Book Review: So Long, Chester Wheeler

Synopsis:

Lewis Madigan is young, gay, out of work, and getting nervous about being able to pay his rent. Because he needs money – if not the aggravation — he agrees to provide end-of-life care for his insufferable, homophobic neighbor, Chester Wheeler. His duties: run errands, be on call in case Chester needs assistance . . . and put up with a miserable old man no other care provider in Buffalo can bear. That’s not an exaggeration. They’ve all quit.

Chester hurls slurs and epithets at Lewis, bickers with him, baits him, lies to him, and pushes all his buttons.

But Lewis can’t deny Chester’s dying wish. Chester is seeking closure. So he wants Lewis to drive him to Arizona in his dilapidated Winnebago so that he can see his ex-wife for the first time in thirty-two years. For the last time.

One week, two thousand miles.

For Lewis, it becomes an illuminating journey into the life and secrets of a vulnerable man he begins to understand. The unlikely road trip companions form an unexpected bond.

So Long, Chester Wheeler, by the incomparable Catherine Ryan Hyde, is about the past — lost and found. And a young man who learns that when we look deep into the heart and soul to form bonds with the last people we’d expect to care about, we often discover that they’re the ones who need it most.

Review:

Bestselling author Catherine Ryan Hyde hails from Buffalo, New York, the setting of her latest book, So Long, Chester Wheeler. She describes her family as “full of well-meaning individuals,” as well as “heartache and chaos.” She says hers was an “unhappy childhood. Everybody seemed quite busy with the problems at hand (I was the third of three), so I became the disappearing child. I amused myself by making up stories in my head, and tried not to need anything from the people around me.” Which, of course, did not work out very well.

Hyde published her first book when she was in her mid-thirties. She held many jobs over the years, but at that juncture was working as a baker and pastry chef in a restaurant situated in a tourist town. The business closed in January, and she knew that the cliché about writing a novel when she had the time “was either true in that moment or it never would be.” Her goal was to simply make enough money to keep writing. She has never looked back. So Long, Chester Wheeler is her forty-third published book.

In her writing, Hyde often explores what she refers to as “found families.” She explains, “When I was thirty-three, I got involved in twelve-step recovery, and now that’s my found family. I think the reason I like to write about redemption is because of my background as a practicing addict and alcoholic. In a society of throw-away people, I would have been thrown away.” Leading a clean and sober life in the ensuring years has inspired her to “tirelessly defend the idea that no one is beyond redemption.”

And redemption is yet another theme that she examines frequently in her novels, including So Long, Chester Wheeler. The story opens with Lewis having the worst day of his life. A twenty-four-year-old software developer in Buffalo, Lewis has been promised a significant raise that will take his income into the six-figure range. And when he opens the envelope containing his first paycheck reflecting his new salary, he is initially pleased. Then he notices something pink inside the envelope. It is the proverbial “pink slip.” Economic conditions have forced the company to lay off Lewis, as well as several of his colleagues. And those economic conditions make it a very bad time to re-enter the job market.

Making matters worse, when Lewis gets home, he finds his live-in boyfriend, Tim, loading boxes into his car. Tim has decided to move to California alone, instead of with Lewis, as they had planned. Lewis is flabbergasted — he had no idea Tim was unhappy in their relationship. He soon also learns that Tim emptied the jointly titled bank account in which they were pooling their savings to make the move.

Chester Wheeler, Lewis’s next-door neighbor, watches the break-up play out from his front porch. And can’t resist commenting. Chester is about 70 years old and in poor health, although Lewis does not yet know the extent of Chester’s medical issues. His home health aid announces it is her last day on the job. “The agency has no one left to send. He drove every last one of us away. . . . They can’t pay me enough to make it worth it. I’d rather starve.”

Chester’s daughter, Ellie, arrives when another health-care worker cannot be enlisted. She learns that Lewis has just become unemployed and tries to convince him to take the job. She assures Lewis that experience is not necessary. “At this point any sentient human being will do,” she sighs. Although Lewis’s proximity is a distinct advantage, he is adamant that “life is too short for Chester Wheeler.” But Ellie needs to get back home to be present for the birth of her first grandchild. And her two brothers refuse to help in any way. By generously offering Lewis nearly the same amount of money he was making as a software developer, she convinces him to fill in for just a week. He reluctantly agrees so that he will be able to pay his rent while he continues looking for suitable employment. And because agreeing makes him feel that he has Ellie very happy, even if he has made himself quite miserable in the bargain.

So Chester and Lewis begin settling into a tenuous, never-wanted partnership. Lewis learns that Chester is suffering from cancer that began in his lungs but has metastasized. Chester has refused further treatment and will be lucky to live another three months. He is largely immobile and dependent upon Lewis to assist him with his needs, including toileting, which causes them both consternation and embarrassment. The situation is only made worse when Chester flings crude and hurtful homophobic remarks at Lewis, who quickly realizes that he must set boundaries in order to survive a week of caring for Chester. But he is otherwise at sea. “I knew who I so recently had been. I had been a software developer. A good earner. A boyfriend. I’d been that person saving to move to California. But who was I now? I had no idea. Other than the fact that I was just . . . absolutely . . . lost.”

Ellie has an intercom installed that functions like a baby monitor. At night, both men can sleep in their own home, but Lewis can hear if Chester needs assistance and respond. As he adjusts to the new arrangement, Lewis is shocked to hear Chester talking in his sleep. But he doesn’t sound like Chester. Rather, his voice exudes kindness and concern, as though he is talking with his wife about their child. At one point, he hears Chester say, “I found the letters he wrote you,” which stirs Lewis’s curiosity. And, “Of all the guys in the world, why did it have to be Mike?”

One morning Chester announces that he wants Lewis to do him a favor. He wants him to drive him somewhere. Arizona, to be exact. He owns an old Winnebago into which he had a new engine installed just before being diagnosed with cancer. Lewis initially dismisses the idea, but Chester knows exactly which buttons to push with Lewis, announcing, “It sucks that I don’t even get a last wish.” It seems he wants to surprise his ex-wife, Sue, and have a final conversation with her. One they should have had thirty-two years earlier. When Ellie agrees to cover the cost of the trip, Lewis relents because he fears that when Chester is gone, he will feel guilty for having denied a dying man his last wish. “A guy tells you he wants one thing ot make his life compete before he dies. How do you say no to that?”

As Lewis and Chester embark on their journey to Arizona, they must find inventive ways to tolerate each other and co-exist in the motor home. Lewis has to devise safe ways to transport Lewis in and out of the Winnebago, and take care of his hygiene requirements. All without losing his own sanity. Not to mention the matter of how they will approach Sue once they arrive, unannounced, at her home.

The tale is related through Lewis’s first-person narrative and entirely from his perspective. It is at times hilarious, and often heartbreakingly thought-provoking, as Lewis relates cringe-worthy but realistic details of how he figures out the best ways to provide Chester the care he needs while compassionately protecting the older man’s remaining dignity. He candidly admits there are moments when he finds it “disturbing to be so completely in tune with the likes of Chester Wheeler.”

Hyde is a master at creating believable, credible dialogue and the story is given life and meaning through the men’s conversations, as well as the things they do not say to each other. She employs her deceptively straight-forward storytelling style to relate the deep emotional issues with which Lewis grapples and, through his observations and perceptions of Chester, pulls readers along into his consideration of the older man’s internal life and the disappointments, disillusionments, and pain that have resulted in his current predicament. He is facing certain death but, over the years, has somehow managed to push away the very people who should be surrounding him and easing his transition. Tragically, those people aren’t just absent. They don’t care about Chester or his impending demise.

With Chester unabashedly mean-spirited and surly, Lewis finds his own strength and voice as he works to balance his self-respect and dedication to the job he has promised to perform against his need to be treated respectfully by Chester. “The way I do my job is about me, not him.” He concludes that he cannot be a monster who hates an embittered old man who is dying, but must confront Chester’s cruelty, harsh criticisms, and homophobia. Chester insists that he and Lewis are very much the same – hateful – which strikes a nerve with Lewis. “Even if we do both hate, you hate me for what I am. I hate you for the things you say and do. Huge difference.” Hyde challenges readers to ponder if that is true as they come to know both Lewis and Chester better, and understand their fears and motivations.

As in many of her other novels, Hyde explores both the fragility and strength of familial bonds, as well as the importance of communication. She illustrates how unexpected revelations disrupt long-held assumptions and create emotional disequilibrium. And there’s that matter of redemption, and whether Chester will find it. Hyde keeps the character-drive story interesting with Lewis’s discovery of shocking details about Chester’s relationships not just with his children and ex-wife, but also his beloved friend, Mike, with whom he served in Vietnam. Chester has also been estranged for more than thirty years from the man that everybody loved. Will bringing closure to their fractured friendship also help Chester find peace? Hyde’s restrained approach to that aspect of the saga, particularly with respect to the choices Lewis makes, enhance its poignancy and emotional resonance, again revealing her to be one of America’s most gifted contemporary storytellers.

So Long, Chester Wheeler is about two men who journey together toward different destinations. Chester’s final days are spent with Lewis in pursuit of resolution of old hurts and resentments that will lead, hopefully, to a peaceful death for him and lessen the regrets and, perhaps, guilt felt by those he leaves behind.

But Lewis is on the brink of new beginnings and wondering why he is so committed to helping Chester find closure when he barely understands his own past or why his relationship with Tim failed. As he heads home, he recognizes that he is not “exactly the same person I’d been when I first drove that land boat out of Buffalo.” Spending time in the presence of Chester Wheeler turns out to be a profoundly life-changing experience for him, and reading about what he learns is a moving experience for readers.

Once again, Hyde delivers a slyly insightful and wise meditation on finding human connection in the most unexpected places and ways, and how we carry the spirits of those we encounter with us, in various ways and degrees, for the rest of our lives.