Christopher Buckley tickled me with Thank You for Smoking and had me rolling in the floor with Little Green Men; Buckley has the keen wit concerning Washington and its inner working. In his newest book is something else all together. Losing Mum and Pup is about the 12 months in his life when he lost first his mother, then his father. This is hard enough for anybody. Is it easier or worse when you have to turn down the VP of the US as a guest to the memorial service and follow Harry Kissinger in giving the eulogy?
Buckley takes turns dropping name, going through the healing process of grief, telling funny and cogent antidotes about growing up as the only son to the Lion of Conservatism, William F. Buckley and “chic and stunning Mrs. Buckley”, Patricia.
Something rings true and sincere in Losing Mum and Pup. This is no fluff piece about the man who George Nash has called “the most important public intellectual in the United States in the past half century”. This is what it is like to be his son; how arguments go against the man who started “Firing Line” on PBS.
Losing Mum and Pup is touching, funny and very, very real. I take away the lesson that Christopher started with, be careful saying the words you can’t take back. I will work on that – good advice.