Dimensions
140 x 232 x 19mm
At turns humorous‚ irreverent‚ poignant and tender‚ THE BOOK OF DADS‚ collected by former Tin House editor Ben George brings together twenty well-known and beloved writers on the subject of fatherhood. Contributors include: Anthony Doerr‚ Charles Baxter‚ Steve Almond‚ Rick Bass‚ Jim Shepard‚ Brock Clarke‚ Ben Fountain‚ Rick Bragg‚ Davy Rothbart‚ Darin Strauss‚ Jennifer Finney Boylan and Michael Thomas.
As a new father‚ editor Ben George had bought Anne Lamont's Operating Instructions for his wife. Later‚ alone with his newborn daughter two days a week‚ he found himself wishing for his own Operating Instructions. When he entered a search for "fatherhood" on Amazon.com‚ he was first asked‚ by the search engine‚ "Did you mean 'motherhood'?"
And when he scrolled past that initial response‚ he found a list of silly books like Keeping the Baby Alive Till Your Wife Gets Home and Mack Daddy: Mastering Fatherhood without Losing Your Style‚ Your Cool‚ or Your Mind.
George wanted to read the writers he admired telling him something true about this new experience of fatherhood‚ a life change for which he realized early on how poorly equipped he'd been. (And he had "chosen" to do this‚ he often reminded himself. It had been on purpose!) He wanted something directly from the writers' lives: the pure‚ uncut‚ undiluted‚ unvarnished skinny on fatherhood.
THE BOOK OF DADS offers readers unrivaled insights into the complexity of fatherhood as it's experienced now. It is a literary reader for the contemporary dad‚ hip and on point‚ but also substantive‚ with an eye toward becoming a classic that readers return to again and again over the years. And it covers the spectrum of fatherhood experiences. For example:
-As recently as 2001‚ Rick Bragg's bio stated that he was a bachelor and was "likely to stay that way." Not only is Bragg now married‚ he's also stepfather to three children‚ a new life that's suddenly filled with challenges he could have never prepared for.
-Jennifer Finney Boylan‚ author of the first best-selling work by a transgendered American‚ is father to two sons. Her poignant journey to her true identity is a story of unequaled understanding on the part of her family.
-Anthony Doerr reveals how the arrival of one child is a whirlwind‚ but the birth of two can nearly derail you; and then he has to raise them in a foreign country for a full year.
-Charles Baxter‚ having never known his true father‚ who died before the author was two‚ details his own resulting "somewhat insincere and doubtful" fatherhood.
-Or what about being a father to a child not your own? Davy Rothbart‚ after first counseling his lifelong friend to get an abortion‚ later fills in as a father for the child she chooses to have‚ moving into his parents' house with her and her young son.
In all‚ the essays in THE BOOK OF DADS will be a resource for fathers‚ but it will also be a joy to anyone who has been or loved a parent.
