Goodbye, Vitamin: A Novel

<p><b>&quot;Khong is a magician, and we are lucky to fall under her spell at the very beginning of her brilliant writing life.&quot; -- Lauren Groff</b><br><b></b><br><b>&quot;This novel sneaks up on you -- just like life . . . and heartbreak. And love.&quot; -- Miranda July</b><br><b></b><br><b>&quot;Tonight a man found Dad's pants in a tree ... &quot; So begins this funny and inescapably touching debut from a wonderfully original new literary voice.</b></p><p> The pants belong to Howard Young, a prominent history professor, recently diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease. Howard's wife, Annie, summons their daughter, Ruth. Freshly disengaged from her fiancé and feeling that life has not turned out quite the way she planned, thirty-year-old Ruth quits her job and arrives home to find the situation more complicated than she realized. Her father is erratically lucid, her mother lucidly erratic. But as Howard's condition intensifies, the comedy in Ruth's situation takes hold, gently transforming the family's grief into tenderness.</p><p>Told in captivating glimpses and drawn from a deep well of insight, humor, and unexpected compassion, Rachel Khong's <i>Goodbye, Vitamin</i> pilots through the loss, love, and absurdity of finding one's footing in this life.</p>