LIMBO by A. Manette Ansay, 2002

From childhood, acclaimed novelist A. Manette Ansay trained to become a concert pianist. But when she was nineteen, a mysterious muscle disorder forced her to give up the piano, and by twenty-one, she couldn't grip a pen or walk across a room. She entered a world of limbo, one in which no one could explain what was happening to her or predict what the future would hold. At twenty-three, beginning a whole new life in a motorized wheelchair, Ansay made a New Year's resolution to start writing fiction, rediscovering the sense of passion and purpose she thought she had lost for good. Thirteen years later, still without a firm diagnosis or prognosis, Ansay reflects on the ways in which the unraveling of one life can plant the seeds of another, and considers how her own physical limbo has challenged—in ways not necessarily bad—her most fundamental assumptions about life and faith. Luminously written, Limbo is a brilliant and moving testimony to the resilience of the human spirit. (Amazon product description)


Review by Katie Langston

I have something of a love-hate relationship with memoirs.  I love to read them, because a well-written, well-crafted narrative of someone's personal journey can be a deeply intimate experience that is transformative somehow -- just like any good literature.  On the other hand, bad memoir has a way of devolving into self-pity or self-aggrandizement in a way that bad fiction just doesn't.

Fortunately, this lyrical memoir avoids those traps on its way to exploring issues of faith, family, art, and illness.

That is not to say that everything is rosy.  Pain is a prominent theme in Limbo.  The author, A. Manette Ansay, describes her transformation from a devout Catholic and budding concert pianist to an atheist and fiction writer with powerful immediacy -- a transformation that occurs, in large part, because of a mysterious illness that threatens to cripple her. 

I thought her prose was beautiful and her narrative both whimsical and grounded.  I especially enjoyed her memories from a mostly-happy childhood in rural Wisconsin, her commitment to her music, her reflections on faith, and her lovely thoughts on writing at the end of the piece.


Market: Memoir

Language: Mild-Moderate (I actually can't remember any, but I never notice bad language, so I've rated it this way just in case) ;-)
Sensuality: Mild (some typical coming-of-age sexual reflections and experiences; not a major theme and nothing graphic)
Violence: None
Mature Themes: illness, loss of faith, family dynamics


Book formats:
Limbo: A Memoir (paperback)
Limbo (e-book)


To learn more about the author, visit: A. Manette Ansay