Running with Scissors: A Memoir

Amazon.com

There is a passage early in Augusten Burroughs's harrowing and highly entertaining memoir, Running with Scissors, that speaks volumes about the author. While going to the garbage dump with his father, young Augusten spots a chipped, glass-top coffee table that he longs to bring home. "I knew I could hide the chip by fanning a display of magazines on the surface, like in a doctor's office," he writes, "And it certainly wouldn't be dirty after I polished it with Windex for three hours." There were certainly numerous chips in the childhood Burroughs describes: an alcoholic father, an unstable mother who gives him up for adoption to her therapist, and an adolescence spent as part of the therapist's eccentric extended family, gobbling prescription meds and fooling around with both an old electroshock machine and a pedophile who lives in a shed out back. But just as he dreamed of doing with that old table, Burroughs employs a vigorous program of decoration and fervent polishing to a life that many would have simply thrown in a landfill. Despite her abandonment, he never gives up on his increasingly unbalanced mother. And rather than despair about his lot, he glamorizes it: planning a "beauty empire" and performing an a capella version of "You Light Up My Life" at a local mental ward. Burroughs's perspective achieves a crucial balance for a memoir: emotional but not self-involved, observant but not clinical, funny but not deliberately comic. And it's ultimately a feel-good story: as he steers through a challenging childhood, there's always a sense that Burroughs's survivor mentality will guide him through and that the coffee table will be salvaged after all. --John Moe

Book Description

Running with Scissors is the true story of a boy whose mother (a poet with delusions of Anne Sexton) gave him away to be raised by her unorthodox psychiatrist who bore a striking resemblance to Santa Claus. So at the age of twelve, Burroughs found himself amidst Victorian squalor living with the doctor's bizarre family, and befriending a pedophile who resided in the backyard shed. The story of an outlaw childhood where rules were unheard of, and the Christmas tree stayed up all year round, where Valium was consumed like candy, and if things got dull an electroshock- therapy machine could provide entertainment. The funny, harrowing and bestselling account of an ordinary boy's survival under the most extraordinary circumstances.

Customer Reviews:

....and when does it get funny?.......2007-10-13

I hitched a ride on the "Running with Scissors" bandwagon; the movie preview looked humorous so, naturally, I decided to read the book instead. If you are looking for another collection of humorous and cynical essays on childhood you may find in a David Sedaris book, this is certainly not it! Mr. Burroughs' approach to writing is much less observational than Sedaris; Mr. Sedaris comes off as a more sympathetic creature where Mr. Burroughs gains little of my sympathy despite suffering a childhood far more destructive and horrifying. I cannot say that I chuckled more than two or three times throughout the whole book, most likely those chuckles were directed at obscure references not even meant to be humorous. Being shocking is not necessarily funny, and this book is certainly not funny. Perhaps what Dane Cook is to comedy Augusten Burroughs is to humorous memoirs.

Overrated.......2007-10-12

Another book hopping on the "my life is screwed up because of my childhood/adolescence" ficto-auto-biography wagon.

The book reads almost formulaically, in the vein of Sedaris. I didn't find the writing interesting or engaging or particularly humorous.

Just my opinion, but--UGH!.......2007-10-10

I bought this book based on rave reviews on my public radio station and on the book itself by big-time names. I guess I should start using the same system I use for movies--if they rave, it will suck. If they totally trash it, it's probably pretty good. I really tried to give this a chance--I gave it 100 pages to say something, ANYTHING funny, substantial, or go anywhere with the narrative. The writing was not gifted, prosaic, insightful or anything I expected. It was just one really warped incident after another, with no rhyme or reason. Nothing led anywhere, made me think, laugh, cry or go "Hmmm...". If a book can't give you anything in 100 pages, it badly needs a better editor, or the writer should pick another topic. This was just annoying and sad. I'm currently reading a book about fish that's more entertaining and insightful. I don't know what he was thinking. And don't EVEN compare him to Sedaris--that man is pee-your-pants funny. This guy made me think that maybe I wouldn't want him petting my dog.

Very disturbing........2007-10-10

I found this book very disturbing. The pedophilic relationship and the graphic description of the sex acts was especially nauseating. I am a mother of two young boys and this made me angry and sad. I read the whole book although I almost threw it in the trash after the sex chapter. I think the book was interesting, shocking, and amazing that the author is a functioning adult. However, I wouldn't recommend the book due to the graphic content (and I am no prude). I DID NOT find the book funny as the reviews stated. I found myself disgusted with the characters, especially the adults, who really allowed and encouraged this sick lifestyle.

appreciate differences.......2007-10-05

A sad, funny, wildly entertaining story of growing up sane in spite of some awful insane surroundings.

This was a Book Club Pick; it met mixed reviews.
Warning: Do Not See Movie.

Those who saw movie overwhelmly stated it was in bad taste--a waste of time. Movie focused on a few selacious events of the book--not good. Movie watchers refused to read book.

I admit I did not want to read this after a few in my book club reviewed the movie. But, I gave it a shot by getting the AUDIO BOOK at local library.

The Audio was fantastic--read by the author, himself. Burroughs added the inflections and humor/sadness/shock where they belonged. Every time the story started to get too graphic and yes, uncomfortable for me--thankfully, Burroughs closed the chapter and started on with another snapshot of his life.

Yes, this was a non-fiction account of one boy growing up in the midst of an extremely disfunctional group of adults/families/wanderers/outcasts, and how they functioned in a liberal college area in a tumultous time (60s-70s). (names changed to protect those still alive. I think Burroughs had to pay the real "Dr. Finch's family" some $$$ for getting too close for comfort.)

I say LISTEN to the book--it may make more sense. I truly LIKED it. Well written--excellent.

Average customer rating:

One girl's story....
Awareness
WOW
Moving and touched close to home
OH, THOSE TERRIBLE 50S-60S!!

Without a Map: A Memoir
Meredith Hall
Manufacturer: Beacon Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books

Women | Specific Groups | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books
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ASIN: 0807072737

Book Description

Meredith Hall's moving but unsentimental memoir begins in 1965, when she becomes pregnant at sixteen. Shunned by her insular New Hampshire community, she is then kicked out of the house by her mother. Her father and stepmother reluctantly take her in, hiding her before they finally banish her altogether. After giving her baby up for adoption, Hall wanders recklessly through the Middle East, where she survives by selling her possessions and finally her blood. She returns to New England and stitches together a life that encircles her silenced and invisible grief. When he is twenty-one, her lost son finds her. Hall learns that he grew up in gritty poverty with an abusive fatherâin her own father's hometown. Their reunion is tender, turbulent, and ultimately redemptive. Hall's parents never ask for her forgiveness, yet as they age, she offers them her love. What sets Without a Map apart is the way in which loss and betrayal evolve into compassion, and compassion into wisdom.

"Meredith Hall boldly charts one of the bravest of stories, the journey from disrupted youth up through that most tricky and forbidding territory, the family circle. Bone-honest and strong in its every line, this work of memory is a remarkably deep retrieval of its times and souls, thereby reflecting our own."
âIvan Doig, author of Heart Earth

"This is an unusually elegant memoir that feels as though its been carved straight out of Meredith Hall's capacious heart. The story is riveting, the words perfect. It is rare to read a work that manages to be at once artful and compelling, which for me best describes Meredith Hall's debut work. She is an author who deserves to be widely read. Few people write like this. Fewer still have the courage to live like this – without the comfort of any clichÃ©."
âLauren Slater, author of Opening Skinner's Box, Prozac Diary, and Welcome to My Country

"Meredith Hall's long journey from an inexcusably betrayed girlhood to the bittersweet mercies of womanhood is a triple triumphâof survival; of narration; and of forgiveness. Her portrait of her own empty bravado collapsing into total psychological and geographical dislocation is one of the most harrowing passages I've ever read. The subsequent turn toward memory and honesty is agonized, profound, and salvific. Without a Map is a masterpiece."
âDavid James Duncan, author of The Brothers K and God Laughs and Plays

"Meredith Hall is like a geiger counter ticking along the radium edge of these recent decades. She gives us self as expert-witnessâWithout a Map is smart, sharp, and redemptively honest. "
âSven Birkerts, author of The Gutenberg Elegies and My Sky Blue Trades

"Meredith Hall's story of loss, shame, and betrayal is also a story of joy, reconnection, and survival; each memory takes us deep to the marrow of sorrow and celebration. A work of extraordinary beauty and grace."
âKim Barnes, author of In the Wilderness: Coming of Age in Unknown Country

"Without A Map tells an important and perceptive story about loss, about aloneness and isolation in a time of great need, about a life slowly coming back into focus and the calm that finally emerges. Meredith Hall is a brave new writer who earns our attention."
âAnnie Dillard, author of Pilgrim at Tinker Creek

"Think for a moment of Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale, of banishment, reconciliation, redemption, and you'll get the scope of Without a Map, the new memoir by Meredith Hall . . . An extraordinary tale, made all the more moving by Hall's unsentimental prose and ample heart."
âgettrio.com

"a compelling, painful, hopeful story." âmore.com

"Meredith Hall's magnificent book held me in its thrall from the moment I began reading the opening pages. WITHOUT A MAP is a fluid, beautifully-written, hard-won piece of work that belongs on the shelf next to the best modern memoirs, and yet is in a category all its own. It is a moving example of a difficult life redeemed first through examination, then reflection, then finallyâlike a rough stone polished until it gleamsâinto a genuine work of art."
âDani Shapiro, author of Family History

"Hall, a brave and graceful writer who teaches at UNH, examines her life with wide open eyes and an equally open heart. Even as she wrestles with the grief of many lossesâher child, her parents' love and respect, her standing in her community, her identityâshe demonstrates the writer's gift of separating from her own experiences, establishing an objectivity that allows her to make meaning for herself and readers."
âRebecca Rule, Nashua Telegraph

"Open adoptions and connections between birth mothers and their children were not the way of life for a young girl who got pregnant in the '60s. Meredith Hall, in her beautifully written, poignant memoir, tells us what life was like for a naive girl who found herself pregnant and abandoned by her mother and father. This is a tale of loss, of endless traveling in search of an intangible something, and, ultimately, of forgiveness."
âGayle Shanks, Changing Hands Bookstore, Tempe, AZ

"Hall's sensitive, honest account of her personal odyssey shows one remarkable woman transcending this trauma to become a better, stronger person."
âWendy Smith, AARP The Magazine

"Hall's life, as depicted in this memoir, was nothing if not two thingsâdifficult and fascinating. With no family, friends or other support system, she took her life into her own hands at an early, tender age, and she fell quite far before finally rising up. The reader gets the benefit of her trials, a gritty view of the world from America to Europe to the Middle East."
âINtake Weekly

"Without a Map tells a stunning story of exile and ostracization. Meredith grew up on the seacoast of New Hampshire and became pregnant at age 16, in 1965. Her memoir is a rare and clear glimpse into the social mores of the mid 60's, and reveals the state of shame many families faced when an unmarried daughter became pregnant."
âLiz Bulkley, Host of "The Front Porch," NH Public Radio

"Appalling and infuriating, yet uplifting and inspiring, Without A Map pulls you into Hall's personal experience of sudden rejection and expulsion from her only sources of sustenance and connection. As an adoptive parent I cried and cheered for her through her exile and return to a very different home. Meredith Hall is a hero of awesome courage and eloquence."
âFrank Kramer, Harvard Book Store, Cambridge, MA

"[Without a Map] is a searing memoir about loss, betrayal, love and, in some measure, reconciliation. It has already brought Hall a celebrity that surprises her: stories in People, Oprah and Elle, an interview on National Public Radio, brisk sales in a crowded marketplace. It is on the extended New York Times bestseller list. What is arresting about this memoir is the world it reveals."
âMike Pride, Concord Monitor

"Without a Map, is so well written that it was hard for me to accept that the book had to end."
âTina Ristau, The Des Moines Register

"Painfully honest and beautifully writtenâ¦Meredith Hall has managed to distill courage from raw pain, and then somehow write this gem of a book about the experienceâ¦A stunning bookâ¦You must read it."
âLola Furber, Maine Women's Journal

"Fans of Jeannette Walls' The Glass Castle should take note of Meredith Hall's memoir, heartbreaking and ultimately heartwarming..."
âMary Cotton, owner of Newtonville Books, Newton TAB

Customer Reviews:

One girl's story...........2007-09-24

Meredith Hall's memoir is one girl's story of unplanned pregnancy (and its aftermath), told and retold over the generations. A cautionary tale here for young women--one brief lapse in judgement can ripple through the rest of one's life, the awful price paid over and over and over again. I appreciated Ms. Hall's willingness to share her painful story, although much was left out that would have helped frame things more clearly for the reader, i.e. how her placement of a child for adoption affected her marriage (was there one?), did it affect her second and third pregnancies, etc. For further reading about the adoption process pre-1970's, check out the excellent "The Girls Who Went Away."

Awareness.......2007-09-23

What I enjoyed the most about this book was the awareness that it brings. America has painted a fairy-tale image of adoption, and this book reveals the fact that not all children are given a "better life" with another family. Meredy's son was one of those people. Forced to give him up at the age of 17, Meredy, like many birth mothers of this time, wasn't given much detail about where her baby ended up. It was portrayed to her that he was given to a good home in Virginia. Instead, the truth (that would come out over 20 years later) was that he was given to an abusive family just a mile away from her father's home.

Hall is an excellent writer. The way this story is written makes you feel as though you are living in the times and culture that the author faced. It is unfortunate that her parents' lack of guidance contributed to the situation that she faced. Instead of facing the responsibility they in turn rejected her just as harshly as her child was taken from her.

It is a sad, emotional story marked by an ending of peace and reconcile and forgiveness for the family that did not provide a better childhood for her son.

WOW.......2007-09-19

I thought the beginning was good. But then the book just got better and better. It was much more than expected, unfortunately for Ms. Hall. All I can say, is WOW!

Moving and touched close to home.......2007-09-19

This book changed her life forever. With no choice on whether to relinquish her baby for adoption, she was left with an indescribable emptiness that could not be filled. It was a heartfelt book written with painful honesty and love. It is a book that was hard to put down.

OH, THOSE TERRIBLE 50S-60S!!.......2007-09-19

When I was reading this book about Meredith Hall growing up in the 50s and 60s, and suddenly faced with pregnancy at age 16, her pain and confusion and utter despair were palpable to me! I had to stop several times to cry..... In places, it was almost unbearably sad. She was so naive, and her parents were so wrapped up in their own lives as to be uninterested in her or any growing-up, adolescent problems she might have. I know, because I grew up at the same time, in the same circumstances. I knew girls who got pregnant at a very young age, and whether they kept their babies or gave them up for adoption (abortion was not an option then), their lives were never the same, and they carried a painful, heavy burden. Some still do.

In this book, however, something happens in the writing that causes it to lose veracity. Maybe because it was not written as a book, but rather chapters were written for other publications and then everything was put together to form this book. For whatever reason, it began to feel like a lot of short pieces strung together. There are lots of unanswered questions at the end of the book. Such as, who is the father of the two sons that she was able to keep? Whatever became of the father of her first baby? It appears she currently lives on a farm of sorts, yet teaches writing in a university, none of which is ever touched upon. Why has she become so self-indulgent after a lifetime of never, ever being able to speak up for herself? Something doesn't ring ture with the last third of the book.

Be that as it may, it does stand as a testament to the girls who became pregnant in those days. All choices were terrible! And I never knew, or heard about, any parent or any adult having any understanding or empathy for these girls, let alone trying to help them through the pregnancy or help them get on with their lives after the pregnancy. Never! And that is a very sad testament to the kinds of parents who were raising children in the 50s and 60s. Very sad.

I am glad that the author's life has worked out so well. I am sorry that she felt she had to include the chapter on killing the chickens, because I think that's where she lost me. She and her young sons had named them. Then she killed them with her bare hands. And then she laid them out for her sons to see. Terrible! It took a while for me to get that picture out of my mind..... during which time I had to put the book down and go on to something else. And when I got back to this book, it was hard to care as much. And I had just finished reading the delightful LITTLE HEATHENS by Mildred Kalish and she writes a lot about killing chickens and such goings on on her farm in the 30s and 40s, but never as tasteless and crass as the description in this book.

I wanted to love this book all the way through, but sadly I couldn't. However, I am giving it 4 stars because the first part of the book is so powerful.

Warriors Don't Cry: Searing Memoir of Battle to Integrate Little Rock

Average customer rating:

I T CAME TO PASS
Repetition Galore
Warriors Don't Cry
"With All Deliberate Speed . . ."
Very good book

Warriors Don't Cry: Searing Memoir of Battle to Integrate Little Rock
Melba Pattillo Beals
Manufacturer: Washington Square Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Ethnic & National | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books

General | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books

South | Regional U.S. | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books

Memoirs | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books

Contemporary | General | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books

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The Great Gatsby

ASIN: 0671866397

Book Description

You've gotta learn to defend yourself. Never let your enemy know what you are feeling.
-- The soldier assigned to protect Melba

Please, God, let me learn how to stop being a warrior. Sometimes I just need to be a girl.
-- Melba's diary, on her sixteenth birthday

In 1957 Melba Pattillo turned sixteen. That was also the year she became a warrior on the front lines of a civil rights firestorm. Following the landmark 1954 Supreme Court ruling, Brown v. Board Education, she was one of nine teenagers chosen to integrate Little Rock's Central High School. This is her remarkable story.

You will listen to the cruel taunts of her schoolmates and their parents. You will run with her from the threat of a lynch mob's rope. You will share her terror as she dodges lighted sticks of dynamite, and her pain as she washes away the acid sprayed into her eyes. But most of all you will share Melba's dignity and courage as she refuses to back down.

Customer Reviews:

I T CAME TO PASS.......2007-08-13

sO MUCH OUR RACE OF PEOPLE HAVE BEEN THROUGH , AND THE BOOK TELLS A LOT OF THE TRIUMPHS WE WENT THROUGH, AND STILL SOME OF THOSE THINGS STILL ARE GOING ON TODAy. So the title it came to pass is the right title because god said in his word nothing but the rightous.

Repetition Galore.......2007-07-05

Melba Pattillo Beals' "Warriors Don't Cry" was amateur at best. While the purpose of the memoir is inspiring, Beals just appeared to be a broken record.

Upon reading other reviews, I thought this memoir was going to be heartbreaking and inspiring. Yet as I began to read, a pattern developed. The book dragged on and on yet there seemed to be no progression. I found myself void of emotion throughout the whole recount. Needless to say, this was a disappointment, and extremely poorly written.

Warriors Don't Cry.......2007-06-27

We are coming up on the 50th anniversary of the integration of Central High in Little Rock. This book is written by one of the courageous students who braved a racist mob to claim the equality and justice we are all promised in a democracy. The photographs of one student, Elizabeth Eckford, facing the abusive and threatening crowds became iconic, part of history and public memory. What is not as well known is what life was like for the nine students inside the school everyday. Everyday they were threatened, physically attacked, suffered abusive language and attitudes from the white, segregationist students. The author, Melba Patillo Beals, is an extraordinary writer, storyteller and she is blazingly honest. As a way of celebrating July 4th, read this book and give it to every young person over the age of 10 that you know.

"With All Deliberate Speed . . .".......2007-05-15

Melba Joy Pattillo Beals was at the heart of a vortex of history as one of the "Little Rock Nine" who integrated Arkansas' preeminent public school in 1957. In the wake of the landmark 1954 Supreme Court decision, "Brown v. Board of Education," schools throughout the United States were ordered to integrate "with all deliberate speed."

Violent opposition to the integration of Central High led to the garrisoning of Little Rock by the 101st Airborne Division, the first (and thus far only) active-engagement use of Federal troops in the South since Reconstruction.

Ms. Beals (now a journalist) has a journalist's eye as she recalls her experiences at Central High that year. Drawing on her memories and on the copious and detailed diaries she kept, Ms. Beals puts us right into her well-shined saddle shoes, and right into the halls of Central.

At first glance, Melba Pattillo would have seemed to be the wrong sort of person to be on the front lines of the Civil Rights Movement. At fifteen, she was a girl given to romantic daydreams, a girl seemingly perfectly content to listen to Buddy Holly on the radio while cuddling with her stuffed animal collection amidst her flouncy white comforter and matching pillows.

But deep inside, Melba Pattillo had a core of steel. Her mother held an advanced degree in Education, and her gentle, stern, and unyielding Grandmother India had an unshakeable faith both in God, and in Melba, a faith which she transmitted almost by osmosis to her granddaughter---"God's warriors don't cry, child."

If other members of Melba's family and community did not share these ideas, ideals, and values, at least they all understood that this remarkable young lady (and her eight fellow classmates) was doing something that needed to be done, something that portended a sea change in the world.

But for all the fine rhetoric, life at Central was a hell of crowded corridors, shadowy stairwells, and constant terror. From day one, avowed segregationists in the school, in the community, and in the government (including Governor Orval Faubus) tried to break the back of the integration by means foul and fouler. Adult members of Little Rock's White Citizens Council educated their charges at Central in the ways and means of torture.

Anyone stunned by the constant reports of current-day "violence in our schools" will be shattered by Ms. Beals' seemingly endless recitation of the horrors inflicted upon the Little Rock Nine in the halls of Central High. Being cursed at, spat upon, and called a "N****r" was nothing much; open threats with weapons, violent beatings and stompings, stabbings, scaldings with near-boiling hot water, dousings with unspeakable liquids, strangulations, attempts at immolation, and acid sprays in the eyes were commonplace. These were not just hurtful acts. They were often life-threatening, and the passivity (or even gleeful acquiescence) of most of the CHS school officials in the face of such ongoing abuse of these children put in their care is enough to enrage the reader.

The lack of direct adult interest in what the Little Rock Nine were going through is paralyzing to consider. Little was done to protect them, even by their supporters. The 101st was pulled out of Little Rock in a deal brokered by Beltway Bandits, and what was actually happening to the Little Rock Nine was abstract to the politicians. The price these nine black teens paid for our freedom is beyond valuation.

And if the constancy of the violence portrayed in the telling of the tale somewhat blunts the reader's emotions after a time, it is harder to feel blunted when Melba Beals talks about the wrenching changes that went on within herself. Her fame (or notoriety among segregationists) meant that her home became a fortress-prison from which she could rarely escape. Drive-by shootings and bomb threats kept most of the lifelong friends she had made among "our people" (as she calls the blacks in her community) far away, and she was not invited to parties and outings. Holidays passed without the usual gaggle of friends and relations. The sad retelling of her unattended Sweet Sixteen Party is a heartbreaking moment in time, and her sorrow still reaches across the years to touch the reader.

But there are the finer moments as well: Every day spent at Central is at the end a day of victory; her meetings with remarkable men such as Thurgood Marshall are treasured moments in her life; her gratitude to the brave men of the 101st Airborne and the task they undertook to uphold the law of the land just so a girl could go to school where she chose, is inspiring; her first few tentative friendships with some white Central High students gives us cause for hope. Melba Pattillo traded her childhood for adulthood too soon, and her innocence for a hard-honed survival instinct by force.

We live in a far different society today, and in part that is due to Melba Beals. We can thank whatever Spirit moves us that she was given the talent to write this incredible memoir. This is an essential read.

Very good book.......2007-03-30

I loved this book. It was very sad to hear about all the hardships that the 9 students had to endure to integrate Central High. I think it made them better people and I feel sorry that they had to go through those things. The description used by Melba Pattillo Beals was excellent and very useful when you were trying to get a feel for how they felt. You almost felt as if you were there with them and were going through the same things. I would definetly recommend this book to other readers. I would avise that the reader be a little bit older so that they can understand the things that the blacks were going through. Other than being a harsh book because of the things that needed to be describe it was an amazing book.

Average customer rating:

Loved it - hilarious
Laugh out Loud Funny! Thank you!
Possible Side Effects
Hard to stop reading!
not his best, but still good.

Possible Side Effects
Augusten Burroughs
Manufacturer: Picador
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Memoirs | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books

Satire, General | Humor | Entertainment | Subjects | Books

Sellevision: A Novel
Magical Thinking : True Stories
Dry: A Memoir
Running with Scissors: A Memoir
Holidays on Ice: Stories

ASIN: 031242681X
Release Date: 2007-04-17

Book Description

National Bestseller

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Running with Scissors comes Augusten Burroughs's most provocative collection of true stories yet. From nicotine gum addiction to lesbian personal ads to incontinent dogs, Possible Side Effects mines Burroughs's life in a series of uproariously funny essays. These are stories that are uniquely Augusten, with all the over-the-top hilarity of Running with Scissors, the erudition of Dry, and the breadth of Magical Thinking. A collection that is universal in its appeal and unabashedly intimate, Possible Side Effects continues to explore that which is most personal, mirthful, disturbing, and cherished, with unmatched audacity. A cautionary tale in essay form. Be forewarned--hilarious, troubling, and shocking results might occur.

Customer Reviews:

Loved it - hilarious.......2007-10-16

For English class this last year, we were told to pick out the memoir of our choice and read it. I went to the library searching for books and saw this one. Well, the only reason I chose this one was because I liked the cover (I know, I know). Anyway, I got home and started reading it and I loved it! Never before have I laughed out loud so many times while reading a book. It's a great collection of stories and I really recommend it. It is very funny. I also read Running With Scissors, but I enjoyed this book much more.

Laugh out Loud Funny! Thank you!.......2007-10-05

I just loved this book and finished it quickly. I went to the store to buy Clarence Thomas' new memoir and saw this had come out. If this was in hardcover, I missed it, but I grabbed it the second I saw it!

Augusten Burroughs is one of the funniest writers and most enjoyable to read. I've read all his books and would recommend them all thoroughly. There are many things to praise about Burroughs. Among them is his self-deprecating humor. He wants to be a good person (he is actually a good person) and fights the negative thoughts he has almost constantly. He's a bit insecure. I think he used to be a bit unlikeable, but he's grown up a lot in this book.

When I read Laurie Notaro's first book, I loved it. When she grew up, however, and wrote her second book, she just wasn't funny anymore. That's not the case here. Burroughs has actually gotten better with age. He faces his fears, he is more honest than he used to be, he struggles with issues like the rest of us, but does all he can to be the best person he can be. And, he writes about it with spot-on insight and humor.

All of the book is excellent, but the vignette called Moving Violations was completely hysterical and a definite must-read to anyone who appreciates Burroughs' writing and the weirdness of life.

Possible Side Effects.......2007-09-23

I found this book to be yet another brilliant addition to my Augusten Burroghs collection. From the day I bought it I found it hard to put it down. I found myself laughing out loud and often. I really appreciate Augustens easy going writing style. I look forward to many more.

Hard to stop reading!.......2007-09-23

This was a hard book to put down from the second I read it! The interesting life and observations of Augusten Burroughs is a hilarious read! From his horrific experience with the tooth fairy to his telekinesis powers I couldn't stop reading and laughing!

I would recommend this book to anyone who needs a good laugh or just wants a good read!

not his best, but still good........2007-08-12

i really enjoyed Running With Scissors and i absolutely loved Dry. this book was kind of like a flight of ideas, no real surprises, no cohesive story but still amusing. i'll read anything by Augusten Burroughs because i'm hooked on his life. he's an amazing human being and a true survivor.

Average customer rating:

Ignore the man behind the curtain!
I loved it. Really loved it.
Superbly written
So, so good
All over but the Shoutin'

All Over but the Shoutin'
Rick Bragg
Manufacturer: Pantheon
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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Similar Items:

Ava's Man
Somebody Told Me: The Newspaper Stories of Rick Bragg
An American Childhood
The Art of the Personal Essay: An Anthology from the Classical Era to the Present
Normal Family Processes, Third Edition: Growing Diversity and Complexity

ASIN: 0679442588
Release Date: 1997-08-26

Amazon.com

One reason Rick Bragg won a Pulitzer Prize for his feature articles at the New York Times is that he never forgets his roots. When he writes about death and violence in urban slums, Bragg draws on firsthand knowledge of how poverty deforms lives and on his personal belief in the dignity of poor people. His memoir of a hardscrabble Southern youth pays moving tribute to his indomitable mother and struggles to forgive his drunken father. All Over but the Shoutin' is beautifully achieved on both these counts--and many more.

Book Description

A haunting memoir about growing up dirt-poor in the Alabama hills--and about moving on but never really being able to leave.

The extraordinary gifts for evocation and insight and the stunning talent for story- telling that earned Rick Bragg a Pulitzer Prize for feature writing in 1996 are here brought to bear on the wrenching story of his own family's life. It is the story of a war-haunted, hard-drinking father and a strong-willed, loving mother who struggled to protect her sons from the effects of poverty and ignorance that had constricted her own life. It is the story of the life Bragg was able to carve out for himself on the strength of his mother's encouragement and belief. And it is the story of his attempts to both atone for and avenge the mistakes and cruelties of his past.

All Over but the Shoutin' is a gripping account of people struggling to make sense and solidity of life's capricious promises. A classic piece of Americana, it is made vividly, movingly particular by Rick Bragg's searching vision, generous humor, and richly nuanced voice.

Customer Reviews:

Ignore the man behind the curtain!.......2007-09-05

I read this book before I remembered that Rick Bragg had resigned in ignominy from The New York Times in May, 2003, after reports surfaced that he had relied almost exclusively on reporting from a free-lance writer to produce an article, and that he had relied similarly on reportage from stringers and interns to construct other articles he had supposedly written himself and took sole credit for. I liked, and was moved by, the stories this book tells well enough but thought his writing style and punctuation that of a lazy person, for the most part, oddly enough. The stories he tells about his upbringing in the most limited and wrenching of circumstances (and his drive to overcome his birthright ever since) are heartbreaking and inspiring up to a point. As other reviewers have pointed out, his reports of the abuse done to him, his mother, and his brothers by his alcoholic father are credible enough, and reports of violence and political upheaval from Haiti and other distant locales are brilliant and emotionally charged, but one has difficulty grasping how he himself feels about what he is seeing with his own eyes in these unsettling situations. (Perhaps that is because he wasn't actually there??) Bragg seems to have gotten by in many situations throughout his life via bluster and bravado, having never actually had the credentials (i.e., a college degree, for one thing) to function, otherwise, as a respected journalist. He does indeed wear his childhood of poverty and neglect, and, for whatever reasons, his inability to form sustained and commited relationships with others, like a hair shirt that he dares anyone to look underneath.

I loved it. Really loved it........2007-07-27

Although I could relate to his childhood a bit I felt the pain of Rick's mother more then anything. I felt I have somewhat walked in her shoes and the determination to do anything so your children do not have to go without embraced me. It was a great book that pulled at my hear strings. His descriptions were so vivid that it took me there. Great Job!

Superbly written.......2007-05-06

This book is a glimpse into the author's life, of days gone by and of life as it was (and in some places still is) in the south. In reading you felt his family, the occasions he wrote of, and could visualize the surrounding it all took place in. He is truly gifted as are those for whom he writes. I also recommend Ava's Man, also written by him. Both are must reads.

So, so good.......2007-05-01

I listened to this. My husband recommended it. I had just finished "Prodigal Summer" by Barbara Kingsolver and was in a southern frame of mind. How life in the south has changed, life in the world.

To plagerized Frank McCourt, what's interesting about a happy childhood? Like Angela's Ashes this is a powerful memoir and a tribute to a mother's love and family. Although Rick Bragg had some supportive family on his momma's side. I also thought of Dorothy Allison and "Bastard Out of Carolina."

I stepped out of my California life during the 60's, 70's, 80's, on...this was not my life, nor the life I often saw depicted on TV or in movies. As a writer I am inspired to keep typing, keep plugging, continue to honor my momma and love my children and fellow human beings...

Well written, provactive and well worth the read (audio).

All over but the Shoutin' .......2007-04-11

If you can get only "one book" I implore you to get this one. I cannot remember the last time I cried when I finished a book. I cried for him. I cried for myself. I cried for its truth and his courage in telling it. I cried because it could have been me. I cried because in many ways it was me. Read it and weep. Read it and rejoice. Read it and SHOUT!

Waiting for Snow in Havana: Confessions of a Cuban Boy

Average customer rating:

Exhilarating and painful
Hightly recommended
Lots of hype, but still a pretty good read
Getting to know a Pedro Pan
I am without words

Waiting for Snow in Havana: Confessions of a Cuban Boy
Carlos Eire
Manufacturer: Free Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Snow Flower and the Secret Fan: A Novel
Water for Elephants: A Novel
March
Suite Francaise
The Glass Castle: A Memoir

ASIN: 0743246411

Book Description

"Have mercy on me, Lord, I am Cuban." In 1962, Carlos Eire was one of 14,000 children airlifted out of Cuba -- exiled from his family, his country, and his own childhood by the revolution. The memories of Carlos's life in Havana, cut short when he was just eleven years old, are at the heart of this stunning, evocative, and unforgettable memoir.

Waiting for Snow in Havana is both an exorcism and an ode to a paradise lost. For the Cuba of Carlos's youth -- with its lizards and turquoise seas and sun-drenched siestas -- becomes an island of condemnation once a cigar-smoking guerrilla named Fidel Castro ousts President Batista on January 1, 1959. Suddenly the music in the streets sounds like gunfire. Christmas is made illegal, political dissent leads to imprisonment, and too many of Carlos's friends are leaving Cuba for a place as far away and unthinkable as the United States. Carlos will end up there, too, and fulfill his mother's dreams by becoming a modern American man -- even if his soul remains in the country he left behind.

Narrated with the urgency of a confession, Waiting for Snow in Havana is a eulogy for a native land and a loving testament to the collective spirit of Cubans everywhere.

Download Description

"In 1962, at the age of eleven, Carlos Eire was one of 14,000 children airlifted out of Cuba, his parents left behind. His life until then is the subject of Waiting for Snow in Havana, a wry, heartbreaking, intoxicatingly beautiful memoir of growing up in a privileged Havana household -- and of being exiled from his own childhood by the Cuban revolution. That childhood, until his world changes, is as joyous and troubled as any other -- but with exotic differences. Lizards roam the house and grounds. Fights aren't waged with snowballs but with breadfruit. The rich are outlandishly rich, like the eight-year-old son of a sugar baron who has a real miniature race car, or the neighbor with a private animal garden, complete with tiger. All this is bathed in sunlight and shades of turquoise and tangerine: the island of Cuba, says one of the stern monks at Carlos's school, might have been the original Paradise -- and it is tempting to believe. His father is a municipal judge and an obsessive collector of art and antiques, convinced that in a past life he was Louis XVI and that his wife was Marie Antoinette. His mother looks to the future; conceived on a transatlantic liner bound for Cuba from Spain, she wants her children to be modern, which means embracing all things American. His older brother electrocutes lizards. Surrounded by eccentrics, in a home crammed with portraits of Jesus that speak to him in dreams and nightmares, Carlos searches for secret proofs of the existence of God. Narrated with the urgency of a confession, Waiting for Snow in Havana is an both an exorcism and an ode to a paradise lost. More than that, it captures the terrible beauty of those times in our lives when we are certain we have died -- and then are somehow, miraculously, reborn. "

Customer Reviews:

Exhilarating and painful.......2007-09-27

I left Cuba -with my parents- at the age of eight in 1963. Although my exile experience was much less trumatic than Dr. Eiré's, his depiction of life in that place at that time, seen through the eyes of a child, awakened so many emotions, dormant in my conciousness for so many years! What some reviewers have deplored as aimless ramblings brings me as close as I will ever come to a long conversation with a lost childhood friend, with all the complicity of shared experiences. The familiar sights, the smells, the terrors, real and surreal -I still am both terrified and eerily fascinated by lizards, specially the Cuban anolí, which changes colors to match its surroundings, the magic all around me in those days, Catholic school, birthday parties, fear for your life, shameful mischief... I laughed harder than I had in years and also cried too real tears!

I visited Cuba about four years ago, to witness the death of a family member who meant very much to me during my childhood. Despite the tragic circumstances and the terrible destruction of my little town, I unexpectedly felt an overwhelming peace and sense of "home" which I would not have imagined until then, having left so young. I don't recall having slept better in many years before or since. I discovered that there is a part of our being that does not travel. I left it in Placetas when I went away and there it was, intact, waiting for me. And there it stayed again.

I thank Dr. Eiré with all my heart for having brought me as close as it can be to that profusely bleeding chunk of who I am, which will never be in my present address.

Another Cuban boy.

Hightly recommended.......2007-09-19

This book was Great! I believe every person who struggled to get to the US to find freedom would enjoy this book. Eventhough I came much later in life, i believe his accounts really hit home with what i remember.

Lots of hype, but still a pretty good read.......2007-07-18

Wonderful delivery of characters throughout the book, but Eire's relentless weaving of timelines was distracting. It was almost incoherent or redundant at times, rambling from one period to another. I also had a little difficulty understanding the "wistful" invocation of philosophical and spiritual jargon throughout the book.

Despite the distractions, a good read for the first few hundred pages. Probably could have dropped a hundred easily.

Getting to know a Pedro Pan.......2007-06-25

During my career I have worked with and developed close friendships with several Cuban Americans, including two "Pedro Pans" - one of whom is currently a US Ambassador to an important European country. I could never quite imagine what life might have been like for them as boys in Cuba and how their lives were turned upside down. Their resilience has been an inspiration.

Eire's book, mentioned to me by a former high school English teacher, answers many of my questions far better than I could have hoped. It is a literary masterpiece that provides anthropological insights about the life of the privileged under Batista. Remarkably Eire does not whitewash this era - he makes it clear that the sons of Batista, of his chief torturer, and of upper class professionals enjoyed privileges unavailable to most. He admits to serial shop-lifting as a boy and the materialism that made birthday parties stressful events. But it came to a sudden end when Castro took power and banned Christmas, persecuted his opponents, and caused families to send their children abroad.

Over the weekend I had a conversation with someone whose family fled Tehran after the ouster of the Shah. Somehow her stories were evocative of Eire describing Cuba under Batista.

I am without words.......2007-06-20

Nothing I can say can do this book -- and Dr. Eire -- justice. I read this book on a (Cuban-American) friend's recommendation. I knew very little about Cuba or Castro. I have never been so moved by a book in my life. This is a must-read for everyone on the planet.

Average customer rating:

well written memoir
Great Read
Addictive
a poignant look back
Wolff Is Crafty

This Boy's Life: A Memoir
Tobias Wolff
Manufacturer: Grove Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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The Liars' Club: A Memoir
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An American Childhood

ASIN: 0802136680

Amazon.com

Fiction writer Tobias Wolff electrified critics with his scarifying 1989 memoir, which many deemed as notable for its artful structure and finely wrought prose as for the events it describes. The story is pretty grim: Teenaged Wolff moves with his divorced mother from Florida to Utah to Washington State to escape her violent boyfriend. When she remarries, Wolff finds himself in a bitter battle of wills with his abusive stepfather, a contest in which the two prove to be more evenly matched than might have been supposed. Deception, disguise, and illusion are the weapons the young man learns to employ as he grows up--not bad training for a writer-to-be. Somber though this tale of family strife is, it is also darkly funny and so artistically satisfying that most readers come away exhilarated rather than depressed.

Book Description

This unforgettable memoir, by one of our most gifted writers, introduces us to the young Toby Wolff, by turns tough and vulnerable, crafty and bumbling, and ultimately winning. Separated by divorce from his father and brother, Toby and his mother are constantly on the move, yet they develop an extraordinarily close, almost telepathic relationship. As Toby fights for identity and self-respect against the unrelenting hostility of a new stepfather, his experiences are at once poignant and comical, and Wolff does a masterful job of re-creating the frustrations and cruelties of adolescence. His various schemes - running away to Alaska, forging checks, and stealing cars - lead eventually to an act of outrageous self-invention that releases him into a new world of possibility.

Customer Reviews:

well written memoir.......2007-08-28

This is a well written and engaging memoir. It ends a bit abruptly, leaving me wondering how the author went on to become the distinguished writer he did. I enjoyed this book. The people and places described did become alive to me. While not a page turner, this was a book I enjoyed quite a bit.

Great Read.......2007-08-15

Short (4-5 hours) account of author's troubled youth. Hard to put down, this book would easily appeal to a wide audience.

Addictive.......2007-08-11

I can't put this book down. It is wonderfully written and very entertaining.
A must read for any teenagers looking for a nice exhilarating read.

a poignant look back.......2007-01-09

I was impressed by this eloquent account of a young man who found his conscience under the most trying circumstances imaginable. Writing with painful honesty about the deceipt around him as well as self-deceipt, he reveals how he broke through with new-found empathy that temporarily paralyzed him (the others around him misunderstood the motives for his action) but ultimately, I believe led to his most genuine, heartfelt response. This reader ached for him because he could not access the support he needed at this crucial juncture of his moral development, yet I am full of admiration for the strength it gave him, and how it seemed eventually to prepare him for his experiences in Viet Nam. I am eagerly looking forward to reading the sequel to this book which reveals his experiences there.

Wolff Is Crafty.......2006-11-29

The story is about Wolff's childhood. His mother nurtures him as best she can in between disenchantment with male suitors, employers and various geographies. As the good-hearted mom she gives Toby a pretty long leash to act out his child fantasies - at least the ones she could afford. Then she marries Dwight. And at this point in the story the main conflict begins as Tobias faces-off with his insecure, alcoholic step-father.

I read this book thinking: "My god, this Wolff kid is smart, funny, extremely crafty and got a wee bit of the devil in him." But than it's easy to forget you're reading a memoir written by an award-winning writer such as Wolff. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed the adventures of Wolff as a teenager - always wondering how he would lie, cheat, steal his way out of his next jam. His innocence melted away with every turn of the page. But the innocence portrayed by Wolff lacked the quality of real naiveté to me. Overtime it felt more like a precursor, a set-up, for the devilish Wolff to emerge from. Or maybe Wolff just grew-up too fast in those 288 pages for my liking.

What can a person say about Tobias Wolff's writing? Lean? Clean? Outstanding? I venture to say that it's already been called out in one of the hundred reviews listed here. In all, a memoir delivered with a brilliant sense of place, time, and most of all the character of a young man finding his way.

Working In The Reggio Way: A Beginner's Guide For American Teachers

Average customer rating:

Excellent Resource-
An ECE thumbs up!

Working In The Reggio Way: A Beginner's Guide For American Teachers
Julianne Wurm
Manufacturer: Redleaf Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Education | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

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Similar Items:

In The Spirit Of The Studio: Learning From The Atelier Of Reggio Emilia (Early Childhood Education)
Designs for Living and Learning: Transforming Early Childhood Environments
Bringing Reggio Emilia Home: An Innovative Approach to Early Childhood Education (Early Childhood Education Series)
Authentic Childhood:: Experiencing Reggio Emilia in the Classroom
Bringing Learning to Life: A Reggio Approach to Early Childhood Education (Early Childhood Education, 86)

ASIN: 1929610645

Book Description

Working in the Reggio Way helps teachers of young children bring the innovative practices of the schools in Reggio Emilia, Italy, to American classrooms. Written by an educator who observed and worked in the world-famous schools, this groundbreaking resource presents the key tools that will allow American teachers to transform their classrooms, including these:

Organization of time and space
Documentation of children's work
Observation and questioning
Attention to children's environments

This workbook also contains interactive activities for individual or group reflection.

Julianne Wurm works as an instructional reform facilitator in the San Francisco Unified School District. She lives in San Francisco, California.

Customer Reviews:

Excellent Resource-.......2006-06-20

I bought this book after it was recommended in a professional mentor group as a great resource for making authentic changes in individual settings. I found the book to be engaging and easy to read. The suggestions are very practical and respect the individuality of each school site that may use the book. I found the book to be completely process oriented and made me much more aware of the history and thinking in Reggio than other sources I had consulted before. I love that is it a first person account and not based on distant research but original research. I would recommend this book for anyone looking to begin the process of change in their school.

An ECE thumbs up!.......2005-06-28

I have had the pleasure and opportunity to have had Ms. Wurm work as my program's consultant this year. Reading "Working in the Reggio Way A Beginners Guide for Teachers" really brings all of the theory and practice that Julie Lives, Walks and Breathes! I found this book to be "People Friendly" and a hard one to put down! This book really empowers ECE teachers in creating our own "Reggio Way" here in the states. It's also a book which reminds us to place children first.

Black Boy (The Restored Text Established by The Library of America) (Perennial Classics)

Average customer rating:

wow
Not the best edition to have
Searching for Humanity
Read it for the second time!
Hearing Wright's Life and Our Own

Black Boy (The Restored Text Established by The Library of America) (Perennial Classics)
Richard A. Wright
Manufacturer: Harper Perennial Modern Classics
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Black Boy (Cliffs Notes)
Native Son
Invisible Man
The Great Gatsby
The Catcher in the Rye

ASIN: 0060929782

Book Description

With an introduction by Jerry W. Ward, Jr.

Black Boy is a classic of American autobiography, a subtly crafted narrative of Richard Wright's journey from innocence to experience in the Jim Crow South. An enduring story of one young man's coming off age during a particular time and place, Black Boy remains a seminal text in our history about what it means to be a man, black, and Southern in America.

"Superb...The Library of America has insured that most of Wright's major texts are now available as he wanted them to be tread...Most important of all is the opportunity we now have to hear a great American writer speak with his own voice about matters that still resonate at the center of our lives."
--Alfred Kazin, New York Time Book Review
"The publication of this new edition is not just an editorial innovation, it is a major event in American literary history."
--Andrew Delbanco, New Republic

Customer Reviews:

wow.......2007-09-29

This is my all time favourite book ever. I'm sure there are literary drawbacks to it somewhere; but overall I think its an amazingly well written book. Poignant, stark, and unfathomable. Reading it made me so hungry, you wouldn't believe.

Not the best edition to have.......2007-09-15

Much as I love and admire this book--a must-read in American literature--this is not the best edition to have. Wright originally wrote the book in two parts: "Southern Night," about his experiences in the South; and "The Horror and the Glory." His original title for the two-part book was AMERICAN HUNGER.

When it was selected as a primary selection of the Book-of-the-Month Club--a great honor at that time, which tripled the sales of the book--he was asked to remove "The Horror and the Glory" and just publish the first section, "Southern Night." That was the book he retitled BLACK BOY. It is a pure memoir of his life as an aspirational but deeply alienated black growing up in the South.

Recent editions of the book have restored "The Horror and the Glory" to the text, and you might think this is a good thing. I don't think it is, in this case. That section purports to continue his memoir with his experiences in Chicago. However, unfortunately--and ironically--the Book of the Month Club editors were right from an artistic standpoint. "The Horror and the Glory" is completely different in tone. It largely recounts Wright's involvement in the Communist Party of the 1930s, and is deeply enmeshed in party politics. It embodies Wright's own feelings of devotion to Communism and Communist ideals even as it recounts his repudiation of the party.

I have nothing against Wright having been a Communist per se; my objections are not political at all but purely artistic. This second part of the book has none of the directness and immediacy of the first part; it is far less entertaining, and much more of a chore to read. Actually, the first part of the book (about two-thirds of its length) does indeed stand alone as a cohesive, coherent narrative. This is how it was issued, and, actually, it's how it should be read. The second part merely dilutes the artistic impact of the first part, rather than adding to it.

"The Horror and the Glory" was published originally in a motley of smaller articles, in the Atlantic Monthly and elsewhere. The issues it raises--internal Communist party politics and their relationships to the John Reed Clubs and their associated writers' groups--are somewhat interesting historically, but dated and ultimately irrelevant. It feels very much like commentary on facts and events you're expected to know about, but don't.

I suggest readers either purchase an edition that is true to the first edition, and contains only what in this edition is called "Southern Night," or else consider just reading the first part and letting the second part go. I think it's a better book the way it was originally issued.

Searching for Humanity.......2007-06-26

Richard Wrights autobiographical book is all the more remarkable in so much that it exists and was written by a man born to fail by society and given every hinderence to his thirst and love for life and reading.

Wrights book never becomes mawkish or pious.It simply tells it how it was;deep south society at the turn of the century and the black peoples place in it. Wright is open about his own failings-taunting jews, his childhood alcoholism-but there was no escape for him no matter how hard he tried to get ahead. A painful scene comes when young Wright thinks he is 'getting ahead' by selling newspapers to have a wiser black head point out he is actually selling ku klux klan literature. His love for books is hampered by the law banning blacks from libraries.

He comes across liberals who try to help him, but there is only so much anyone can do in a society swamped by prejudices.

The sad end is when Wright traveled up to the north; Chicago, where 'Blacks are free' The memoir ends here, but further reading of Wrights work-and that of his admirers and contemporaries such as Ralph Ellison-makes you aware that this was just another myth.Yes,life wasn't as oppressive as the south, but the 'liberals' liked the blacks to stay in the 'black belt'(a favourite term of Wrights) and used all means at disposal should they get 'Uppity'.

Wright inspired Ellison and Baldwin amongst others, but I feel sure he must have inspired MLK as well, as all Wright ever really wanted was human dignity for all mankinds peoples.

Read it for the second time!.......2007-04-25

This book is an early years autobiography of Richard Wright, the famed and accomplished African American author. I read all of Mr. Wright's books when I was in junior high school and wanted to share them with my teenage daughter. In doing so, I picked up "Black Boy" and couldn't put it down until I read it again.

Richard Wright was raised in the South in the 1920's. He experienced the hardships, poverty, and racism of those days and relays these experiences descriptively yet simply in the book. The reader can can see and feel the events without being bored.

"Black Boy" is a quick one- or two-day read, and I recommend it highly. I also highly recommend one of Mr. Wright's fictional novels, "Native Son."

Hearing Wright's Life and Our Own.......2007-04-05

Peter Francis James's performance of Richard Wright's autobiography brings many of its aural qualities our ears, qualities we may not notice in a silent reading of the book. These CDs enable both the visually impaired and the sighted to enjoy Wright's classic and to ponder why after sixty-two years the book still provides insights about American culure.

Average customer rating:

Oh please...
Truly an Amazing Memoir
i guess my teacher liked it
A passionating story
Loved this book!

When I Was Puerto Rican
Esmeralda Santiago
Manufacturer: Vintage
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Similar Items:

Almost a Woman
How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents (Essential Edition): (Plume Essential Edition)
Dreaming in Cuban
Down These Mean Streets
The Turkish Lover

ASIN: 0679756760
Release Date: 1994-10-11

Book Description

Selling over 16,000 copies in hardcover, this triumphant coming-of-age memoir is now available in paperback editions in both English and Spanish. In the tradition of Black Ice, Santiago writes lyrically of her childhood on her native island and of her bewildering years of transition in New York City.

Customer Reviews:

Oh please..........2007-05-30

I had to read this book for a class in college back when it was still fairly "new". I say "new" because it is the same tired formula of most contemporary Latin American authors.
I currently, previously and, as far as I can tell, will continue to BE Puerto Rican and the "charms" of this story fail to grab me.
Reading some of the glowing reviews for this book, I suspect I was never meant to be it's target audience.

Truly an Amazing Memoir.......2007-04-28

When I first saw the title I was a little anxious to see why she wasn't Peurto Rican anymore. I really enjoyed this book from start to finish. It was hard for me to put it down and I usually don't say that about many books I have read. Esmeralda Santiago is a brilliant writer and has beat the odds after all she's been through. I mean I'm not going to lie about anything in this review. The book did have it's boring moments, but the action pick back up again after you thought everything was back to normal. I truly enjoyed this book.

i guess my teacher liked it.......2007-03-09

i had to read this for a college class (urban development). this book really gives you the opportunity to reflect on how hard it is to get by in other cultures. the author of this book overcomes a lot of hardship and eventually obtains her phd in the u.s. it is powerful. i wouldnt have read it unless it was for class though. thats minus 1 star

A passionating story.......2006-08-03

The life of the young Esmeralda Santiago is interesting, well-written and full of colored details.

Loved this book!.......2006-07-12

My husband is Puerto Rican (I am not) and read this book years ago. He said that it reminded him of a combination of his mom and grandmother's childhoods. He lent it to his sister, mom and grandmother to read (they all loved it) and eventually to me. I just couldn't get enough of it. Then my mother-in-law lent us "Almost A Woman", which I just finished. Esmeralda Santiago is an amazing writer with a great story.

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