your head going "wait, what just happened." If you can get to the end without getting lost it ends in a sweet if not memorable manner.