Who Killed Mom? : A Delinquent Son's Meditation on Family, Mortality, and Very Tacky Candles

Memoir, biography, and outrageous comedy make for a perfect blend in the debut book from acclaimed writer Steve Burgess . Telling the tale of his mother's life and death, and along the way laying bare his own life and struggles, Burgess renders a memorable and deeply moving meditation on life and family. The author's mother, Joan, barely survived her thirteenth birthday: a rare disorder had made it almost impossible for her to swallow food. Her battle to survive this illness was the first in a lifelong sequence of courageous confrontations with her upbringing. As she raised her five children, Joan revealed herself to be a strong and remarkably complex woman. This is her story, but it's also the story of her husband, a charming United Church minister, and their children-including the alarmingly delinquent Steve, who spent much of his adolescence and beyond dropping acid, drinking to excess, and getting in trouble with the law. Which leads him to wonder: was he responsible for his mother's ills and perhaps even her death? Whether he's relating how an ice cream product saved him from a gruesome death on the Trans-Canada, or sizing up the rebranding efforts of a woeful Manitoba motel, or depicting daily life