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laura_on_a_lark's review
4.0
Creative blending of stats (based on responses from the two dozen-ish contributors), moving personal stories, humour, and nostalgia. Particularly meaningful for anyone who went to the U of A in the late 90s/early 2000s (especially if they haunted The Gateway offices), but likely resonant with anyone who's realised that, yes, they are now considered middle-age.
Essays from Christie Tucker and Kate Rossiter specifically landed well with me, but there's a little something for everyone here.
Essays from Christie Tucker and Kate Rossiter specifically landed well with me, but there's a little something for everyone here.
davykent's review
5.0
The premise of this book filled me with skepticism at first mention, primarily because I find myself innately allergic to the idea of stereotypical midlife. It feels a level of ordinary, of nowadays "neurotypical," that is simply outright incompatible with the very foundation of who I am.
But, someone I respect was involved in it, and she talked it up a great deal. And really, this was a perfect opportunity. I hold no interest in what I consider to be ordinary, despite desperately wanting to be exactly that (hey, there's an essay in Midlife about this), and I usually find myself checking out in regular conversation about it. Here is an opportunity to see what midlife is like through a lens of introspection.
I also find myself in a unique position. I am young at 26, but I am likely to be well past my midlife. Not only am I obnoxiously attached to the idea of being special, my basic biology makes the experience of a midlife crisis (or aimlessness, or rediscovery, or...) an impossibility. It is an experience that I will not have, no matter what. Even the healthy men on my father's side died before their 50s. I am, to put it mildly, not healthy. I spent most of 2020 wondering if I would be dead the next day, and that culminated into an extended hospital stay in September and October and then finally even getting COVID-19 in November. Suffice to say, I will never know the "ordinary" worries of traveling the world, being accomplished, getting married, having children, and all the trappings of a life that can be changed. That was all robbed from me at age 15, and I by and large consider my 20s to have thus far been a slow march to an inevitable end.
So to see the internal dialogue of people who can experience normality, in a format that I find more digestible, is really a window into what is ultimately an alien experience for me. I can scoff and use the subtextual slur of ordinary all I want, but it's still something I do not know, cannot know, and should probably strive to know if I have any hope of not being an arrogant bellend till my dying day.
I burned through this book quickly. It was easy to just lay down and read through it in just a single sitting.
As expected, there were essays that remained opaque and alien to me.
But there were essays I related to, or at least understood and could empathize with.
First, opening the book with an essay about hockey was pandering. An easy hook for me, someone who mysteriously finds themselves a fan of the Leafs.
I could go into detail about each essay, but I think I'll leave the review with a simple list of my favourites: Jag Dhadli, Dave Alexander, Iva Cheung, Kati Kovacs, Leanne Brown, and Adam Rozenhart. These essays all said something to me in a language I could understand.
But, someone I respect was involved in it, and she talked it up a great deal. And really, this was a perfect opportunity. I hold no interest in what I consider to be ordinary, despite desperately wanting to be exactly that (hey, there's an essay in Midlife about this), and I usually find myself checking out in regular conversation about it. Here is an opportunity to see what midlife is like through a lens of introspection.
I also find myself in a unique position. I am young at 26, but I am likely to be well past my midlife. Not only am I obnoxiously attached to the idea of being special, my basic biology makes the experience of a midlife crisis (or aimlessness, or rediscovery, or...) an impossibility. It is an experience that I will not have, no matter what. Even the healthy men on my father's side died before their 50s. I am, to put it mildly, not healthy. I spent most of 2020 wondering if I would be dead the next day, and that culminated into an extended hospital stay in September and October and then finally even getting COVID-19 in November. Suffice to say, I will never know the "ordinary" worries of traveling the world, being accomplished, getting married, having children, and all the trappings of a life that can be changed. That was all robbed from me at age 15, and I by and large consider my 20s to have thus far been a slow march to an inevitable end.
So to see the internal dialogue of people who can experience normality, in a format that I find more digestible, is really a window into what is ultimately an alien experience for me. I can scoff and use the subtextual slur of ordinary all I want, but it's still something I do not know, cannot know, and should probably strive to know if I have any hope of not being an arrogant bellend till my dying day.
I burned through this book quickly. It was easy to just lay down and read through it in just a single sitting.
As expected, there were essays that remained opaque and alien to me.
But there were essays I related to, or at least understood and could empathize with.
First, opening the book with an essay about hockey was pandering. An easy hook for me, someone who mysteriously finds themselves a fan of the Leafs.
I could go into detail about each essay, but I think I'll leave the review with a simple list of my favourites: Jag Dhadli, Dave Alexander, Iva Cheung, Kati Kovacs, Leanne Brown, and Adam Rozenhart. These essays all said something to me in a language I could understand.
amyrhoda's review
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
medium-paced
4.0
Midlife is a collection of essays (and photographs) by a group of 27 friends who met at a Canadian university newspaper in the late 90's and early 00's. The book was conceived as a pandemic project around the theme of midlife, and was brought together and self-published in 2020 and 2021.
Midlife is a beautiful book, an exemplar of how good self-published books can be. (It helps that the team includes one of the best copyeditors in Canada, Iva Cheung, and many of the team went on to careers in publishing.)
The essays are moving and thought-provoking, on topics including ambition, cars, children (or the refusal thereof), the pandemic, romantic relationships, family relationships, and pets. My favourite might be Iva Cheung's essay, "Cocoa and Coconut", about what she learned from her guinea pigs, but it's hard to choose. There are a lot of really good essays in this book.
Midlife is a beautiful book, an exemplar of how good self-published books can be. (It helps that the team includes one of the best copyeditors in Canada, Iva Cheung, and many of the team went on to careers in publishing.)
The essays are moving and thought-provoking, on topics including ambition, cars, children (or the refusal thereof), the pandemic, romantic relationships, family relationships, and pets. My favourite might be Iva Cheung's essay, "Cocoa and Coconut", about what she learned from her guinea pigs, but it's hard to choose. There are a lot of really good essays in this book.
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