Who Do You Think You Are?: A Memoir [Paperback]

Alyse Myers (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 28, 2009

After her mother's death, Alyse Myers covets only one thing: a wooden box that sits in the back of a closet. Its contents have been kept from her for her entire life. When she was thirteen years old her mother promised she could have the box, "when I'm dead. In fact, it'll be my present to you."

Growing up in Queens in the 1960s and '70s, Alyse always yearned for more in life, while her mother settled for an unhappy marriage, an unsatisfying job, and ultimately a joyless existence. Her father drifts in and out of their home. There are harrowing fights, abject cruelty, and endless uncertainty. Throughout her childhood Alyse adamantly rejects everything about her mother's lifestyle, leaving her mother to ask "Who do you think you are?"

A personal portrait of a mother and daughter, Who Do You Think You Are? explores the profound and poignant revelations that so often can come to light only after a parent has died. Balancing childhood memories with adult observations, Alyse Myers creates a riveting and deeply moving narrative.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Myers (v-p, brand programs for the New York Times) considered herself a daddy's girl, until the death of her father when she was only 11 left her particularly lonely. In this dark though moving book, she explains that she never told her two younger sisters of her loneliness and found her mother's unpredictable cruelty truly bewildering. Although this was a working-class Jewish family in Queens in the 1960s and '70s, it wasn't the sort featured in storybooks. Her parents chain-smoked and fought endlessly, slinging curses at each other without a thought of their children listening. Alyse got herself into a gifted high school in Manhattan, found herself part-time jobs and enrolled in an affordable city college. It was only after she married and had a child herself that she started to understand her father had been a philanderer and her mother used morphine to cope. The greatest gift she gave her daughter was the determination to create a different sort of life for herself. (May)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

Bad parenting has prompted many a memoir; Myers’ is the latest. The eldest of three daughters, Myers was the one labeled by her beautiful, blue-eyed mother as the most likely to give her grief. The lament was largely unjustified. Myers was a smart, studious kid whose greatest crimes were her unconditional love for her father (a charmer and cad who disappeared without warning for long periods of time) and a persistent insistence that her mother should better her lackluster life. Myers’ mother hit her with a strap, and once, when Myers was 13, threw her out of their Queens apartment and told her never to come back. (The teen stayed at a neighbor’s down the hall; upon her return, her mother didn’t seem to care where she’d been.) After her mother’s death, Myers gains possession of a mysterious wooden box her mother had forbidden her to open. She hopes its contents will help explain her mother’s mean spirit and malaise. Myers, an executive at the New York Times, conveys a chilling childhood in crisp, candid prose. --Allison Block --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 272 pages
• Publisher: Touchstone; Reprint edition (April 28, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1416543066
• ISBN-13: 978-1416543060
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.4 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.1 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (49 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #542,222 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

64 of 67 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars My must-read book of the year, April 26, 2008

By 

Amester17 (Exeter, NH) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Who Do You Think You Are?: A Memoir (Hardcover)

'Who Do You Think You Are?' is a beautifully written book. I read it in one sitting because, from the first page, I literally could not put it down. It is such a BRAVE book: it dares to look at that most sacrosanct -- and mythologized -- relationship: mother and daughter. And it tells a truth: that not all of us like our mothers. And not all mothers like their children.

The book begins with the mother's funeral. The only thing the author wants is a wooden box that has been hidden in her mother's closet for as long as she can remember. She takes the box but does not open it, afraid of the secrets contained within. We then flash back to the 60s in a poorer neighborhood in Queens. Through tight, beautiful prose, we learn of the author's childhood.

What is magical about this book is that it is not a chronicle of some nightmare or a retelling of yet another horrifying story of abject cruelty. Rather, 'Who Do You Think You Are?' is the story of what really goes on behind the closed doors of many peoples' lives. Relationships are not perfect. People hurt one another. People damage one another. And life goes on. Especially for the survivor. Ultimately, this is a book about what it means to love and to discover that place within yourself that lets you love in spite of the hurt you have suffered. It is also a book about forgiving and how that contributes to love. This is an amazing book and one that I recommend in the highest possible terms. It's a gem.

17 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Beautifully sad, May 26, 2008

By 

M. Davis - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Who Do You Think You Are? (Kindle Edition)

Alyse Myers, if I recall correctly, is a marketing executive with The New York Times, and this is her first book. I recommend it highly!

This memoir makes me want to aspire to write my own. Alas, I doubt I could reach the simplicity of Myers' writing coupled with the profundity of it.

Maybe it's because the book relates closely to my poor, poor relationship with my mother, but that's not all of it, I think. It is simply a great read.

Why can't more books use the simplicity of writing to such powerful effect as Myers does? I sure wish I could.

WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE? was, like other reviewers have said, a very fast read. So fast I didn't want it to end at times.

Five unequivocal stars!

25 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A great book, April 28, 2008

By 

J. Ferrara (New York, NY) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Who Do You Think You Are?: A Memoir (Hardcover)

I loved this book. And I wouldn't have thought of it as my kind of book. A friend who liked it gave it to me to read and I couldn't put it down. There's something about the straightforwardness of the writing that just draws you in. My relationship with my mother wasn't as bad as that of the author, but I saw so many issues of our relationship reflected here that it really moved me. And the unexpected ending was amazing.