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Grief Is for People
Grief Is for People | Sloane Crosley
16 posts | 16 read | 16 to read
Disarmingly witty and poignant, Sloane Crosley's first memoir explores multiple kinds of loss following the death of her closest friend. Grief Is for People is an unusual kind of grief book--the story of several compounding, unexpected losses, and the struggle to hold on to the past without being consumed by it, but told with the verve and voice we have come to expect from Sloane Crosley. Focusing her trademark humor and wit on the deep pain and confusion of losing her closest friend and mentor to suicide, Crosley looks for answers in friends, philosophy, and art, searching for a framework more useful than the unavoidable stages of grief to understand her new reality. Sloane and Russell worked together and played together, navigating the corridors of office life, the literary world, weekends in the country, and the dramatic ups and downs of making it in New York City. In a city where friends become family, they were best friends. When Russell dies, Sloane is already reeling from a break-in and the theft of her jewelry, her most prized and meaningful possessions. While Russell's death puts that loss in perspective, it also propels her on a quest to right the losses she is feeling, as the city itself faces the staggering toll brought on by the pandemic. Crosley's search for answers is frank, funny, and gilded with a deeply resounding empathy. Upending the "grief memoir" in utterly unexpected and entirely welcome ways, Grief Is for People rises precisely to console and challenge our notions of loss during these grief-stricken times.
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Centique
Grief Is for People | Sloane Crosley
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Pickpick

How to say that you enjoyed a grief memoir? This is almost a memoir in essays or thought pieces. Sloane moves from a burglary, to a friend‘s death & into the pandemic in New York. It is as much a memoir about not moving on - the memories that don‘t leave, the conversations with the person that isnt there anymore, the illusions you have of turning back time & saving them. Very much the internal workings of Sloane‘s grieving and beautifully done.

Centique Photo is flowers from a friend last week. 2mo
Suet624 Gorgeous flowers 2mo
Librarybelle I completely agree with your review! I read this recently, and it still sticks with me. 2mo
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Centique @Librarybelle I‘m going to have to read more by this author - she captured so many thoughts in a way that really spoke to me. 2mo
Librarybelle I‘ve read this collection by her, which I found quite humorous overall (it was written years ago, and I read it years ago, so I‘m not sure how true the observations are anymore): 2mo
CarolynM Hope everyone is doing well 💕 2mo
Centique @CarolynM we‘re doing so much better thanks Carolyn! 14yo is back at school and wound is 70% healed i think. Im excited to use your kind gift once hes 100%. 💕 How is your holiday going? 2mo
CarolynM Glad to hear that 🥰 We‘re having a wonderful time. One week to go. I‘ve not been reading much but I might post a few reviews with photos when I get home😊 2mo
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AvidReader25
Grief Is for People | Sloane Crosley
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Mehso-so

This memoir about the death of a friend & burglary of her home is honest, bitter, angry, & heartbreaking. I love that she didn't shy away from the hard parts of grief. She didn't wrap it up in a tidy bow & give a life lesson at the end. There are layers of pain when it comes to missing someone, being angry they are gone, & feeling guilty for your life continuing. This is a painful book, full of her scorn for those around her, but it's a truthful.

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Librarybelle
Grief Is for People | Sloane Crosley
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Pickpick

Crosley uses her razor-sharp words to explore her grief—exactly one month after being robbed, her good friend dies by suicide. This is raw and so poignant. Beautifully crafted memoir.

marleed What stays with me after this memoir is the thought of who gets to grieve hard and long the loss of a beloved friend. Anyone and everyone, of course, but after a very short amount that grief often becomes a lonely journey. 4mo
Librarybelle @marleed So true. I‘m still processing everything I learned from this. It was so good. 4mo
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Floresj
Grief Is for People | Sloane Crosley
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Pickpick

Crosley is an exceptional writer or articulates grief in an intellectual, relatable, vulnerable way. It‘s not a self help book, but a journey through her own grief of her friend‘s death. It‘s sad, but I kept thinking, “She said that so well,” repeatedly. If you can sit in someone‘s sadness, this is an exceptional book.

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jlhammar
Grief Is for People | Sloane Crosley
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Pickpick

Wonderful grief memoir—smart, funny, heart-wrenching. Just a pleasure to read. #BOTM

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cariashley
Grief Is for People | Sloane Crosley
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Pickpick

A wholehearted and enthusiastic pick for this excellent memoir. Read to moving effect by the author on audiobook.

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marleed
Grief Is for People | Sloane Crosley
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Pickpick

I read my last self-help book on grief years ago, but can‘t quit a memoir of someone with the words to document their own unique experience. Sloane was grieving the violation of a home robbery (jewelry inherited from her mean grandmother) when hit with a grief no one anticipated – the suicide of her one-time boss, and best friend Russell. ⚠️ TW: This could hit hard if moving through a friend‘s suicide remains a struggle to a reader.👇

marleed There is a who-was-he-to-you element to her experience since she was neither Russell‘s partner or family member, I sympathize with this. I remember returning to work after the funeral of one of the few mentors in my adult life. I must have looked a wreck as I explained to a questioning
coworker I‘d been at a funeral. His response - and I kid you not - Well, who was she to you? 😳 👇
7mo
marleed Also, if you have memories (like I do) of reading the tagged when all the 💩 hit the fan, there‘s a super interesting account here because both Sloane and Russell were publicists for this book. 👇 7mo
marleed I googled Russell Perreault after reading this which lead me to his Instagram - and scrolling down 3 years of his feed. Well, that made me sad - gone too soon. 7mo
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Susanita I heard an interview with her about this book. It sounds moving and genuine. 7mo
marleed @Susanita oh I‘m going to go search YouTube for an interview right now! 7mo
Susanita It was the Book Case podcast. 7mo
Suet624 The people I have mourned is such a personal thing. No one should ever question grief. 7mo
marleed @Susanita oh I‘ll listen! I listened to her interview on Politics and Prose. 7mo
marleed @Suet624 I agree. I‘ve realized my own journey with grief is a complete unknown every time. When my oldest sister passed following a long fight with cancer and other health issues we all thought we were prepared. But it ended up hitting all of us (her four sisters) so hard - and 3 years later still landing. We think it was because she was fighting until her final breath even when doctors, hospice, family was gathered around here. 7mo
Suet624 💔💔💔 7mo
68 likes10 comments
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Pinta
Grief Is for People | Sloane Crosley
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7 “Denial is also the weirdest stage of grief because it so closely mimics stupidity.”

25 “You become numb when you swallow too much sadness at once. The reason it feels like no boundaries have been crossed is because the concept of boundaries has been obliterated.”

175 The locket: “I‘d turned him into jewelry and jewelry into him.”

185 “How do I keep you buried and keep you with me at the same time?”

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Pinta
Grief Is for People | Sloane Crosley
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^^human need for intention and causality—what did I do to get burgled?

A book of ??s seeking impossible answers:

46 the dreaded “Did you know?”

53 “Do you have to forgive a person who dies by suicide?”

60 “You do realize we‘re all going to get old and die without you?”

61 “How could you have left the dogs?”

64 “How will he know you loved him unless you try to destroy yourself?”

68 “Can we ever get back what‘s lost?”

115 “Were we snobs?”

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Pinta
Grief Is for People | Sloane Crosley
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Pickpick

Blow-by-blow of 2 losses in close proximity: family heirlooms, beloved Russell. Question-filled, loving look at impossible topic: making sense of the suicide of a friend. Musings, not-knowings, wounds. Some of Crosley‘s work crosses into too-cleverness for me & this one gets gossipy. But it works. The suddenness & enormity of the losses, her vulnerability & guttedness, make all the clever & trite bits a desperate attempt at self-protection. 2024

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Hooked_on_books
Grief Is for People | Sloane Crosley
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Pickpick

One month after a home invasion with theft of jewelry (meaningful items she had received from family), Crosley‘s best friend died by suicide. She moves through these losses and what they mean in concert. Thoughtful and moving, but of course laced with her signature humor. Excellent book.

AmyG I really loved the audio. So well-written….and heartbreaking. 8mo
squirrelbrain I have the ARC of this - just haven‘t had time to get to it. 🙄 8mo
Hooked_on_books @squirrelbrain Isn‘t that the story of our reading lives? I can relate! 8mo
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JenReadsAlot
Grief Is for People | Sloane Crosley
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Goodreads win!

AmyG Nice. Let us lnow what you think. 8mo
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kbuggle
Grief Is for People | Sloane Crosley
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Pickpick

I loved this. Out in bookstores next week, a nuanced memoir about life and loss, laced with Sloane Crosley‘s sharp humor and wit.

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everlocalwest
Grief Is for People | Sloane Crosley
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Crosley moves through multiple griefs in this memoir. The theft of heirloom jewelry, the loss of her dearest friend, and ultimately the loss of life as we knew it with the swift coming of the Covid-19 pandemic. Always insightful and frequently funny, this memoir was a joy to read even as the subject matter stung. One turn of phrase had me gobsmacked: 'Ego, as it turns out, is depression's comorbidity.'

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