Today, May 1st, we begin the first discussion question for the Beyond Busy Global Monthly Book Club. We just finished Anne Lamott’s Some Assembly Required, A Journal of My Son’s First Son and now we will spend seven days discussing it. Anyone who has read the book can participate by commenting. You can also join our public BBGMBC Facebook group, if you would like to join us in reading one excellent quality book per month and then discussing it here.
Some Assembly Required, A Journal of My Son’s First Son is written by Anne Lamott with Sam Lamott and published by Riverhead in 2012.
This is a book by an author with a huge following. So the first question has to be asked: Are you new to Anne Lamott’s work or are you a long-time Anne Lamott fan?
How does your past history with this author (or your lack of past history with this author) impact your attitude towards this book?
Would you purchase and read anything Lamott wrote? If so, why? If not, why not?
If you are a hard-core Lamott fan, tell us why.
Does it matter? Why or why not?
Let the games begin! (I’ll announce the May book in a separate post to follow this one.)
Comments on this entry are closed.
This was my first Anne Lamott book but it will not be my last. So much of her decsription was beautiful that I want to read other works by her. At times I lost interest a bit in the book (trip to India for example) but her writing kept me moving forward. For me, it was more about the subject matter of that grandparent bond and I was fascinated to watch how she would evolve.
This will most likely be the last Lamott book that I read. I know that she is considered the end-all-be-all by many, but I don’t get it. Bird-by-Bird was, for me, the best of the lot. Some good solid advice. But I find much of her writing to be self-indulgent and leaning towards narcissistic. I thought the premise of this book was clever…and was then disappointed that it was less of a joint project but one that was mostly Anne with some cameo appearances from Sam. In other words, more of the same…
[let the flaming begin]
It was a good read. I will read an other of her books after this month is over.
I have never read Anne Lemott’s work before. I would like to read one more book before I judge her.
Like Cheryl Strayed she shows enormous courage in writing what is going through her mind all day. Not sure that I could match her openness. But I do share her tendency to be more structured in my child rearing, that may be Grammy thing. I just don’t share her advanced level of stress or guilt about her son and grandson. In the end she came to good place and seems to have accepted much more that the previous year.
I enjoy her approach on faith- a little off the chart and open to all beliefs, willing to consider it through all available lenses.
I would like to hear from one of her hard core fans which book they would suggest next- someting with a bit of different flavor.
My first Anne L. book and I liked her style of writing. If her writing were a salad it would be the perfect blend of veggies and dressing to suit me. Yes, I will pursue more of her work. My intent is pass it on to my step-daughter, who is now walking down the young parent road herself. I’m not sure it will hold her attention; it is more of grandma book. She will get it anyway!
Everyone has until noon tomorrow for day one and then day two will post at noon. 🙂
I have been a fan for years, starting with Bird by Bird. I have read all her non-fiction and some of her fiction and buy her books in hardcover if possible because I read and (reluctantly) loan, preferring to purchase copies for family and friends in case they aren’t returned.
As a hard-core fan, I was a little disappointed in this particular book. It didn’t draw me in the way earlier memoirs about her faith and addiction compelled me to read late into the night. And though I am a grandmother with a one-year-old grandson in my own town, and I found myself smiling, this book didn’t have me laughing out loud the way I did when I read Operating Instructions.
I too have been a hard-core fan of Lamott’s. And of course I will remain one. However, like Deb, I found this book to be somewhat lacking not only in the things I’ve always loved about Lamott’s books but also missing the opportunity to really be something different. However, the biggest disappointment for me was, as Sue mentioned, the missed opportunities. Lamott goes to India with a man she has mysterious relationship with that I never understood, she barely describes the settings, and gives only gestural hints that left me wanting more, more, more. The whole India trip felt jet-lagged and dropped in. I am reluctant to say that I felt like Sam Lamott’s writing was more lively and compelling and fresh most of the time than his mother’s. I found Lamott was at her best in describing her relationship with her son. And I sensed, overall, a great deal of hesitation on Lamott’s part to share so much of her extended crews’ points of view without violating their (and her) privacy. That whole thing just was not working for me. Don’t ask a memoirist to be a journalist. It just didn’t work. And sometimes the addition of sections written by others besides Anne and Sam felt gratuitous, like fillers. So, generally speaking, as far as a departure from her usual work, I think this was a missed opportunity. Or at least I ended up not liking the part I was looking forward to most. I think instead, I would have simply stuck with the singular point of view that Lamott is so comfortable with so that she could have penetrated the telling better, as she has done with her other nonfiction books. There were strong moments in this book. But I would have liked more of them.
I struggled to finish the book and wanted to quit altogether several times. She completely lost me in the details of her trip to India and I began scanning most of it at that point. As a mom myself, I didn’t find enjoyment in reading about every little step of her grandchild’s growth because I’ve been through it many times with my own children. I was disappointed in the book and although I have read one other Lamott book, it will be awhile before I’m willing to read another one.
I have heard of Anne L. but never read her.
On the upside, I enjoyed the life lessons she stated and her analogies. But I wouldn’t have picked this book by title or cover and I wanted to stop reading on every page–except around page 200 when I was curious how it would end. I was disappointed. When I reached the India part I thought, wait a minute. She promised a book about grandma-son-grandson and now it’s a travel report. I was confused by her religious beliefs: was she Catholic? Presbyterian? Other? Did she embrace them all or take what she needed? Her remarks struck me as overwrought and her son’s and friends’ responses so unnatural that I think I’d avoid them both at a party for fear of appearing less schooled–or bored.
I can relate to the raw tightrope that a mother of a son walks with the mother of his child; maybe readers new to that experience will benefit from knowing they are not alone. (I just read over the comments and appreciate Rebecca’s ‘let the flaming begin” but if the book was a salad–as MLreadsandwrites cleverly said–I would say it was mostly onions with a handful of really tasty croutons hiding nearby.)
The first book I read by Anne Lamott was Bird by Bird. I was blown away. I was in Costa Rica at the time, and a friend who lived there loaned me the book. I coveted that book. When I finally got home several months later, buying that book was one of the first things I did, and then I read her other books too. I have read a number of her books, but not all of them. She has a talent for drawing the reader in close, making you feel she is speaking directly to you. She is such a unique woman, with a fascinating point of view. Her work reminds me what it means to read for pleasure, and I learn so much in the process.