Three star review, originally posted here on August 20, 2024.
I hadn’t heard of this book before, but it was listed very high on a Goodreads list of best memoirs. I love a good memoir, and this one had promise. From its placement on the list, and the other books around it, I was expecting something akin to The Glass Castle or Educated, but with a hint of humor. I dunno, on paper I guess that’s what this was, but somehow it fell flat. It’s tough to put my finger on what that is, though. I think Burroughs just lacked the writing chops to turn his tales into a masterpiece. It was a series of fucked-up anecdotes, some of which were somewhat funny, all of which were absurd, and many of which were infuriating and heartbreaking. Normally I like listening to authors narrating their own memoirs in audiobooks, but I’m wondering if maybe I might have enjoyed this book more without the author’s delivery. Maybe the absurdity would have been more elevated if I’d added my own pacing.
This all sounds like a pan, but it’s really not. Burroughs has been through some seriously weird shit, and I was constantly flabbergasted by what I was hearing. I had several jaw drops. I felt real emotions. The most palpable emotion reading this book, though, is pure rage. I felt rage at the parents in Glass Castle and Educated, as well. But the adults in this boy’s life made those parents seem like the Cleavers. They should all be in prison, and I bet (or at least I would hope) if the same story had happened today, they would be. I hesitate to even use the term silver lining here, but can’t think of a better phrase: if there is anything to gain from their abuse and neglect, it is that Burroughs was able to describe, in heartbreaking detail, what it felt like for a boy to be groomed and repeatedly raped. Burroughs doesn’t hold back. His descriptions of his sensations and emotions are evocative. And the rage felt at the other adults around, who normalized this abuse for Burroughs when they should have been saving him, was amplified for me because of it.
Helga without the H 