Running With Scissors/Dry/A Wolf At The Table by Augusten Burroughs

WOW!!!!  Imagine being given away by your mother to her shrink?  Well that’s exactly what this memoir is about. Augusten was 11 years old and his mother just gave him away.   Imagine being told how to get out of going to school?  And by an adult!  After being given away by his mother – his father doesn’t accept his calls and the only person who shows him attention is another man that was also under the care of the same psychiatrist.

I like the authors humor (his novels are great – Sellevision was hysterical). These three, “Running With Scissors”, “Dry” and “A Wolf at the Table” are about his life.* 

After reading “Sellevision”,  I wanted to see what else the author wrote and continued on to read these tales of his life as an adult.

“Dry” tells the story of his adult years as an alcoholic. His job is on the line and it’s required that he go to rehab.  It helps him for about 3 months and then when a personal crisis ensues, he’s back to the bottle.  At the end of the book he does get the help he needs.  The author digs deep within himself and sometimes that’s what you have to do to get over things. I’m sure it’s the hardest thing for a person to do.

Again, I like his writing style.  He talks about how many beers it would take for him to “hook up” with someone.  He even makes a comment about a Baldwin brother being doable.  I thought that was a good crack considering a Baldwin portrayed his father in the movie Running With Scissors.

“A Wolf at the Table” is the story of his father.  This story is what happened prior to the writing of  “Running With Scissors.”   This is his memory of his father’s personality and character from his perspective.  His father was harsh.  He let Augusten’s guinea pig Ernie die and he let Grover the dog die.  Grover had a growth on his tongue that continued to get worse and Augusten’s father just kept shrugging off his requests to take him to the vet. Grover died.  The guinea pig was a different horror story. His dad knew that he killed the pig by not feeding him and left him in the aquarium for Augusten to discover when he came home from a trip.  The first thing his father said was, “did you say hello to Ernie”?  How cruel!!  This is a memoir of a little boy who deeply wanted his father’s attention.  After the Ernie incident he hated his father, but deep down inside, he still longed for his acceptance.   Even on his father’s deathbed, his dad turned his head away from Augusten.

Appreciate his candor, humor and humbleness at telling his story.

*I also watched the movie, Running With Scissors”.  It was good also.  He could not have cast a more perfect couple as his parents – Annette Bening and Alec Baldwin.