Good evening.

I am Ted Ayres and I am so pleased that you have taken the time to join us here on PBS Kansas, the home of Seriously Good TV in south central Kansas, tonight We are pleased to support the Wichita Public Library and NEA Big Read Kansas.

This is an annual program funded by a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts that is designed to broaden our understanding of the world, communities and ourselves.

Through the joy of sharing a good book.

Of course, this is part of the DNA of Inside the Cover.

Each year, the Big Read program focuses events around one book and its themes bringing together area schools, libraries, cultural organizations, businesses and book clubs in the community to celebrate literacy and learning through reading a common book.

This year, the Wichita Public Library is kicking off the 2023 events on Sunday, March 12, from 2 to 4 p.m. at the Advanced Learning Library at 711 West 2nd Street North.

You can go to the library's website for additional information.

The book, selected for this year's Big Read, is Can't We Talk About Something More Pleasant?

A Memoir by Roz Chast.

This book was originally published in 2014, and it won a National Book Critics Circle Award for autobiography.

It was also a finalist for the National Book Award.

It is now time to go inside the cover.

Roz Chast is an award winning staff cartoonist for The New Yorker.

Since 1978, she has published more than 800 cartoons in that magazine.

She also publishes cartoons and Scientific American and the Harvard Business Review.

Chast grew up in the Flatbush section of Brooklyn.

The only child of George Chast, a high school French and Spanish teacher.

And Elizabeth Chast, an assistant principal in an elementary school.

Her Jewish parents were children during the Great Depression, and as for many, this had a great influence on their lives and certainly their only daughter, who was born on November 26, 1954.

In Cant We Talk About Something More Pleasant?, a graphic novel illustrated with Chasts cartoons and photographs, she addresses a very difficult subject matter in a candid, poignant, caring and honest fashion, leavening the story with her art and her humor.

The subject matter is, of course, watching the physical degradation and mental decline of people you love.

As Chast makes quite clear, the aging process is difficult, expensive, excessively worrisome and heartbreaking.

If you have ever had a friend or a family member in an assisted living facility or a memory care facility, you know exactly what I mean.

And you can fully identify with Chasts writing.

Chast also spends time addressing the topic of sorting and disposing of the family possessions, the physical embodiment of a life together.

Having personally done this on three different occasions, I can offer that it is a sometimes moving and fun trip down memory lane and sometimes a difficult and saddening experience.

Closing a home and erasing a lifetime.

I do wish we could show you some of Chasts cartoons from the book, but we will respect the copyright.

However, let me close with the following excerpt from the Epilogue that was added to this edition.

Quote - “Even though he often drove me bats, I remember my dad with great affection.

In my heart of hearts, I feel as if he and I were kindred spirits.

I'm still working things out with my mother.

Sometimes I want to go back in time and warn her, don't do that.

If you're mean to her, (me) again, you'll lose her trust forever.

It's not worth it.

Obviously, I can't.

” End of quote.

Tonight's book has been Can't We Talk About Something More Pleasant?

By Roz Chast.

I consider it a tasteful, touching and thought provoking book, and I'm happy to recommend it to you.

I'm also recommending that you consider participating in this year's NEA Big Read Wichita.

Goodnight and see you next time.