Book recommendations based on data from real readers.
Books like Operating Instructions: A Journal of My Son's First Year
The most honest, wildly enjoyable book written about motherhood is surely Anne Lamott's account of her son Sam's first year. A gifted writer and teacher, Lamott (Crooked Little Heart) is a single mother and ex-alcoholic with a pleasingly warped social circle and a remarkably tolerant religion to lean on. She responds to the changes, exhaustion, and love Sam brings with aplomb or outright insanity. The book rocks from hilarious to unbearably poignant when Sam's burgeoning life is played out against a very close friend's illness. No saccharine paean to becoming a parent, this touches on the rage and befuddlement that dog sweeter emotions during this sea change in one's life.
Liked Operating Instructions: A Journal of My Son's First Year by Anne Lamott? Here's what readers who loved it picked up next.
- The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion (2005) · 3.86★
- The Liars' Club by Mary Karr (1995) · 3.92★
- Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris (2000) · 3.97★
- Truth and Beauty by Ann Patchett (2004) · 3.94★
- Comfort Me with Apples: More Adventures at the Table by Ruth Reichl (2001) · 4.02★
- Bel Canto by Ann Patchett (2001) · 3.92★
- Angela's Ashes by Frank McCourt (1996) · 4.07★
- Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America by Barbara Ehrenreich (2001) · 3.6★
- SantaLand Diaries by David Sedaris (1998) · 4.33★
- The Bean Trees by Barbara Kingsolver (1988) · 3.94★
- Animal Dreams by Barbara Kingsolver (1990) · 4.05★
- Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within by Natalie Goldberg (1986) · 4.17★