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A review by leaflinglearns
I Am Sorry to Think I Have Raised a Timid Son by Kent Russell
3.0
Recently, Karen Russell's brother Kent Russell came out with a book that was supposedly about hyper-masculinity in America. In the brilliantly named I Am Sorry to Think I Have Raised a Timid Son, Russell writes about his time spent with juggalos, a man who immunizes himself to snake venom, Amish baseball players, a survivalist, and more. Sounds exactly like my kind of book, right? He also intersperses this with writing about his relationship with his father. And the truth about this book is that he really just wanted to write about his dad.
If he wanted to write about his dad and his family, he should have. Russell is an interesting character and a really good writer. He's often really funny, and I loved his descriptions of Florida. It's just that the essays he wrote weren’t very connected. They were just kind of inserted next to each other: something about his dad next to something about some manly guy. And the last essay felt especially disjointed. It was clear that he had probably written it for something else. It's when he's writing about his family that he touches on some interesting things.
Read more of my review and my experience reading this book with a dead father here: http://outlandishlit.blogspot.com/2015/04/reading-kent-russells-essays-when-my.html
If he wanted to write about his dad and his family, he should have. Russell is an interesting character and a really good writer. He's often really funny, and I loved his descriptions of Florida. It's just that the essays he wrote weren’t very connected. They were just kind of inserted next to each other: something about his dad next to something about some manly guy. And the last essay felt especially disjointed. It was clear that he had probably written it for something else. It's when he's writing about his family that he touches on some interesting things.
Read more of my review and my experience reading this book with a dead father here: http://outlandishlit.blogspot.com/2015/04/reading-kent-russells-essays-when-my.html