My Favorite Book

by Wade Longworth

While I was growing up reading was never really something that caught my interest. I was always the kid that wanted to play outside or was participating in sports. I would’ ve done almost anything over reading, including watching television and playing video games. It took a while but I finally came around to knowing the feeling of a comfy chair, a good book, and a relaxing beverage. In honor of our Reading Rainbow month, I thought I would share with a little description of one of my favorite books that is the first in one of my favorite series. It is called "The Life We Bury" by Allen Eskens.

"The Life We Bury" tells the story of Joe Talbert, who is a junior at the University of Minnesota, and receives a class assignment to write a biography of someone who has lived an interesting life. After going back and forth on who to write about, Joe finally decides to stop procrastinating and focus on his project instead of his job at a local bar. As he has no idea who to interview for this project, he comes up with the bright idea that he will head to a nursing home to find someone; because everyone there must have an interesting story, right? While at the nursing home, he meets Carl Iverson, a man dying of cancer who has been medically paroled after spending thirty years in prison for the murder of a fourteen-year-old girl. Carl agrees to tell Joe his story, and Joe sets out to get down to the bottom of the thirty-year-old murder. As Joe writes about Carl's life, especially Carl's valor in Vietnam, he cannot put together the heroism of the soldier with the despicable acts of the convict.

To make things more complicated, Joe's alcoholic mother has started living with a low-life who hits Joe's eighteen-year-old brother, who has autism. Joe is torn by the guilt of going to college and abandoning his brother. Throughout the story, Joe has to intercede on multiple occasions to protect his brother and is conflicted every time he has to leave his brother behind. The power of that guilt weighs heavily upon Joe the entire story, and the enthralling ending will leave you on the edge of your seat.

If you can make some time to read this book, I highly recommend it. This is just the first in a series that delves into multiple characters ’ lives that are introduced in this novel.