Clutching at the heartstrings and never letting go, A Heart That Works, well, works. It is an excruciating read. Not something that would be expected from the creatively lucid mind of Rob Delaney, but to expect a light romp through life from the American comedian would be a sign of a safe and unaware time. Delaney charts the all-too-brief life and death of his youngest son, Henry, in unflinching detail. There are sobering moments that display grief in all its clunky and strange moments as Delaney and wife Leah march on through, understanding and facing off the cancer diagnosis that tested their strength. Engaging that is as brutal as it is necessary, for Delaney and the reader.
Calamitous and tragic, A Heart That Works is a spiral through grief that Delaney manages to put into words. He is frequent to note that his words, descriptive as they are, do not do justice to the heartbreak, the passion or love, that he has for Henry. Understanding it as best a reader can, a reliance on the simple brutality and facts of the matter pushes through with complete truth. Delaney is a wonderful writer and manages to keep focus in some of the most trying and heartstring-tugging times. Interactions with those he is thankful for, an understanding of the tough strains and restraints on a system of healthcare that is a just and reasoned good, but on the teetering, terrifying lapse of buckling under pressure. Delaney charts all of this with first-hand experience, something he is gifting the reader and horrifying them with at the same time.
That is the inherent and painful beauty to Delaney’s work here. There is not acceptance but understanding. Delaney takes readers through the process of losing, gaining and losing a loved one. He does so while charting the other moments of life, the good memories and the horrifying ones. Lingering grief and doubt expressed lovingly and furiously through a hundred or so pages. Key to this though is the process Delaney goes through. He does not have a quick fix, he does not promise to change the perspective of the reader in a manner that will be wholly good and permanent. What Delaney does is far more important. An acceptance that grief is not just acceptable but necessary to living, even when it hurts most actively.
From imploring those working the American healthcare system to, in the words of David Lynch, “fix your hearts or die” or wailing against the horribly cut and financially underfunded NHS, Delaney’s words are as much a grieving father as they are a rallying cry from someone with experience. As brutal and broad as the premise of losing a child is, Delaney navigates it warts and all. There is real innocence and heart and humanity found within these pages, and that does much to extend a hand to the reader, and to smack them around the mouth with it. A Heart That Works is impossible to understand without grief, Delaney states as much frequently throughout, and he is correct. But it is easy to sympathise, and by the end of this book, it is hard to reason that sympathy is what people need above anything else.
