Jennifer
Rating:
Review
This is a memoir of Augusten's father, a man who was a monster in many ways. This book was slower to get into than his other books for me, but still managed to greatly disturb and entertain me, all at the same time. Augusten had the misfortune to be born into a family with severe mental "quirks" that seemed to get weirder and more pervasive by the day as he grew up. His mother seemed to hang on to her wits and social graces as long as she could, but eventually unraveled completely. His brother didn't like any living thing and didn't make eye contact with anyone. His father got meaner and more demented, and as Augusten perceptively wrote, "My father was actively missing an essential human part". A Wolf at the Table answers a lot of questions about how Augusten turned out to be the out-of-control adult described in Running with Scissors and Dry. If you have read either of these memoirs, I would highly recommend reading A Wolf at the Table which will give you the background on the other two books. None will disappoint or fail to shock you, I guarantee it.
Best Line:
"I had the sensation of colliding with a limitation".
Kim
Rating:
Review
From the author of Running with Scissors and Dry, this is Mr. Burroughs latest memoir, which begins in his early childhood. For those readers not familiar with the author's history, his father, John, is a college professor with a drinking problem, his mother, Margaret, is an artist/poet with some mental problems, and his older brother has problems that aren't clearly or medically defined. Stands to reason that little Augusten might have some problems too? Oh…where to start? When he is young, his parents are still married and living in a woodsy house of horror and dysfunction. Add tragic to the list of adjectives I would use for this book as well. Just like Ernie the guinea pig and Grover the dog, Augusten's childhood is doomed, and that message is clear in the first 100 pages. There were times I cringed at the author's brutal honesty, especially describing how rejected he was, and felt, by his father. There is little worse than being lonely in a room full of people, let alone living with that loneliness day in and day out. I am glad I read this book, since I've read his others and this one fills in some holes. It was tough to read about the covert abuse this little boy suffered though.
Best Line:
"He had missed so much not knowing me."
