My Father's Ghost: The Return of My Old Man and Other Second Chances Hardcover - 2002

by Suzy McKee Charnas

"My Father's Ghost" is a wise woman's look at a "failed" father-daughter relationship--how it hurt, how it healed, and how, ultimately and in unexpected ways, the problem father became the daughter's strength. My Father's Ghost will be an inspiration to anyone who is dealing with a parent's aging or approaching death, and fans of this splended writer will find her at her best here." (Sarah Smith, author of A Citizen of the Country)

"In My Father's Ghost Suzy McKee Charnas reveals a father-daughter relationship at levels recognized only by the heart...she communicates the fears and wishes that surround dying in a personal and uplifting story. I recommend this book to all." (Daniel Hays, author of My Old Man and the Sea)

"My Father's Ghost is a thoughtful, sad and loving study of the life and death of a brilliant and troublesome man. You'll be glad you read it. (Tony Hillerman)When Suzy McKee Charnas realized that her father could no longer care for himself on his own, she invited him to come live in the old adobe "in-law" cottage beside her own in New Mexico. My Father's Ghost skillfully traces a parent-child relationship inverted by the changes of aging.

Over the last seventeen years of her father's life-as she drove him to the grocery store, to the bank, or picked him up off the floor after he had fallen-Charnas struggled to understand this man whose former artistic ambition seemed to hang like a shadow over his old age. She reflects on the difficulties inherent in their situation even as she reveals that her father's inability to care for himself afforded them the opportunity to bridge a gap that might easily never have been mended.

A moving portrait of the last chapter in a father-daughter relationship and of the divide between the person we are in our youth and who we become in our old age, My Father's Ghost will resonate deeply with anyone facing old age or caring for an elderly loved one.