Media | Mindy Fried

Review in The Gerontologist
“Caring for Red is a both a moving account of her caregiving experience and a story about the complexity of human relationship…As a sociologist, Fried is perhaps in a unique position to describe the journey of caregiving in personal as well as social/systemic and scholarly terms. Throughout the book, Fried peppers her own story of caregiving with important data and references to relevant theories, such as continuity theory and exchange theory. Interspersed with poignant personal examples are related statistics on the aging of the population, caregiving, gender division of labor, assisted living, and long-term care financing…One of the strengths of this book is its versatility for classroom use. In addition to the extensive content on aging and caregiving, there is enough discussion of topics such as McCarthyism, labor activism, familial relationships, and grief/loss to make this text applicable not only in gerontology courses but also in history, social work, psychology, or theater. Due to the memoir style, it could also be used in English or literature courses as well. Further, because the book stems from the author’s blog, Mindy’s Muses, the chapters are written in such a way that each provides enough context that single chapters can easily stand alone. Instructors could easily choose to assign the entire book or a select chapter most relevant to course content.”