A London Scrapbook: A Memoir
by: Polly Grose
Published by: Beaver's Pond Press
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Reviewed by Michelle Kerns
When Polly Grose first meets her future husband David at his London apartment in 1978, he shows her his collection of scrapbooks – large bound books full of photos, cuttings, and memories of David’s life. They are for “fitting the pieces together,” David tells Polly. What David’s scrapbooks, and later Polly’s, do in pictures and memorabilia, A London Scrapbook does in words: it is a literary record of the bits and pieces that make up the collage of Polly’s experiences as a fledgling businesswoman, an American in Britain, and as a wife, daughter, and mother.
When Polly first begins scrapbooking herself, David advises her to set her memories down in themes rather than chronologically. A London Scrapbook follows this thematic template, beginning with Polly’s impressions of her first encounters with David, moving to memories of her life as a young mother of three boys, to her experiences working in the male-dominated society of the late 1970s, then on to her married life with David and his eventual illness. Woven throughout are vivid memories, like snapshots, of her father, mother, and grandmother and her own eventual development as a writer.
Polly tells her story with simplicity and honesty. Her descriptions of David’s illness and the memories of his time in the hospital bring back her father’s struggles with failing health and her mother’s faithful care, giving the reader a transparent window into some of Polly’s most painful times. By doing this, it does what every well-prepared scrapbook is best at – elevating the fleeting, seemingly anonymous and forgotten experiences of an unknown life to a memorable record that links it to all of human experience.
While, like all memorabilia and memoirs, portions of A London Scrapbook may be riveting only to people who either have a personal interest in Polly Grose’s subject matter or experienced similar situations, overall, it captures one woman’s life, work, and love exceptionally well.
Armchair Interviews says: A London Scrapbook is written with simplicity and honesty and is a pleasure to read.
Author website: http://www.PollyGrose.com
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