Title: Eleven Miles South of Half Moon Bay
Author: Bill Sullivan
Publisher: iUniverse
ISBN: 978-1-4620-8029-8
Pages: 298 Genre: Memoir
Reviewed by: Allison Walker
Pacific Book Review
When you pass on from this life, how would you like to be remembered? What stories will you want your friends and families tell about you? When a loved one passes, it’s easy to become caught in reminiscing in the final years, the final moments even. Being able to look back on the lifetime spent with that person, and remembering those stories they would want you to recall, is both a gift to their spirit and a way of healing your own.
Eleven Miles South of Half Moon Bay is one-half beautiful memory and one-half recovering from the aftermath, as author Bill Sullivan shares his dearest, and most hilarious, stories about his late cousin, Bruce. Throughout the novel, Sullivan struggles to accept the flavor of guilt underlying his young memories of Bruce, and comes to peace with his untimely passing.
Sullivan’s novel begins as a crafty, fun, tongue-in-cheek recounting of boyhood in the 1950’s. As Sullivan narrates, cousins and brothers Bill, Bruce and Bobby engage in clever and hilarious antics with their neighborhood buddies. They use apples as ammunition in war games, build buggy cars to race against their rivals, and generally engage in activities that make us adults look back and wonder at the resiliency of children. It is during these chapters that Sullivan’s humorous writing style really shines; for example in this passage, one of my favorite anecdotes, “As if [the God of mischievous boys and winter pranks] had not already provided sufficient recompense to his perpetually naughty followers, the temperatures began to rise, rendering the eight inch blanket of snow perfect for packing snowballs.” Therein follows the most epic snowball escapade known to boyhood, followed by the boys being hilariously caught by the local constable.
The boys grow up in this pre-Vietnam era, becoming young men and beginning their own families. This is where Eleven Miles South of Half Moon Bay changes its tone. When the unspeakable happens, and Bruce sacrifices his life to save a drowning swimmer, Sullivan’s playful bildungsroman becomes a soulful memoir, a tribute to the loss of his cousin and spirit brother. As he recalls, the family must now come to terms with the tragedy of never seeing Bruce again, and indeed never recovering his body, something Sullivan remembers being an emotional struggle for them all.
Despite the devastating recounting of Bruce’s passing, Eleven Miles South of Half Moon Bay is curative. Reading its pages is like putting salve on a wound. While Bruce’s life ends far too young, the preceding stories of his boyhood paint him brightly. He is a witty and fearless boy, loyal to his brothers and cousins, quick to dive into trouble and equally quick to find a way out again. Even as the author grapples with his own childhood feelings toward his troublesome cousin, every memory of Bruce is befitting to the way he should be remembered. Sullivan crafted a beautiful memoir, lovely and honest, and a fitting tribute to a lost, beloved brother.
