They May Not Mean To, But They Do (Schine)

Book Reviews
…combines black comedy with shrewd observation of family dynamics…Joy is a persuasive character, intelligent, independent, with a flair for witty responses and wry thoughts, though in fact everyone in Schine's narrative is given to sharp comment and occasionally manic behavior. Despite its subject matter, They May Not Mean To, but They Do is a very funny novel…Cathleen Schine writes with economy and style—saying most by saying least, employing brief staccato sentences, with much of the action unfolding by way of dialogue. Some readers might feel that too much levity surrounds some disturbing matters…But others will see this as a proper form of defiance, the best way to face down the most disagreeable of circumstances. This is a novel in which serious subjects are treated with a deliberately light touch, a tactic that doesn't imply insensitivity or lack of empathy but simply accepts the fact that humor may be the best way of dealing with the unavoidable.
Penelope Lively - New York Times Book Review


Cathleen Schine [is] one of our most realistically imaginative, dependably readable novelists.... [H]er ten books comprise a sly, illuminating corpus that seems more related to the English comic novel than to most contemporary American fiction. [S]hapely and precisely structured... ruefully satiric... buoyant... sharply observant.... Her tenth and newest novel... cuts deeper, feels fuller and more ambitious, and seems to me her best.
Phillip Lopate - New York Review of Books


A seamless blend of humor and heartbreak
Miami Herald


Schine has a gift for transforming the pathos and comedy of everyday life into luminous fiction.
Entertainment Weekly


With its unexpected moments of profundity and laugh-aloud humor, Cathleen Schine’s novel movingly demonstrates how parents and children may not mean to but they do, ultimately, strain yet sustain one another.
Lilith Magazine


Schine’s latest novel combines the dark, pithy humor of a Lorrie Moore short story with quieter insights into aging, death, and the love, loneliness, and incomprehension that gets passed back and forth between generations.
Tablet


[A]droit observations about family, loss, and aging....showcasing Schine’s intuitive empathy, and any adult with an aged parent will recognize [Joy's] children’s well-meaning concern. Unfortunately, the ending peters out without a real conclusion.
Publishers Weekly


Schine is a master at limning family dynamics in all their messiness.... [T]his could be any reader’s clan. In addition, Schine’s ability to shift seamlessly from one person’s point of view to another’s adds depth and richness. —Andrea Kempf, formerly Johnson Cty. Community Coll. Lib., Overland Park, KS
Library Journal


A deeply affecting yet very funny intergenerational novel...the novel is as humorous as it is compassionate.... They May Not Mean To, But They Do has an extra layer of depth and dignity, making for a profound but very readable novel that is among her very best.
BookPage


"It's hard to be an old Jew," as one of the characters comments, and it's not so exciting to read about them, either. If this is the beginning of a tsunami of books about aging by baby-boomer authors, let's hope things pick up.
Kirkus Reviews