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In a memoir entitled Disaster Preparedness nothing much happens at all – unless you count the daily business of life and growing up in the 70s as a disaster. Heather Havrilesky is author of the sarcastic Rabbit blog. Up until this past year she was a staff writer at Salon.com. Havrilesky’s blog is clever and entertaining. She tackles all manner of pop culture, entertainment and personalities. At the heart of this non-fiction memoir is an interesting metaphor about life and the messy process of growing up at a time when children were raised in a culture of fear. Hard not to grow up slightly maladapted or anxious if some adult, teacher or newscaster is always shouting “It’s the end of the world!” The Iran Hostage Crisis, The Regan years and constant threats of World War 3 were reference points for Havrilesky’s formative years. The cultural references here in Disaster Preparedness are both fun, resonant and slightly grating. At times the references were a bit overly familiar to me, a writer of about the same age as Havrilesky. In fact at times I felt as if I might have been reading a story of my own early years. Havrilesky was raised by parents that argued bitterly and then got a divorce, which is hardly earth shattering. Many children of the time period were in the same boat. Havrilesky’s gift is sarcasm and she excels at recreating the 70s in fine detail. There are scenes here of birthday parties gone awry and parents acting out ridiculous soap operas as if life too were a performance. “Around the time my parents stopped making the slightest effort to hide their distaste for each other, we started taking long family vacations in the car each summer. This is the perverse logic of two people caught in a crumbling marriage: Instead of spending as little time together as possible, they vow to spend more time together, thinking they might reignite some lost spark through the purgatory of enforced contact.” She is at her best when skewering rights of passage like high school cheerleading tryouts, which she dubs a masochistic ritual. Sarcasm is one of the most difficult tools for a writer to make jump off the page, but Havrilesky’s on line writing has clearly helped her to hone this style. Fans who follow her on line writing will enjoy this memoir, but it is not the type of read that will appeal to everyone. At times I couldn’t wait for this book to be done, but I love a good metaphor and this idea of life as a great series of disasters that happen between the lines while waiting on perfection, well that is a truly gorgeous use of this literary device. And the ending, well it is empowering and lovely and strangely perfect.

Thriftymommasbrainfood rating $$$ out of $$$$$
• Disaster Preparedness, by Heather Havrilesky, Dec. 30, 2010 Riverhead Hardcover Books (Penguin Books USA), New York, 256 pages, $25.95 or $32.50 Canada, Hardcover ISBN 978-1-59448-768-2

I was given a copy of this book to review. My opinion is all my own.

Admit One: My Life in Film by Emmett James is one of the funniest, easiest, reads I’ve been sent in a long time. I wasn’t prepared for how witty this book is and after reading the cover blurb assumed Admit One would be a sad memoir of a poor youth raised in Croydon, South London. Memoir as a genre can be self indulgent and frankly I have read far too many that fall into the let’s blame my parents for every sad thing that ever happened to me category. This story however is not one of those point the finger maudlin tales. From start to finish this is a catchy, witty saga of a young lad who seeks solace at the movies and in fact tells his life story as it relates to major movies that came out during specific times of his life. It is a simple device _ this echoing of life’s stories through other media, such as film, books, art. And yet when used effectively it is a lovely way to frame a story and it can propel plot along nicely. Admit One starts with an open letter prologue to Steven Seagal which made me chuckle. James begins to list the top 10 films of his youth and then goes on to note that readers will notice no Steven Seagal movies on the list, with good reason. I enjoyed everything about this book. Its deadpan humour was a perfect pick me up for this reader during a long dreary winter in Canada. There’s even an adoption subtheme that made me like the book even more as it is revealed that James’ mother was adopted and then goes on later in life to adopt a pair of girls. As some of my readers know I am an adoption advocate, frequent speaker and writer about adoption. Chapter One starts with The Disney version of Jungle Book 1967 and it is clear that a young boy’s reverence for film will feed his imagination and shape his destiny early on. The author’s musings on films and directors/animators tweaked a nostalgia in me that was unexpected and a welcome reminder of days gone by and also major films and television shows/ rituals that shaped my own childhood. In my own family as a youngster we would gather around the TV on Sunday nights without fail to watch Walt Disney’s weekly family movie. James knows these are the things that bind us, often strangely even more than life’s big events, the small weekly rituals with emotional resonance long preserved into tiny gems hidden within longterm memory. Remarkably this memoir ends up carrying us to Hollywood and the older James stumbles through a series of humourous missteps as an extra, eventually landing himself a part on the blockbuster hit Titanic. I thoroughly enjoyed this one as a light, entertaining read.

Admit One: My Life in Film, by Emmett James, Fizzypop Productions, 2010. 2nd edition. $19.95 hardcover. (A very good price)

The first edition was published in 2007, by Wheatmark Books in Arizona
thriftymommastips rating $$$$ out of $$$$$
Thriftymomma was no compensated for this review but instead received a free copy of the book for review.