Book Review: Not Finished Yet by Tracie Adams

Reviewed by Shelby Zwintscher

Ebb and flow through this collection of poetic essays in flash.

Jellyfish live in a state of perpetual flow, their malleable form drifting from whichever way the tides carry. Humans live similarly, ebbing and flowing through the multitude of experiences and emotions that come within a lifetime. Not Finished Yet: Essays on the Rhythmic Beauty of a Life in Flux considers this human/jellyfish parallel through four themed sections of gripping, little but fierce memoir essays.

“The jellyfish’s transparency and its seeming fragility are deceptive. Beneath its delicate tentacles lies a hidden resilience.”

“Section One: The World in Flux” collects essays about Adams’ adolescence into early adulthood. Here we are introduced to the metaphor of the jellyfish. This section artfully and viscerally brings to life distinct childhood memories and emotions, illustrating moments of trauma and growing pains.

“Section Two: Floating Through Currents” covers the jellyfish tumbling through the current. Here we witness the tumultuous currents of mental health, loss, and grief. These essays are “an exploration of resilience as well- not as an endpoint, but as a practice.”

“Section Three: Surrendering to the Undertow” explores the adaptability of the jellyfish. This collection of essays reflect on the necessity of losing your shape to evolve into a new form in life.

“Section Four: Drifting and Waiting” embraces living life as a work in continual progress, fluid as a jellyfish. In this section Adams writes on moments within the flux of motherhood and growing older in family life.

Not Finished Yet touches on depictions of topics that may be difficult for sensitive readers, such as child abuse, sexual abuse, physical abuse, suicide, eating disorders, depression, grief, death of loved ones, and addiction. Each subject is written with immense care and tact.

The book gorgeously transcribes this vast range of difficult personal subjects in a way that is both movingly honest in its hardships and tinged with hope. Emotional processing and healing pour through every line in each essay. The unflinching intimacy of these essays opens the door for readers to find themselves and universally connect.

This collection is dream-like and experimental. It features essays that follow their own form.“When We Were Giants” is written in a drawling, singular sentence. “The Extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Brooch” is from the perspective of a brooch passed down to Adams from her grandmother. Other creative formats include a family meal as a tea party featuring her family as stuffed animals, a conversation of notes between Adams and her stomach, and essays speaking directly to a specific subject.

“Together, we remember your grandmother’s winter coat, her blue silk scarf, her hair dyed the color of a moonless night. Her lilac perfume is inscribed forever in a circle of gold. Oh, how we cling to those ordinary days, the ones that came before.”

Each essay grabs your attention, its brevity serving as a strength in encapsulating the reader and drawing them to read just one more. The gripping imagery and word choice of Not Finished Yet creates a sensory and emotional experience—this is a standout example of the flash memoir form.

Not Finished Yet left me inspired creatively and spiritually, eager to embrace a life in flux. This book is for readers who can find beauty in darkness and long for memoirs that defy convention and excel in craft.

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