“She’s familiar but funny, boldly outspoken yet simultaneously reassuring,” wrote Alex Kuczynski in a review of Nora Ephron’s final book “I Remember Nothing,” a sequel to her 2006 work “I Feel Bad About My Neck.”

Her work was sprinkled through with everyday objects, activities, and catchphrases (“I’ll have what she’s having”), while managing to capture the complexities of relationships, our daily lives, and the sometimes comical, sometimes tragic ways we see our world.  In the mundane details of her life, she found a profound timelessness and universality, noting that when she died, she would miss “taking a bath.  Coming over the bridge to Manhattan.  Pie.”

Kuczynski noted, “I Remember Nothing does at times give us more depth and gravity and an actual, almost gravely serious reflection on divorce, duplicity, disease.”  But no matter the depths of despair her characters faced, there was always a sense of uplift if not redemption in their endings.  Harry did indeed meet Sally.  Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan Got Mail.  Julie and Julia were two sides of the same coin.

As Kuczynski wrote, “Ephron is the poster girl for the religion of When Life Gives You Lemons, Make Lemonade.”

See also: Nora Ephron, Jewish Women: A Comprehensive Historical Encyclopedia; Nora Ephron, 1941 – 2012, We Remember; “When Harry Met Sally” hits theaters, This Week in History; “Nora, you may remember nothing, but we remember you” and "Ephron's Book: Funny Truth or Big-time Set-back?" in Jewesses with Attitude; Katz’ Delicatessen, On the Map.

Sources:  “The Oft-Examined Life,” Alex Kuczynski, New York Times.