You Were Always Mom's Favorite!: Sisters in Conversation Throughout Their Lives [Hardcover]

Deborah Tannen (Author)

Book Description

Release date: September 8, 2009 | ISBN-10: 1400066328 | ISBN-13: 978-1400066322 | Edition: 1

"I love her to death. I can't imagine life without her," a woman says about her sister. Another remarks, "I don't want anyone to kill my sister because I want to have that privilege myself." With these two comments, begins this eye-opening and entertaining new book.

New York Timesbestselling author Deborah Tannen is renowned for illuminating the way we communicate–and revolutionizing relationships in the process. What she did for women and men in You Just Don't Understand, and mothers and daughters in You're Wearing THAT?, she now does for sisters in a groundbreaking book that explores one of the most powerful and perplexing relationships in our lives.

Conversations between sisters reveal a deep and constant tug between two dynamics–an impulse towards closeness and an impulse towards competition, as sisters are continually compared to each other. When you're with her, you laugh your head off, and can giggle and be silly like when you were kids. But she also might be the one person who can send you into a tailspin with just one wrong word. For many women, a sister is both.

With a witty and wise voice, Tannen shares insights and anecdotes from well over a hundred women she interviewed, along with moving and funny recollections of her own two sisters. You'll come away with a profound new understanding, as well as effective techniques to improve and accessible solutions for problems in this unique and precious relationship.

Editorial Reviews

Review

 
“Siblings will jump on this book to read about pigeonholing . . . power dynamics . . . and the coded messages, fond or furious, that only the person who knows you best will understand.”
—O: The Oprah Magazine

 
“If you have a sister, you will probably recognize every detail and laugh or cry.”
—The Daily Beast
 
“Tannen’s very talented ear allows her to see inside our most intense relationships using the windows of our words.”
—Baltimore Sun
 
“Love/hate doesn’t begin to describe the elation and heartbreak, the humor and perplexed contradictions revealed in this delightful book when sisters speak of and to each other.”
—The Philadelphia Inquirer



From the Trade Paperback edition.

About the Author

Deborah Tannen is the acclaimed author of You Just Don’t Understand, which was on the New York Times bestseller list for nearly four years including eight months as #1; the ten-week New York Times bestseller You’re Wearing THAT?: Understanding Mothers and Daughters in Conversation; I Only Say This Because I Love You: Talking to Your Parents, Partner, Sibs and Kids When You’re All Adults, which won the Books for a Better Life Award; Talking from 9 to 5: Women and Men at Work; That’s Not What I Meant!; and many other books. A professor of linguistics at Georgetown University, she has written for and been featured in newspapers and magazines such as The New York Times, The Washington Post, USA Today, Time, and Newsweek. She appears frequently on TV and radio, including such shows as 20/20, The Oprah Winfrey Show, The Colbert Report, Nightline, Today, Good Morning America, and NPR’s Morning Edition and All Things Considered. She is university professor and professor of linguistics at Georgetown University, and has been McGraw Distinguished Lecturer at Princeton University. She lives with her husband in the Washington, D.C., area.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 256 pages
• Publisher: Random House; 1 edition (September 8, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1400066328
• ISBN-13: 978-1400066322
• Product Dimensions: 6.4 x 0.9 x 9.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (60 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #702,887 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Deborah Tannen is the acclaimed author of You Just Don't Understand, which was on the New York Times bestseller list for nearly four years including eight months as #1; the ten-week New York Times bestseller You're Wearing THAT?: Understanding Mothers and Daughters in Conversation; I Only Say This Because I Love You: Talking to Your Parents, Partner, Sibs and Kids When You're All Adults, which won the Books for a Better Life Award; Talking from 9 to 5: Women and Men at Work; That's Not What I Meant!; and many other books. A professor of linguistics at Georgetown University, she has written for and been featured in newspapers and magazines such as The New York Times, The Washington Post, USA Today, Time, and Newsweek. She appears frequently on TV and radio, including such shows as 20/20, The Oprah Winfrey Show, The Colbert Report, Nightline, Today, Good Morning America, and NPR's Morning Edition and All Things Considered. She is university professor and professor of linguistics at Georgetown University, and has been McGraw Distinguished Lecturer at Princeton University. She lives with her husband in the Washington, D.C., area.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

34 of 34 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars More About Roles Than Conversation August 27, 2009

By litaddiction VINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Vine™ Review (What's this?)

I enjoyed You Just Don't Understand: Women and Men in Conversation and know of Tannen's other books, so was interested to see that she has sliced her studies of conversation yet another way here -- along sisterly lines in You Were Always Mom's Favorite!

It's an interesting slice since, as Tannen writes, "A sister is like yourself in a different movie, a movie that stars you in a different life." She posits that these lives revolve around a subset of sibling rivalry where sisters connect and compete in attempts to align themselves for parental love. She supports that not through strictly scientific data but rather social anecdotes -- examples pulled from literature, pop culture, and her own interviews. It's notable that I've recently read two other books that incorporate "everyman" quotes; they were clumsy in insertion and vacuous in content and frankly spoiled the works. But here, Tannen knows expertly when to summarize someone's comments, and when instead to roll seamlessly into a spot-on and memorable quote.

A couple quibbles. First, contrary to the subtitle, this book is not much about conversation. Rather, it's primarily about psychology and exploring the underlying family roles and dynamics that sometimes bubble up into verbal and nonverbal communications.

Second, Tannen leaves no stone unturned, no shade of gray unexamined. At one point, she refers to the 17 single-spaced pages of research notes she'd accumulated for one topic; I think she included every one of them in this book -- first via a complete, fully formed example, then appended with a summarizing paragraph. The wordiness and repetition grew tedious, and tolerable in doses of at most a chapter at a time. I actually think an audio version would be a better fit for Tannen's smooth, conversational (!) style, and would make any repetition feel reinforcing rather than frustrating.

21 of 21 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Helped Me Figure Out my Wife! August 18, 2009

By N. Bilmes VINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Vine™ Review (What's this?)

My wife's relationships with her sisters drive me absolutely bonkers. One day/month/year they're best friends who do lots of things together, and the next second/minute/hour they're arch enemies who can't agree on anything. Deborah Tannen's book is an entertaining look at the dynamics of sister-sister conversations, and although it doesn't explain everything I'd like to know about why my wife and her two sisters act the way they do, it at least let me know that there are lots of other sisters out there who act just as bizarrely.

I recommend this for anyone who wants support in trying to negotiate this minefield.

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Another Insightful Book from Deborah Tannen July 30, 2009

By Emily Glickman VINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Vine™ Review (What's this?)

I loved Tannen's book about mothers and daughters in conversation, so I had to read her latest, about sisters. If you have a sister or daughters I think you will find this book enjoyable and useful. It's interesting that sisters' conversational themes are so universal that Tannen can analyze them.

Most helpfully, Tannen addresses why sisters compete. She gives parents tips about how to minimize sisters' rivalry and adult sisters advice about how not to get riled up about old childhood baggage.