Operating Instructions: A Journal of My Son's First Year - Softcover

Lamott, Anne

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1400079098 ISBN 13: 9781400079094

Publisher: Vintage, 2005

Synopsis

With the same brilliant combination of humor and warmth she brought to bestseller Bird by Bird, Anne Lamott gives us a smart, funny, and comforting chronicle of single motherhood.

It’s not like she’s the only woman to ever have a baby. At thirty-five. On her own. But Anne Lamott makes it all fresh in her now-classic account of how she and her son and numerous friends and neighbors and some strangers survived and thrived in that all important first year. From finding out that her baby is a boy (and getting used to the idea) to finding out that her best friend and greatest supporter Pam will die of cancer (and not getting used to that idea), with a generous amount of wit and faith (but very little piousness), Lamott narrates the great and small events that make up a woman’s life.

"Lamott has a conversational style that perfectly conveys her friendly, self-depricating humor." -- Los Angeles Times Book Review 

"Lamott is a wonderfully lithe writer .... Anyone who has ever had a hard time facing a perfectly ordinary day will identify." -- Chicago Tribune 

About this title

Review

The most honest, wildly enjoyable book written about motherhood is surely Anne Lamott's account of her son Sam's first year. A gifted writer and teacher, Lamott (Crooked Little Heart) is a single mother and ex-alcoholic with a pleasingly warped social circle and a remarkably tolerant religion to lean on. She responds to the changes, exhaustion, and love Sam brings with aplomb or outright insanity. The book rocks from hilarious to unbearably poignant when Sam's burgeoning life is played out against a very close friend's illness. No saccharine paean to becoming a parent, this touches on the rage and befuddlement that dog sweeter emotions during this sea change in one's life.

From the Publisher

Anne Lamott is someone I can truly relate too; single, in her thirties and full of many of the insecurities that independent women have. When she gets pregnant and her best friend develops cancer, she unlike most of us can write about all this with a heartbreaking clarity few can match. On top of this Anne Lamott is incredibly funny.

I'm a sales rep for Ballantine books and this has been one of my favorite books to sell over the years. But if I was to quit tomorrow I would still be talking about this book. It is a book I have given to countless friends the past few years. Expectant parents especially, both men and women love this book because Lamott is able to verbalize the entire spectrum of emotions a child can bring into their lives.
        --Karen Hayes, Sales Rep.

Edition details

• Publisher: Vintage
• Publication date: 2005
• ISBN 10: 1400079098
• ISBN 13: 9781400079094
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 272