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keight's review against another edition
3.0
Alexandra Styron is the daughter of William Styron, the novelist best known for Sophie's Choice and The Confessions of Nat Turner. Her book Reading My Father is part memoir and part biography, focusing at times on her experience growing up with a well-known writer as a father, and at other times providing a straightforward narrative of his life. Every so often it gets meta and zooms in on Styron's research of her father while writing this book, finishing with a few chapters that detail his long decline in health related to two episodes of severe depression and his long-time alcoholism. All these different parts are interesting individually, but they don't entirely cohere. Read more on my booklog
lazygal's review against another edition
3.0
I hesitated to read this, thinking it would be a version of Mommy Dearest, but that is not the case here. Ms. Styron has written an interesting, heartfelt appreciation of the writer, the man and her father, William Styron.
Like most children, she grew up knowing one side of Daddy: the sometimes funny, sometimes drunk, sometimes terrifyingly angry person living in the house. Through the Duke University archives she discovers the man, thanks to his letters to his father and others, and the writer, thanks to his drafts and other writings. The portrait painted is complex and while her daughter's point-of-view never quite disappears you can see her appreciating the sides of him she didn't know and reconciling with the Daddy she did.
This isn't a linear memoir, which works well. Styron's descent into depression in 1985 (and again in 2000) is the thread that holds her story together. I wondered if he was depressed prior to then, how much of the despair was covered by the alcohol and the rage.
One never really knows one's parents, but reading this I get the sense that Ms. Styron now knows her father better than most.
ARC provided by publisher.
Like most children, she grew up knowing one side of Daddy: the sometimes funny, sometimes drunk, sometimes terrifyingly angry person living in the house. Through the Duke University archives she discovers the man, thanks to his letters to his father and others, and the writer, thanks to his drafts and other writings. The portrait painted is complex and while her daughter's point-of-view never quite disappears you can see her appreciating the sides of him she didn't know and reconciling with the Daddy she did.
This isn't a linear memoir, which works well. Styron's descent into depression in 1985 (and again in 2000) is the thread that holds her story together. I wondered if he was depressed prior to then, how much of the despair was covered by the alcohol and the rage.
One never really knows one's parents, but reading this I get the sense that Ms. Styron now knows her father better than most.
ARC provided by publisher.
angelina41's review against another edition
3.0
I listened to about half of this book and I felt I was getting the gist of it, so I stopped. I do want to read THE CONFESSIONS OF NAT TURNER and SOPHIE'S CHOICE now.
emmastia's review against another edition
3.0
I enjoyed this book, but I think I enjoy memoirs more than most.
liloud0626's review against another edition
3.0
This book, this story, was exhausting. The author is the daughter of William Styron (Sophie's Choice, Confessions of Nat Turner, et cetera), and it is her tale of parts of her father's life, and her own, growing up with Styron as a "parent." I place the word in quotes because he wasn't much of one. In part, mental illness (major depressive episodes requiring hospitalization) prevented him from being so, but he was also often selfish and manipulative. Still, her behind-the-scenes look at how his books came together and her research into his often-lonely early life explain a lot of his later behavior. I still think she makes too many excuses for him, but this couldn't have been an easy tale to tell.
willwrite4chocolate's review
5.0
A beautifully written memoir by the daughter of famous writer William Styron. She did a great job of investigating her own feelings as she explained her understanding of this complicated and difficult man. Never once did I feel as if she were whining or complaining. Her final portrait of him made me weep.
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