Customer Reviews

It Sucked and Then I Cried: How I Had a Baby, a Breakdown, and a Much Needed Margarita

5 star:		(63)
4 star:		(31)
3 star:		(22)
2 star:		(12)
1 star:		(17)

 

 

I'm a huge fan of Dooce but I couldn't finish this book. Between the CONSTANT RANDOM CAPITAL LETTERS and the fact that it was basically her blog, just updated to be in past tense, this book was overall a disappointment. I was really hoping for something more from Dooce. I know she does the capital letters thing on her blog but I had hoped she could do her humour and keep her voice without resorting to typical blog format.

Basically, if you're a newcomer to Dooce and missed all the drama surrounding Leta's birth, this book might interest you. But if you don't want to pay for it, just go peek through Dooce's archives - it's all right there.

Heather Armstrong, proprietor of Dooce.com is a funny and fantastic writer, but this fell really flat for me and left me truly, truly disappointed (even though she loves Morrissey). And although I knew many of her blog entries would be included in the book (duh, they would have to), she doesn't really delve into anything particular to give a NEW reader true insight; almost like she skimmed over cruicial elements of depression, PPD, her real past with said depression. I think she rushed to have it published.

If you don't read her blog, this would still be a funny, sweet book, but I really wanted to learn more about her-not just a reiteration of the blog.

I must preface this by saying that I am a huge Dooce fan. I have been following Heather for years, and feel like I know her family personally. The book is well written, however feels very uneven. In one breath she's talking about lack of sleep leading to generally melting down, and in the next she's out shopping, visiting family, and writing Leta her monthly "I love you" letters. (Which btw - I also do for my daughter...) I find Heather an amazing writer - quirky, smart, caustic... But this was either poorly organized, or badly edited. I guess I expected more.

In my opinion, the best part of the book was when she talked about Jon and how he helped her through her depressions. They obviously have a strong marriage - and that was the one part of the book that didn't feel even slightly embellished. Honest, raw, and loving.

I am a big fan of [...], and was especially fascinated by her blog's account of postpartum depression (even though I've never had a baby), but the book bored me and left me bereft of compassion for her suffering. I kept thinking, "Good lord, woman, your baby's missing sock is neither interesting nor urgent. Get a sense of perspective and an editor."

I gotta say, if you've ever read her blog, which I have, this is more like a compilation book. I guess I was hoping for some newer material or else something a bit more inspiring than "creatively rearranged" blog entries. Darn.

I'm not a reader of Dooce.com, so I can't comment on whether this is regurgitated blog material, but I have to say, I found this an enjoyable, honest and quick read. I'll admit I hadn't heard of Heather Armstrong until a few weeks ago and while I am suspicious of blog to book deals, I was pleasantly surprised by how enjoyable I found the book.

I am not a parent, so it may be strange for me to read this, but a few of my friends have become parents in the last year (I'm 27, so the baby makin' has commenced among my group of buddies). I really found it refreshing that she doesn't try to paint pregnancy and motherhood as sunshine and rainbows and preach about how her child is just the best thing to ever happen in the history of the world, because in reality, over a stolen sip of wine, my friends are a lot more like Heather than they are those people on the Baby Shows that populate TLC.

The writing itself is not bad. If it's easy to read, then I'm A-ok with it! There are some authors (blog to book authors) like Jen Lancaster who I find just too darn quippy, and others (stephanie klein) whose style is really disjointed. She tends to jump back and forth in time and place (not very gracefully) and her books actually do read like blog posts, culled together at times. But I didn't find that at all with this book. It might be thanks to an incredible editor and if that's the case then Heather has lucked out and if not, more power to her.

Overall I enjoyed the book. She speaks about her emotions and a time in her life where very serious and exciting and devastating things are happening, and she still seems approachable, relatable and not like she is taking herself so seriously. There's no self aggrandizing and no "i just feel soooooo much, look at my pain! relate to my pain!" in there.

I'd recommend.

I am a frequent reader of dooce.com and was excited to read this book. It's a very fast read and quite enjoyable. Like some other reviewers, however, I was hoping for more original material and insights into her experience of pregnancy, having a baby and suffering from post-partum depression. I thought some of the strongest parts of the book were those discussing her relationship with her husband and the strain post-partum depression put on their relationship. I don't recall seeing much, if any, discussion about that on Heather Armstrong's blog, so this information provided new insight. I wish she had stretched herself a little beyond her comfort zone (humor) and talked more about her recovery from PPD, beyond just finding the right combination of meds and hiring a babysitter. More emphasis on the evolving relationship with her daughter would have strengthened the book as well. Overall, I enjoyed the book, laughed more than a few times, but ultimately wished for a bit more than it delivered.

This book could have been so much better. The topic of pregnancy, depression and life are all of great interest but the book felt rushed and skimmed over the critical points....particulary depression. For someone who has never experienced the trials of pregnancy, depression and post partum depression, this could be an acceptable surface read. But it lacks depth that could have, should have been there, but the author just didn't make it happen. I kept reading, hoping to get to the whole purpose of the story, but it never happened. It's like a movie that has no boiling point and, ultimately, no resolution. The author does not paint a pretty picture of being a mother, even after she is medicated with a cocktail of anti-depressants and anti-anxiety drugs. This is the best blog on the internet? Seriously?

If you want to read a book, buy a book by someone who is writing a book. If you want to read a blog that has been marketed into a book, then this would be the perfect thing to waste some money buying. The "storyline" is choppy (written exactly in the same style as the author's blog, which you can read for free). If you are interested in reading tedious memoir of a middle-class unhappy housewife who actually has to FIND things to complain about, you might like this book. I did not.

I knew the author was a blogger when I bought this book, but naively I assumed that some editing would have happened between a quickly-written blog and the publishing of a book. Unfortunately, this doesn't appear to be true. There are the sentence fragments, verbs that don't match nouns, and other grammatical errors which should have been caught by even a mediocre editor. But worse, the book just isn't that engaging. It's not well written. The humor is repetitive and obvious. This book is what you'd expect from an overwhelmed mom who found an hour or two to write each chapter, and then managed to get the sum printed without further editorial review.

There are better books on birth (try "Birth Day" by Mark Sloan). There are better books by authors with emotional problems (try "Madness" by Marya Hornbacher).