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Hello, I Must Be Going: A Novel
Hello I Must Be Going A Novel
Author: Christie Hodgen
A richly memorable family story of love, grief, and growing beyond by "a bright new voice in the culture" (Frederick Barthelme). — It's the early 1980s, and tomboy Frankie Hawthorne's world is overturned when her beloved father?a Vietnam amputee who masks depression by playing comedian?shoots himself. Frankie's neighorhood, in a down-at-th...  more »
ISBN-13: 9780641906862
ISBN-10: 0641906862
Publication Date: 6/19/2006
Pages: 288
Edition: 1
Rating:
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0 stars, based on 0 rating
Publisher: W. W. Norton
Book Type: Hardcover
Other Versions: Paperback
Members Wishing: 0
Reviews: Member | Amazon | Write a Review

Top Member Book Reviews

reviewed Hello, I Must Be Going: A Novel on + 7 more book reviews
Helpful Score: 2
This one was a bit difficult to get through. Although the ending was touching and the story itself was unique I felt depressed every time I read another chapter of this book. I was kind of glad to get it done.
farfella68 avatar reviewed Hello, I Must Be Going: A Novel on + 84 more book reviews
Helpful Score: 1
I thought this book was okay because the story line was a little bit hard to follow. When you read the book, the main character is speaking in first-person, so everything you read about is from this character. The character goes back and forth between past, present, and future. It is about a girl who is the first to see her father after he kills himself by shooting himself in the head. The little girl is very traumatized by the event, but never really gets any help from the ordeal. You end up feeling sorry for the girl because she basically has no friends and her family doesn't care about her. The book follows her from being a child all the way up to when she is in college. I thougth that it was an okay book. I don't think that I would recommend it for anyone to read.
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raksha38 avatar reviewed Hello, I Must Be Going: A Novel on + 203 more book reviews
A tomboy named Frankie has a father who is a Vietnam vet who lost his leg in the war. He does a good job masking his pretty severe depression with humor, but its still too much for him and he ends up killing himself. This book is about Frankies journey through the aftermath of his suicide and its lasting effects on her life. It does a really good job of showing how profoundly something like that can impact you in ways you dont even realize.

Its a very well written book and the characters are very vivid. This is definitely one of those books thats all about the characters, rather than moving a plot from Point A through Point B toward a destination of Point C. Know what I mean? I think Frankies father was especially well done. Even after his death, there are lengthy scenes of him through memories Frankie is experiencing, so you get to see a very nuanced portrait of a man with a lot of charm and love, even as he struggles with pain and darkness in ways that his children were too young to understand at the time.


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