Synopsis
Bernadette Rogers swore she’d never put her father in a nursing home. Does that include euthanizing him to keep her word? Her mother thinks it does. Bernadette isn’t so sure. And even if she were, it’s not like you can walk into a drug store and buy Nembutal.
As an ICU nurse she’s no stranger to the blunt realities of death, but her mother’s request to help her father—who’s disappearing into the abyss of dementia—go “peacefully” blindsides her. Her mother thinks it’s assisted suicide. Bernadette knows better. Even if they do it for all the right reasons, it would still be murder.
Surrounded by conflicting voices, Bernadette doesn't know which way to turn. Her self-righteous sister insists it's a sin. Her magnanimous ex thinks her mother will try it alone. Then her best friend offers to help. What was supposed to be a relaxing two-week break becomes an emotional rollercoaster as Bernadette is forced to make an agonizing decision about her beloved father and figure out just how far she’s willing to go for love.
For fans of Jodi Picoult and Lisa Genova, House on Fire is an unforgettable story of family, friendship, and the promises we aren’t sure anyone should honor.
Format 282 pages, Paperback
Published March 31, 2023 by 9:25 Books
ISBN 9798987461518
Published March 31, 2023 by 9:25 Books
ISBN 9798987461518
About the Author
D. Liebhart is a nurse and writer. She writes (and sometimes lives) stories about ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances, where they learn that life is rarely predictable and answers to the most complex questions are almost never black and white.
House on Fire, her first novel, won the 2023 Page Turner Award for both fiction and debut. It was long-listed for the 2022 Petrichor Prize and received an honorable mention from Writer’s Digest. Her essay Thalassophobia (a true account of a very out-of-the-ordinary honeymoon) won the 2021 Linda Julian Creative Nonfiction Prize from Emrys Journal.
Learn more about the author
My Thoughts
My mother asked me to kill my father on Christmas.
D. Liebhart’s House on Fire is a deeply affecting novel that offers a raw, unflinching look into the emotional landscape of a family navigating life with a parent suffering from dementia. With tender prose and piercing honesty, Liebhart brings readers into the daily struggle—balancing love and exhaustion, duty and resentment, memory and loss, and the struggle to determine when to let go.
I don't want to disappear in little pieces, like God is crushing stars between his fingers until the whole sky is dark.
Personal note: My mother suffered sudden onset dementia after a terminal cancer diagnosis and went within a few months from someone fully capable of caring for herself and maintaining a household to needing someone with her nearly 24 hours a day. It was both a blessing and a curse that it hit Mom so fast and hard that we didn't have to watch her slowly fade, and since she was terminal, we only suffered through 18 months of mental decline.
Through intimate storytelling and alternating timelines, Liebhart captures the small moments of disorientation and fear that characterize dementia’s slow progression-- not just in the afflicted, but in those left to witness it. The reader is placed in the shoes of adult children trying to make impossible decisions, second-guessing themselves at every turn, as they juggle careers, relationships, and guilt.
Dementia had given him an obstinate streak, like a two-year-old practicing "no" at every opportunity.
This book struck me in an unexpected way. It became something akin to therapy for me, like talking to a friend who's been through the same thing. I felt a kinship with the main character as she navigated the rocky path of dementia watching a parent slowly degrade and debating over how the story will end.
The fervency in his actions was new. Everything was turned up a notch.
What sets House on Fire apart is its refusal to simplify the emotional toll. There is no neat resolution, no sanitized version of caregiving. Instead, we are offered insight into the helplessness that comes when a once-strong parent becomes someone unrecognizable, and the heartbreak of watching that transformation. The novel excels in showing how dementia doesn’t happen in isolation; it happens to a family. Liebhart gives voice to the internal conflict so many caregivers face—the desire to do the right thing against the quiet rage of watching someone slip away. Her characters are flawed, tender, overwhelmed, and real, and they speak clearly to someone who has traversed this hell themselves.
Liebhart’s writing is lyrical without being sentimental, and the story is grounded in an authenticity that suggests lived experience. House on Fire will resonate with anyone who has felt the sting of watching a loved one fade, and it offers a compassionate, cathartic lens for those in the throes of similar trials.
Five words: honest, heartbreaking, human, cathartic, intimate
Buy Now:
My final word: This novel doesn't just tell a story—it feels like a lived experience, and in doing so, affirms the resilience of the human spirit, even when it seems on the brink of collapse. It’s a beautifully written, empathetic novel that offers both comfort and clarity to anyone touched by dementia. A valuable perspective for those who haven’t yet had to walk that road, House on Fire is a testament to resilience, and to the emotional complexities of loving someone through the most difficult of goodbyes.
Warnings:
Marijuana use and alcohol, casual references to sex, dementia (can be a trigger for anyone who has had a loved one diagnosed with it)
My Rating:
The Cerebral Girl is a middle-aged blogger just digging her way out from under a mountain of books in the deep south of Florida.
I received a copy of this book to review from the author in exchange for my honest opinion. I was not financially compensated in any way, and the opinions expressed are my own and based on my observations while reading this novel.
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