Book Review – Dark Chocolate, A Mother’s Puzzle - by Monica Reid

Chances are you know someone who suffers from the condition known as AUTISM. If that person is a family member living in your own household – your sibling or your child – you will readily relate to the challenges Monica Reid’s family encountered as told in this charmingly crafted little book. Everyone else will get their eyes opened. Wide.   

This first-time mother’s struggles were due not only to the conflicting emotions she experienced when, despite doing everything possible to protect her child in utero, her son Bryson was diagnosed with autism. She had given up everything considered detrimental to optimal fetal development, most especially her Lord-of-the-Rings epic-sized obsession: “Chocolate! I needs it… worse than Gollum needed his Precious… more than Menelaus needed Helen of Troy… more than the moon needs the Earth or Europa needs Jupiter…”

To sacrifice chocolate, that “warm, buttery, velvety, unctuous delight,” all for naught.  Bryson’s demeanor grew more worrisome as time progressed - it wasn’t all snuggles and sweetness in the Reid household. Her son behaved, well, a bit differently than expected and later, destructively. As she dealt with the special needs of her son, Monica took solace in that deep dark confection only a bona-fide chocoholic can understand.

Ironically she notes: “I didn’t do anything (while pregnant) that left me racked with guilt over Bryson’s diagnosis”. But during her second and third pregnancies, she - shall we say – ramped down the vigilance (and it turns out that was a good strategy.) Chocolate was on hand in times of need, always and any color of chocolate until…..well, you’ll just have to read the book to find out what happened to all that chocolate, and to Bryson.

Dark Chocolate: A Mother’s Puzzle is a heroine’s journey of nine years and counting through the labyrinths of addiction and tough love. It’s told in honest and soulful prose dipped in dark humor, delivered to the reader to savor in small bites.

 Precious…oh yes.

Non-fiction: Special needs, parenting, humor.  38 pages, including color photographs.  $2.99 

(Available through Amazon for Kindle Reader. Free reader downloads are available on the website.)

http://www.amazon.com/Dark-Chocolate-mothers-puzzle-Monica-ebook/dp/B01AMU6TH0/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1453990984&sr=1-1&keywords=monica+reid