Friends with Books discussion

Got any good memoir recommendations?



I've read three memoirs and loved them all. Well... Wild was really good but not as good as Rules of Inheritance. Rules of Inheritance is a tough read. It took me awhile to read this and it's good I read it slow because I think I would have been consumed in sadness. It's very powerful and very good. Wild has hiking in it and her journey to find herself. Love reading about the great out doors and her life. I'm Down was pretty hilarious but it dealt with this girl trying to gain approval from the most important person in her life: her father.

hmm, I've read quite a few memoirs, and enjoyed them. Let me see, some favorites have been:


Amazing. I just read this and it was fantastic. It is a memoir, but written by the daughter of the person the book is about. It's written like fiction, but it is a true story. I loved this book.

This was very political and I thought it would be boring, but it was actually interesting.

One of my favorite books I read in my Grade 12 year.

This one was quite memorable, and I remember really enjoying it.

Hole in My Life by the great Jack Gantos is a very good memoir. It shows extraordinary insight on Gantos's part into the mistakes of his past, and provides a blueprint for how he used the consequences of those mistakes to propel him on a new course toward becoming an award-winning author, culminating in his winning the 2012 Newbery Medal for Dead End in Norvelt.

Ooh! These books look fantastic XD
I'm loving memoirs now...
For Swing Low A life (weird question) what's a Mennonite church?
Eh :/ Political books... but if you liked it anyways I guess I could give it a shot.
For Found I would try to read the first book first but it's so sad! All memoirs seem to have that same consistent feeling.

Ugh. I got a bad feeling when seeing the cover of Hole in My Life. I thought it looked like Che. It also reminds me too much of grandparents being in jail in Cuba...

There's a first to Found?? hmm.
I agree, memoirs are sometimes profoundly sad! It's a shame really, that people with happy lives don't write more memoirs!!

Mennonites are a conservative religion. From what I understand they keep to themselves quite a lot and have their own communities. I'm almost positive they are similar (or even the same?) as Amish people...

It says so in Found I'm pretty sure...
You're right I'm sure there are a couple of happy ones out there. There is a book called:

I don't know if it's a memoir. I think it is.

Huh. Interesting. So many religions out there that I don't know about.

Adriana wrote: "Ugh. I got a bad feeling when seeing the cover of Hole in My Life. I thought it looked like Che. It also reminds me too much of grandparents being in jail in Cuba... "

I guess that was just the look in the 1970s. Jack Gantos was young when that picture (his mug shot) was taken. If memory serves, I believe he was only twenty-one. His arrest came as a result of an expedition he undertook smuggling a huge shipment of drugs into the United States. He did it mainly for a quick buck (actually $10,000, and that's in 1970s currency), but it ended up costing him a couple of years behind bars. Still, Hole in My Life is a remarkably hopeful and inspiring young-adult story, and I gained so much personal insight from reading it.

Adriana wrote: "It says so in Found I'm pretty sure...
You're right I'm sure there are a couple of happy ones out there. There is a book called:

I don't know if it's a memoir. I think it is...."

I read The Happiness Project. I suppose it could count as a memoir. It's more just regular non-fiction though. In my opinion, anyway.

Another memoir that I like is It Came From Ohio: My Life As A Writer by R.L. Stine. It was first published when R.L. Stine was at the absolute height of his popularity, when the original Goosebumps series was still being written and selling so well that, in the "About the Author" section in the back of the books, R.L. Stine was unflinchingly called "the most popular author in America". It Came From Ohio includes plenty of interesting stories from R.L. Stine's life, and I would consider it a must-read for most Goosebumps or Fear Street fans.

Josiah wrote: "Adriana wrote: "Ugh. I got a bad feeling when seeing the cover of Hole in My Life. I thought it looked like Che. It also reminds me too much of grandparents being in jail in Cuba... "

I guess that..."

It does sound intriguing. It begs the question what he did after he got out of jail.

Trevor wrote: "Adriana wrote: "It says so in Found I'm pretty sure...
You're right I'm sure there are a couple of happy ones out there. There is a book called:

I don't kn..."

Oh really! Did you like it even though the author was kind of... well off? I thought it was weird she was writing a book about happiness when it was easier for her...

Josiah wrote: "Another memoir that I like is It Came From Ohio: My Life As A Writer by R.L. Stine. It was first published when R.L. Stine was at the absolute height of his popularity, when the original Goosebumps..."

He wrote a memoir!? Must get my hands on that book!

Adriana wrote: "It does sound intriguing. It begs the question what he did after he got out of jail. "

It was actually only a few years after his release that his first book, Rotten Ralph, was published. My thoughts on the correlation between the two events is something that I went into detail about in my review of Hole in My Life. In a very tangible way, it was Jack Gantos's change to focusing on the stories about his childhood that helped keep him sane while in prison, and kept him on a positive path in life once he was released. He hasn't looked back since.

Aw! I don't think I would have favored well if I thought solely on my childhood. I'm more of a dreamer so the possibilities of the future would keep me going. You?

Adriana wrote: "Trevor wrote: "Adriana wrote: "It says so in Found I'm pretty sure...
You're right I'm sure there are a couple of happy ones out there. There is a book called:
[bookcover:The Happiness Project|6398..."

I did enjoy the book. At the time of reading it I was looking for ways to be happier and I read it much more as a manual or a to-do list rather than a story of a woman becoming happier, you know? So I didn't pay much attention to her life. I can't remember much of that book anyway, it was water. Nothing substantial.

That's how I thought it to be too. A manual.

Adriana wrote: "Aw! I don't think I would have favored well if I thought solely on my childhood. I'm more of a dreamer so the possibilities of the future would keep me going. You?"

For Jack Gantos, though, his future had become a dark, frightening place, with very little hope. He was a convicted felon scarred by his time in prison, and had shown a total lack of self-control in his life. Without self-control, how could he ever hope to turn things around and begin going in the right direction? In setting his mind on the happy stories of his childhood, he was able to calm his distressed spirit and get back to a place where hope was as natural as breathing, where recreation didn't mean taking drugs and friendships were begun just for the sake of having friends, with no ulterior motive. It was this decision to keep his thoughts on the positives of his childhood that gave Jack Gantos the discipline to not venture further into the darkness that had been swallowing him up, and served as the launch of his career as a successful writer after many, many false starts before the arrest. And what a success he has been!

Your passionate about this book aren't you? (;
You've convinced me.