Dwell Here and Prosper
“Chris Eagle does an extraordinary job in this book showing the humanity as well as dignity one can maintain amongst daily indignities in some of our nation’s assisted living and rehabilitation centers. One does not feel pity or contempt reading about these vulnerable and complicated characters, but a sense of awe watching people live life on life’s terms. As the narrator of the book (Chris Eagle’s dad, a lifelong Phillies fan) might have said, the author knocks it out of the park.”
Michelle Bowdler, author of Is Rape a Crime?
Dick, a blunt and bawdy Philly sports fan, finds himself in an assisted living facility following a stroke. Determined to regain his independence, he does daily laps around the grounds with his quad cane. But when recovery never comes, and days swell into years, Dick finds purpose instead by studying his fellow residents, chronicling their odd obsessions and their nasty arguments, their breakdowns, their drunken debaucheries-and yes, even their sexual escapades.
Dwell Here and Prosper is a gritty but heartfelt novel, heavily informed by the author's father and his experiences in assisted living near Philadelphia in the 90s. With its set of memorable outcasts-a shady jokester who insists he worked for the FBI, a schizophrenic Catholic who roams local cemeteries at night in search of the Virgin Mary, a twenty-six-year-old whose teeth mysteriously fell out, a middle-aged alcoholic who prostitutes herself to other residents for booze and cigarettes-it's a One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest for a different generation and a different kind of institution. This timeless book offers a funny yet honest meditation on aging and community, and what it means to thrive in purgatory.
Praise