A Review of Bigger: Essays by Ren Cedar Fuller
By Vani Mandava

The most important literature for my review was our mother’s words, which I followed as though they were the breadcrumbs in a fairy tale, slipping through a little girl’s fingers while she walked deeper into the forest.

These are Ren Cedar Fuller’s words when talking about reconstructing her mother’s when she can no longer communicate with her children due to her failing mind. Her heartwarming collection of essays titled Bigger is an exploration of relationships with people whose differences make them at once relatable and vulnerable in the current climate. Ren writes about her neurodiverse father, her transgender child, her mother’s Alzheimer’s, and her hidden disability. 

The author, a Seattle resident who grew up in rural California is a parent educator, a retired preschool director and a facilitator for TransFamilies, an online support hub for families with gender diverse children. She won Under the Sun’s Summer Writing Contest and her essays have appeared in HerStry, Hippocampus, New England Review, and North American Review. 

In Naming My Father, she approaches her father’s neurodiversity with the sensitivity of a career child educator and the empathy of a parent who approaches her own childhood hurt with grace. Tar Rocks explores the comforting embrace of a young summer friendship while navigating the tenuous relationship of a teen with her family. 

In our teenage years, decades ago, boys were supposed to keep their hair short, girls were supposed to keep their legs together, and queer people were supposed to keep hidden until they moved to the big city.

In Checklist for a Sign-making Party, Cedar Fuller talks about changing times as she remains a steadfast cheerleader to her teenager’s journey, with the constant conflict between holding on, and letting go. 

Ren Cedar Fuller writes about her experiences as a daughter, sibling, mother and partner with a tenderness for the relationships in her life, in a rich narrative storytelling style that takes the reader in the midst of the wonderful people in her life with their strengths and frailties. 

Her style is bereft of labels and diagnoses and instead focuses on the deep human experience of the people that surround her with a subtext of celebrating the differences that enrich human relationships. 

The book will be a helpful read to anyone who may be navigating the world with a loved one who is neuro-atypical, non-binary, or living with a hidden disability. As part of Ren’s reading group, I loved watching the process of each essay in the book unfolding and the deep thoughtfulness with which Ren approached each story. Even though our lives could not have been any more different, her stories made the world more comforting and intimate for me as I connected with her writing through the fabric of our shared emotions. 

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Vani Mandava, an academic having published extensively in academic journals, now finds joy in creative writing. Originally from Mumbai, India, and having lived most of her adult life in Seattle, Washington, she feels at home anywhere there is an ocean to the west. As the bewildered mom of a teenager, she has found inspiration in the words of other personal storytellers and has found community through her writing group and writing practice.

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