Review: Elephant in the Sky by Heather A Clark

Elephant in the Sky

by Heather A Clark

Publisher: ECW Press

Pages: 326

Format: book

Buy the Book: Amazon

Goodreads:  The story begins from nine-year-old Nate’s point of view, etching the details of an unbalanced mind struggling to make sense of rampant thought patterns and heightened paranoia. Enter Ashley, Nate's mother, and a hardworking advertising executive concerned that she’s not giving her family enough of her time — especially now that she senses something might be wrong with her son. As the story moves deftly back and forth between the two perspectives, the narrative converges to reveal one family's journey of discovery as they strive to find balance in their lives.


Kritters Thoughts:  The mother and the son take turns narrating the story and showing their side, the son doesn't get as much playtime, but the fact that you hear from him was very important.  This mother, Ashley, is a full time working mom with a husband that took the stay at home with the kid part of the duties, so she is a little removed from what is going on in the house day to day, but with odd things happening she starts cluing into what is happening at home which is making her work life completely suffer.  Without spoiling this magnificent read, things start imploding and the family must figure out how to live the new normal.

First, as a working woman I LOVED the portrayal of the working mom.  The honesty to show that it is hard for the parent that is at work to be completely in the know at home also was great.  I loved the arc of this mom as she made more of an effort to work on the home/work balance and how that is a struggle to be fully present in both places.  

Nate is the second child in this family, the baby of the family, and by giving him chapters and a voice really gave the story more depth and grit.  Although his chapters were sometimes the hardest to read, the value outweighed the struggle to read them.

I would recommend this book to almost any reader.  The only caveat would be the reader who may have a sensitivity to mental illness - this can be hard to read at times, but the value of family completely took this book over the top for me.


Rating: definitely a good read, but can't read two in a row

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I received one copy of this book free of charge from ECW Press.  I was not required to write a positive review in exchange for receipt of the book; rather, the opinions expressed in this review are my own.