He had the sensation of having been lost so many times it was a dream he never escaped. – Art Dennison
We first meet Art Dennison as a four-year-old living with his family in Camden, New Jersey in the summer of 1951, and over the course of twelve interconnected short stories The Shame of What We Are follows Art through to age seventeen and high school graduation.
As we look in on Art in those twelve snapshots of his life we are treated to an intimate peek into the mind of a sensitive, intelligent boy who struggles to cope with life-altering events such as a cross-country move, his parents’ divorce, his mother’s mental breakdown, and his own journey from overwhelmed and insecure to on the cusp of grasping the confidence needed for his burgeoning independence.
Along the way author Sam Gridley skillfully interweaves details about both pop culture (America’s burgeoning addiction to television, for example) and world events (the launch of Sputnik, desegregation) that make the 1950’s setting come alive in a wonderfully vivid manner. To that end, the dozen or so illustrations by artist Tom Jackson which are included marvelously capture the essence of the stories, helping bring them even further to life.