Conversations with the Conroys: Interviews with Pat Conroy and His Family

This small gem of a book collects five group interviews conducted with bestselling author Pat Conroy (The Great Santini) and four of his siblings: Mike, Jim, Tim, and Kathy. Like many writers, Conroy wrote what he knew. Unfortunately for Pat and his siblings, that included the physical and verbal abuse inflicted by their father, USMC colonel Donald Conroy, aka the Great Santini. As the eldest, Pat was often the target. He was also the one who would, “like a dog,” herd the other children to a safe place during their father’s rages. These valuable interviews provide intimate glimpses into the lives of children who suffered deeply but came to see themselves, in Tim Conroy’s words, as “survivors,” not “victims.” Those survivors had acquired enough perspective by the time they were adults to observe that their father “totally changed” after their mother divorced him, becoming a “nice guy and great grandfather.” Even brother Tom’s suicide, which Conroy calls the “great wound of our family,” is recounted with some humor (albeit dark humor). The abundance of joy present in the siblings’ exchanges about painful events, often expressed in teasing, underscores the message of South Carolina poet Nikky Finney’s afterword: that “the art of the conversation has the power to save each of us.” For fans of Conroy’s books, this is a must-read. 50 b&w illus. (Oct.)