Half the house

the long version

Half the House is the story of a family repeatedly visited by death and suffering; of a boy burdened with a terrible secret; of a father and son estranged by grief and anger. Richard Hoffman recalls his boyhood in postwar, blue collar Allentown, PA, a world of breweries and ballfields, by turns idyllic and brutal. He depicts his family's struggles to maintain their dignity while caring for two of his brothers, who are terminally ill, and reveals how, under such circumstances, hope and denial become one; love and rage are inextricably fused; and silence and unreality threaten.