Ratings8
Average rating2.9
PREQUEL TO THE INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER RUNNING WITH SCISSORSFrom the author: 'My father doesn't feature much in Running with Scissors. And one of the reasons for this is because he didn't feature much in my life. But there's another reason, too: Our relationship was so complicated, so dark, so confusing and so big, that to tell the story would require a book. So finally, upon the death of my father in 2005, I decided to tell the story I have been most afraid yet most compelled to tell. 'This prequel to international hit Running With Scissors tells the story of Augusten's relationship with his tormented father: a man who sent his wife mad and saw his other son run away from home, prior to Augusten going into foster care. Harrowing, insightful and amusing by turns.
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I used to love Augusten Burroughs. I'm not sure who has changed, me or him, but I disliked this book. First: so many scenes were familiar. Like, I wasn't sure if I'd read it before or not—turns out there's just a lot of rehashing from Dry and Running With Scissors.
Everything seemed trite and overwrought. I wasn't as compelled, and it felt like this book lost his typical humor as well.
Beyond that, as a nonfiction writer, I was really struck by my lack of trust in him as a narrator. Lots of hypotheticals and imaginings that made the narrative less potent as I questioned what was reality.