Fascinating Authors

Book Review
By
John H. Manhold

I Promised You Daisies, ISBN 9780982060537, Paperback 302 pages, $15.00, is the second volume in a trilogy entitled Imperfectly Ordinary by Robert A. Benjamin.

This volume is an interesting, autobiography/memoir of a man who might be described as an unusual type of workaholic. To explain the classification of unusual: the usual workaholic concentrates on his main occupation with ancillary situations largely ignored. Benjamin frequently concentrated on three or more occupations simultaneously and did so for many years. He dropped out of Bowdoin College in Maine during his third year, returned to Boston, wandered through various menial jobs until meeting and eventually marrying Karen, the love of his life. Karen was a nursing student with a compulsive drive to study and ‘be the best’. The couple decides that Benjamin will work while Karen finishes her training, and then the two will return to Maine for him to finish his degree and become a public school teacher. From here, his workaholic life begins with a small position at Massachusetts General that gradually expands into numerous side functions resulting from his willingness to learn and his ability to equate with people. Karen graduates, and they move to Maine, where he completes his education. However, the scenario they had so studiously worked out, does not function in quite the manner they had expected and therein lies much of the story.

I read few autobiographies or memoirs but discovered this one to be particularly interesting. The author’s story reads like a novel centered in Maine, Massachusetts and New Jersey and exhibits an intimate knowledge of Massachusetts General Hospital, Beacon Hill, and other places of interest, as well as Brunswick, Me, and some of State of New Jersey, but also skips to the western part of the United States for a few scenes.

In I Promised You Daisies, Robert Benjamin has provided a most enjoyable autobiography/memoire that reads like a very interesting novel. At its conclusion you find yourself with a desire to read the 1^st of the series, and look forward to the final volume of the trilogy.