ForeWord Clarion Review

FORMAL REVIEW: The Inheritance: A Story of Love, Legacy, and Lost Opportunities

Michael K. Parson’s The Inheritance is both a heart-warming and heart-wrenching account of marriage and family life. It vividly depicts the relational pitfalls that may subtly emerge in a beautiful marriage when left unguarded, untended, and malnourished. At the same time, The Inheritance shows the power within each of us to heal, learn, overcome, and reconnect with loved ones through concerted effort over a lifetime. One cannot help but be touched by the powerful spirit of this family rendering.

With the changing trends and the unstable, precarious nature of family relationships in recent years, Parson’s The Inheritance subtly, yet eloquently, reinforces time-honored values of love, forgiveness, understanding, choices, humility, thoughtfulness, and accountability as crucial elements of achieving stability in family life. He powerfully illustrates the importance of reflection upon one’s life through journal writing as a means of preserving family history and benefiting posterity for generations to come.  Communication and understanding in family relationships are sometimes achieved through accounts of one’s life and the process of reflection once loved ones are passed on. Often family life, and all that we inherit from our families, is best understood through a generational perspective.

Parson’s literary style is commendable and insightful. He engages the reader on a saga that leads through a lifetime of relational choices. One sees the development, fall, and re-emergence of both relationships and souls. The quotes between chapters both create an excellent foreshadowing technique and lend a bit of educated, philosophical mystery that engages the reader at a higher level than most books of this genre.

Particularly masterful is the way Parson portrays the intersection of societal factors, complacency developed through frustration, the role of emotional and physical fatigue, the unexamined pre-marital value differences, the impact of family of origin issues, the misunderstandings of quick judgments, and the reactivity levels that often combine to undermine marital stability. The reader is transported in time to an earlier era through songs, movies, events and descriptions reminiscent of simpler times, yet reveals how complex living in that era could be.

From a spiritual perspective, one reads how a lack of service, a failure to nourish love, a tendency toward selfishness, an attitude of carelessness, and a propensity toward idleness coupled with a devastating dose of pride lead to regret in relationships. Yet, Parson adroitly captures the human spirit, which will not wallow forever in misery and yearns to remedy and restore some of the losses caused by human flaws. Parson depicts an emerging, unconquerable determination in overcoming one’s regrets despite the character’s destructive decisions years earlier.

The pathos with which Parson writes is magnificent and stirring. One feels the challenges and losses of life endured by the characters-both the pains and the joys of life are felt by the characters and reader, alike. It urges the reader on, without being able to set the book down. The character development is both endearing and superb. From just a glimpse, the reader understands the depths of the characters’ (and their own) souls.

Michael K. Parson’s The Inheritance will warm your heart and home. It is a “must read” for anyone who seeks to nurture, develop, and enhance their family relationships!

Kyle N. Weir, Ph.D., LMFT
Marriage and Family Therapist
Associate Professor – Counselor Education Program
California State University – Fresno