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Julie Myerson
316 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2009
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459 people want to read
About the author
Julie Myerson
25 books181 followersJulie Myerson is the author of nine novels, including the internationally bestselling Something Might Happen, and three works of nonfiction. As a critic and columnist, she has written for many newspapers including The Guardian, Financial Times, Harper’s Bazaar, and the New York Times.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 86 reviews
July 16, 2020
Julie Myerson's new book has created quite a stir, both in England when it was published in Spring, 2009 and here in the US in August, 2009. She has been the subject of numerous columns in the UK, where she had been previously railed against for publishing stories about her family - male partner, two sons and one daughter - in an ongoing, anonymous blog in a London paper for a couple of years. She wrote about her family - sometimes in shocking detail of how difficult it was to live with three teenagers - and quit only when she was exposed as the author. She had denied to her children she was the author of the blog until exposed. So already there were mixed feelings about her new book, which is mostly about her children, in particular her oldest, a son she refers to only as "the boy". "The boy" has fallen deeply into drug dependency, which, by the age of 17 has left him violent, angry, and a societal drop out.
"The boy" is not the only subject of the book; she writes about an on-going literary project about Mary Yelloly, who died as a young women in the 1830's and is known today by her watercolor prints of the house she grew up in and the society around her in Regency England. Myerson writes about her "hunt" for a woman dead almost 200 years, a hunt which includes visiting her various homes, meeting many of her direct descendants, and seeing original papers about her life. Mary was one of ten children of a doctor and his wife. Mary and several of her siblings died either in early childhood or in their 20's and 30's, mostly of consumption. So, the term, "lost child" could apply to either Mary or Myerson's son.
Myerson's son has become addicted to "skunk", a particularly virulent form of cannibus. He smokes daily and he has basically dropped out of school and is extremely violent at home. Extremely violent, if Myerson's account is to be believed. She and her partner, "the boy's father", live with this ongoing violence and try, rather ineffectively, to live day-to-day with "the boy" and his younger brother and sister. Finally, the parents kick "the boy" out of the house and he makes his way on the streets. The book ends with a somewhat hopeful idea that he's possibly hit bottom and will go in for treatment.
All the ruckus in England has tended to be about the right of a parent to write about a child. Myerson was castigated first for her writing about her children - and their lives - in her "anonymous" blog, and then, now, with the publication of this book. In the last chapter, she says she showed the manuscript to "the boy" and he made minor changes in the manuscript, and even sold her some of his poems for publication in the final draft.
I'm NOT going to review the book on the basis of the "should she or shouldn't she" write about her family. I am reviewing the book on the basis of the writing, which I think is very good. It was a hard story to tell, the one about her family, and she told it well. Whether she SHOULD have told it or not, is something she'll have to live with.
"The boy" is not the only subject of the book; she writes about an on-going literary project about Mary Yelloly, who died as a young women in the 1830's and is known today by her watercolor prints of the house she grew up in and the society around her in Regency England. Myerson writes about her "hunt" for a woman dead almost 200 years, a hunt which includes visiting her various homes, meeting many of her direct descendants, and seeing original papers about her life. Mary was one of ten children of a doctor and his wife. Mary and several of her siblings died either in early childhood or in their 20's and 30's, mostly of consumption. So, the term, "lost child" could apply to either Mary or Myerson's son.
Myerson's son has become addicted to "skunk", a particularly virulent form of cannibus. He smokes daily and he has basically dropped out of school and is extremely violent at home. Extremely violent, if Myerson's account is to be believed. She and her partner, "the boy's father", live with this ongoing violence and try, rather ineffectively, to live day-to-day with "the boy" and his younger brother and sister. Finally, the parents kick "the boy" out of the house and he makes his way on the streets. The book ends with a somewhat hopeful idea that he's possibly hit bottom and will go in for treatment.
All the ruckus in England has tended to be about the right of a parent to write about a child. Myerson was castigated first for her writing about her children - and their lives - in her "anonymous" blog, and then, now, with the publication of this book. In the last chapter, she says she showed the manuscript to "the boy" and he made minor changes in the manuscript, and even sold her some of his poems for publication in the final draft.
I'm NOT going to review the book on the basis of the "should she or shouldn't she" write about her family. I am reviewing the book on the basis of the writing, which I think is very good. It was a hard story to tell, the one about her family, and she told it well. Whether she SHOULD have told it or not, is something she'll have to live with.
December 16, 2020
The following is based on a FirstReads win (an advance reading copy).
Myerson's The Lost Child A Mother's Story is actually two stories: her historical research into the (short) life of Mary Yelloly of the 1800s, and her and her family's struggle with their oldest son and his destructive drug addiction. The narrative includes the process of researching Mary, as well as what she finds (including excerpts from diaries and letters), and other stories from the author's young life as she relates them to the crisis with her son.
I liked the sections about her son. Myerson's pain as a mother - the questions, confusion, and horrible doubt - comes through. Not a huge fan of the staccato style, but I got used to it. These sections seemed real and were compelling, and address some tough questions that any loved one trying to help an addict has to deal with. As "a mother's story," it worked.
However, the rest of it. I couldn't get into the sections about Mary, the girl who died of consumption two hundred years ago. The author's obsession with her seems so distant and unrelated, even though she has tied them together in her mind. Maybe on its own the process of researching a woman from two centuries ago would be more interesting, but meshed in with a modern day tragedy just diminished Mary's side of the story. Also, trying to keep track of Mary's long family tree got old. (Maybe the final copy will have a diagram?)
Myerson does try to tie the two story lines together at the end in an imaginary meeting with Mary, followed by an afterward in which the son reads the manuscript. It's the best ending we're going to get, I suppose.
Myerson's The Lost Child A Mother's Story is actually two stories: her historical research into the (short) life of Mary Yelloly of the 1800s, and her and her family's struggle with their oldest son and his destructive drug addiction. The narrative includes the process of researching Mary, as well as what she finds (including excerpts from diaries and letters), and other stories from the author's young life as she relates them to the crisis with her son.
I liked the sections about her son. Myerson's pain as a mother - the questions, confusion, and horrible doubt - comes through. Not a huge fan of the staccato style, but I got used to it. These sections seemed real and were compelling, and address some tough questions that any loved one trying to help an addict has to deal with. As "a mother's story," it worked.
However, the rest of it. I couldn't get into the sections about Mary, the girl who died of consumption two hundred years ago. The author's obsession with her seems so distant and unrelated, even though she has tied them together in her mind. Maybe on its own the process of researching a woman from two centuries ago would be more interesting, but meshed in with a modern day tragedy just diminished Mary's side of the story. Also, trying to keep track of Mary's long family tree got old. (Maybe the final copy will have a diagram?)
Myerson does try to tie the two story lines together at the end in an imaginary meeting with Mary, followed by an afterward in which the son reads the manuscript. It's the best ending we're going to get, I suppose.
Read
February 13, 2018Bisognerebbe dare due giudizi separati su questo libro: uno per ognuna delle storie che vi si intrecciano. Da una parte, una storia-pretesto che ricostruisce la vita molto breve di una giovane pittrice Mary Yelloly, morta di tuberculosi nel diciannovesimo secolo, attraverso le ricerche compiute da Julie Myerson - autore e personaggio nello stesso tempo - storia piuttosto debole, non spiacevole ma che sa più di acquarello che di pittura. Dall'altra parte, la storia vera, quella della donna che scrive la biografia di Mary Yelloly ma che, in realtà, è completamente presa, stritolata nella vicenda di suo figlio, tossico. Ecco, questa merita. E' dolente, tenerissima e crudele, e ci mostra da molto vicino che cosa sia per un padre, una madre, dover chiedere al proprio figlio di andar via di casa. Julie Myerson, visibilmente, sa esattamente di che cosa sta parlando. "Nostro figlio se n'è andato e ci possiamo rilassare tutti. Lo abbiamo amato per una vita intera, ce ne siamo presi cura e adesso lui è là fuori chissà dove per le strade e noi possiamo tutti rilassarci. E' un'idea terribile per me." E' una vera amputazione che deve infliggere alla sua famiglia per salvare la pelle, anche quella del figlio, forse. Non è facile viverle queste storie, non deve neppur essere facile scriverle, e se parlo di questo libro, peraltro non eccezionale nella scrittura, è per la sua capacità di raccontare l'umiliazione, la disfatta, la capitolazione di genitori, senza indulgere né nella violenza, pur presente tra le righe, né nella compassione.
Want to read
February 21, 2012I won this book from First Reads! I was intrigued by the cover and even more so my the book description. I can't wait to get it and to read it!
November 5, 2009
I didn't think, during the first half of this book, that I would end up saying I liked it...at least not without lying. I really wasn't into it until about halfway through, and even then, it was a difficult read. But now that I've finished it, and I've seen how it all comes together, I feel that calm, satisfied feeling of reading a book that I don't regret reading.
The Lost Child is a book I never would have given a second thought, except that I won it in a giveaway and didn't have much choice. Maybe that was why I was automatically hesitant to like it; I've never been keen on assigned reading. But I also hesitated to like it because of my stubborn distaste for unconventional grammar, and this book doesn't use a single quotation mark in any of its dialogue. That was distracting the whole way through.
But, petty preferences aside, this book is good. It is real, and it is painful, and it is inspiring. The author tells her own story without holding back, and she crafts the story of another's life -- a life lost some 150 years ago -- with diligent research and a lot of emotional connection.
It's good. I can't really say much more than that, because having finished it only minutes ago, I am completely drained. It's definitely a book that will shake you up. I'm 24 years old, newly married, and I can't imagine ever being able to live through losing my own child. It scares me to death.
The Lost Child is a book I never would have given a second thought, except that I won it in a giveaway and didn't have much choice. Maybe that was why I was automatically hesitant to like it; I've never been keen on assigned reading. But I also hesitated to like it because of my stubborn distaste for unconventional grammar, and this book doesn't use a single quotation mark in any of its dialogue. That was distracting the whole way through.
But, petty preferences aside, this book is good. It is real, and it is painful, and it is inspiring. The author tells her own story without holding back, and she crafts the story of another's life -- a life lost some 150 years ago -- with diligent research and a lot of emotional connection.
It's good. I can't really say much more than that, because having finished it only minutes ago, I am completely drained. It's definitely a book that will shake you up. I'm 24 years old, newly married, and I can't imagine ever being able to live through losing my own child. It scares me to death.
April 17, 2012
Two seemingly very different true-to-life stories woven together into one -- that's the gist of Myerson's The Lost Child. Did she pull it off smoothly? For the most part, yes, I think so. The writing style is a little different -- reminiscent in my mind to James Frey -- but I kind of liked that about this book. I felt like she nailed it down as far as expressing a mother's feelings of love & helplessness in dealing with her son's drug addiction & there were times I really ached for her. During this same period of time, Myerson is collecting historical information about a girl who grew up in England in the early 1800's, but who died at age 21, leaving behind her legacy in watercolors done as she was growing up. Myerson interweaves both these stories: her personal struggle w/ her son's addiction & her hunt to really get to "know" this young girl from the 19th century by piecing together the various clues she collects through her descendents. Some readers may have difficulty meshing these two stories together, but I thought it was a refreshing approach and overall found myself really wondering what was going to happen next in both instances.
October 1, 2009
I am stopping reading this about 1/2 way through. It has an annoying lack of cohesion, quotation marks or any basis in reality. Her son gets violent because he's a pot addict? On what planet is this pot from?
Mostly I'm annoyed with this book because it's really much more about her research into a Regency era young woman's life. This is seemingly wholly unconnected to her family problems at least here at the halfway point in the book.
Mostly I'm annoyed with this book because it's really much more about her research into a Regency era young woman's life. This is seemingly wholly unconnected to her family problems at least here at the halfway point in the book.
June 8, 2022
The 2 stories didn’t work together in my opinion. I would rather have read each one separately. In fact actually I wasn’t very interested in the Mary story and hurried through those sections to get back to the more interesting story of her relationship with her son.
August 9, 2023
2.5
This was very much a book of two halves for me. I found the parts about her son and her childhood fascinating. I wasn’t the least bit interested in her research into the painter. It remained unclear to me why she was so determined to research her life.
This was very much a book of two halves for me. I found the parts about her son and her childhood fascinating. I wasn’t the least bit interested in her research into the painter. It remained unclear to me why she was so determined to research her life.
September 30, 2010
I won this book from Goodreads, and here is my review:
The Lost Child, A Mother's Story, a memoir by Julie Myerson, released August 2009 by Bloomsbury USA, 328 pages.
"You can make your babies and you can love them with every single cell of your being, but you can't make them safe, you can't in the end choose how their lives turn out." Reading the memoir The Lost Child by Julie Myerson is heartbreaking, and, as you can guess, Julie's son's life turns out not as she expected but instead it became a great mess of lies, stealing, drugs, poetry, poverty and song. Weaving together threads of Mary Yelloly's story (which began as a journal of early 1800's watercolors Myserson came across at a book dealer's fair), her son's sudden addictions at the ages of 15-17 and their consequent horrific results, Myerson's connection - and lack of connection - to her father after an ugly divorce, and poems written by her son during his early drug-taking time period, The Lost Child becomes quite a colorful tapestry!
Myerson had started out wanting just to write about what she'd discovered through her research on Mary Yelloly, but her life experience with her son (unnamed throughout the book intentionally, as are his siblings, while Yelloly's story has names and familial detail) was so wrenching that she was compelled to contrast both stories within the same binding. Never knowing that her son would resort to lying and stealing money from the family, skipping school and being apathetic between drug quests, or that he would end up hitting her and perforating her ear drum and she'd be forced to throw him out repeatedly, as a mother Myerson still missed the "old" him and her many pre-drug memories of him (sleeping with his stuffed animal, Kangaroo, for fifteen years and his great love of his cat, Kitty, for instance). Her adventures researching Mary Yelloly's family and the buildings in which she'd lived, her mysteries and Mary's love of art and opera, would appear as a great task but almost a light-hearted one if we didn't know that at the same time Myerson was burdened with wondering about whether her son had somewhere to stay or something to eat amongst his new friends. Her sad tale about her father's resentment of her because of her mother's move to divorce him (with her father trying to cut her off from going to school, at which she excelled as a linguist, by not paying the fees, and later cutting off from her, but not her siblings, completely) makes us realize how, even more so than other people, Myerson wanted to keep her own family together. And her son really does have a talent for poetry, which we hope has not been discarded or lost in the rubble of his life.
The Lost Child is one of the most poignant and moving books that I've read in a long time. Myerson is helpless in trying to change her son and bring him back to a more normal life and fears his absolute destruction, not to mention having to watch the other parents around her revel in the bright lives of their children of the same age. But she must let her son go, because there's nothing else she can do, and the book ends on the hopeful note of him starting to make more frequent visits back home.
Reviewed by Christina Zawadiwsky
Christina Zawadiwsky is Ukrainian-American, born in New York City, has a degree in Fine Arts, and is a poet, artist, journalist and TV producer. She has received a National Endowment for the Arts Award, two Wisconsin Arts Boards Awards, a Co-Ordinating Council of Literary Magazines Writers Award, and an Art Futures Award, among other honors. She was the originator and producer of Where The Waters Meet, a local TV series created to facilitate the voices of artists of all genres in the media, for which she won two national and twenty local awards, including a Commitment to Community Television Award. She is also a contributing editor to the annual Pushcart Prize Anthology, the recipient of an Outstanding Achievement Award from the Wisconsin Library Association, and has published four books of poetry. She currently reviews movies for http://www.movieroomreviews.com, music for http://www.musicroomreviews.com, and books for http://www.bookroomreviews.com.
The Lost Child, A Mother's Story, a memoir by Julie Myerson, released August 2009 by Bloomsbury USA, 328 pages.
"You can make your babies and you can love them with every single cell of your being, but you can't make them safe, you can't in the end choose how their lives turn out." Reading the memoir The Lost Child by Julie Myerson is heartbreaking, and, as you can guess, Julie's son's life turns out not as she expected but instead it became a great mess of lies, stealing, drugs, poetry, poverty and song. Weaving together threads of Mary Yelloly's story (which began as a journal of early 1800's watercolors Myserson came across at a book dealer's fair), her son's sudden addictions at the ages of 15-17 and their consequent horrific results, Myerson's connection - and lack of connection - to her father after an ugly divorce, and poems written by her son during his early drug-taking time period, The Lost Child becomes quite a colorful tapestry!
Myerson had started out wanting just to write about what she'd discovered through her research on Mary Yelloly, but her life experience with her son (unnamed throughout the book intentionally, as are his siblings, while Yelloly's story has names and familial detail) was so wrenching that she was compelled to contrast both stories within the same binding. Never knowing that her son would resort to lying and stealing money from the family, skipping school and being apathetic between drug quests, or that he would end up hitting her and perforating her ear drum and she'd be forced to throw him out repeatedly, as a mother Myerson still missed the "old" him and her many pre-drug memories of him (sleeping with his stuffed animal, Kangaroo, for fifteen years and his great love of his cat, Kitty, for instance). Her adventures researching Mary Yelloly's family and the buildings in which she'd lived, her mysteries and Mary's love of art and opera, would appear as a great task but almost a light-hearted one if we didn't know that at the same time Myerson was burdened with wondering about whether her son had somewhere to stay or something to eat amongst his new friends. Her sad tale about her father's resentment of her because of her mother's move to divorce him (with her father trying to cut her off from going to school, at which she excelled as a linguist, by not paying the fees, and later cutting off from her, but not her siblings, completely) makes us realize how, even more so than other people, Myerson wanted to keep her own family together. And her son really does have a talent for poetry, which we hope has not been discarded or lost in the rubble of his life.
The Lost Child is one of the most poignant and moving books that I've read in a long time. Myerson is helpless in trying to change her son and bring him back to a more normal life and fears his absolute destruction, not to mention having to watch the other parents around her revel in the bright lives of their children of the same age. But she must let her son go, because there's nothing else she can do, and the book ends on the hopeful note of him starting to make more frequent visits back home.
Reviewed by Christina Zawadiwsky
Christina Zawadiwsky is Ukrainian-American, born in New York City, has a degree in Fine Arts, and is a poet, artist, journalist and TV producer. She has received a National Endowment for the Arts Award, two Wisconsin Arts Boards Awards, a Co-Ordinating Council of Literary Magazines Writers Award, and an Art Futures Award, among other honors. She was the originator and producer of Where The Waters Meet, a local TV series created to facilitate the voices of artists of all genres in the media, for which she won two national and twenty local awards, including a Commitment to Community Television Award. She is also a contributing editor to the annual Pushcart Prize Anthology, the recipient of an Outstanding Achievement Award from the Wisconsin Library Association, and has published four books of poetry. She currently reviews movies for http://www.movieroomreviews.com, music for http://www.musicroomreviews.com, and books for http://www.bookroomreviews.com.
June 21, 2020
This true story of the narrators search for what happened to the young girl from the 1880s whose watercolours the narrator is shown and her own terrifying battle with the drug addiction of her beloved son are both vividly drawn in this book. They both share, loosely, the experience of loss. I found the connection failed however as there was no connection or effective narrative bridge between the two young people - Mary Yelolly and 'the boy' - who were the central characters. This book is about Julie Myerson as well and I found her presence an increasingly unwelcome intrusion in the unfolding lives of the long dead girl and her very alive son. I really enjoyed the way she described her search for Mary, the detective work, the wins and losses she encountered, the people she met on the path. Her son, constantly and annoyingly referred to as 'the boy' - leapt from the pages as did the careful interactions between her and her husband - 'the boys father'. There are many readers I suspect who might find elements of their own both angry and loving sons in the helpless interactions she draws. Mary and 'the boy' never reached for me that seamless place in a story however that makes it hold together as a whole. It is two stories and the authors personal journey needs to be seperate, maybe in terms of how writing this and getting reprieve from her very real pain by the escape and excitement into researching and writing up Mary's life helped? As it stands I am left with a lot of questions an curiousity about Mary's life and the social conditions of the time and about 'the boy's life and all those other young boys and girls like him. 3 stars because it was good enough to stick with and read to the end despite growing irritation. And also because she made me cry.
April 23, 2018
1.5 stars. Not recommended for anyone except the Yelloly and Suckling families in England.
The Lost Child is two sub par books made worse by their clumsy interchange and degraded further by the marginal "poems" that bridge the chapters.
In contemplating the best part(s) of the book it's easy to settle on one strength: the author does an excellent job of expressing the feelings of hope of parents for their young children.
The challenge comes in sorting out the book's many problems. Myerson's son, Jake, (referred to throughout as merely "the boy") comes across as such a detestable boor that it's impossible to muster any empathy for him. Myerson's husband, Jonathan, (referred to throughout as "the boy's father") is flaccidly drawn and completely one-dimensional. Myerson's father adds the elements of creepiness and mental illness to this dreary mess. The author's imagined conversation with Mary Yelloly at the end of the book was tired and over-wrought.
The Mary Yelloly story is the better part of the book but that isn't saying much. The excitement of discovery is the author's exclusively. As she pieced clues together and switched back and forth between the Yelloly story and her own I couldn't help but wonder if I had enough gas in my car to get me through the week.
The Lost Child is two sub par books made worse by their clumsy interchange and degraded further by the marginal "poems" that bridge the chapters.
In contemplating the best part(s) of the book it's easy to settle on one strength: the author does an excellent job of expressing the feelings of hope of parents for their young children.
The challenge comes in sorting out the book's many problems. Myerson's son, Jake, (referred to throughout as merely "the boy") comes across as such a detestable boor that it's impossible to muster any empathy for him. Myerson's husband, Jonathan, (referred to throughout as "the boy's father") is flaccidly drawn and completely one-dimensional. Myerson's father adds the elements of creepiness and mental illness to this dreary mess. The author's imagined conversation with Mary Yelloly at the end of the book was tired and over-wrought.
The Mary Yelloly story is the better part of the book but that isn't saying much. The excitement of discovery is the author's exclusively. As she pieced clues together and switched back and forth between the Yelloly story and her own I couldn't help but wonder if I had enough gas in my car to get me through the week.
January 9, 2010
A profoundly moving and affecting book! The author perfectly captures the intense joy of discovery that awaits the social historian uncovering hitherto unseen documents and artifacts. Interwoven between this story of an early 19th century English family cruelly decimated by illness is the tale of her own personal mothering trauma as her teenaged son succumbs to drug addiction.
Myerson skillfully interweaves the two stories, and each is heightened by contrast to the other. She has a true gift for bringing individuals vividly to life with a few carefully chosen words. Particularly poignant are the quotations from the family letters and journals of the long-departed young woman whose life captures her attention. Jane Austen fans will delight in the glorious language of the period. Curious and compelling tidbits of history are sprinkled throughout the narrative, relieving what might otherwise be an oppressively gut-wrenching tale of maternal anguish.
Myerson skillfully interweaves the two stories, and each is heightened by contrast to the other. She has a true gift for bringing individuals vividly to life with a few carefully chosen words. Particularly poignant are the quotations from the family letters and journals of the long-departed young woman whose life captures her attention. Jane Austen fans will delight in the glorious language of the period. Curious and compelling tidbits of history are sprinkled throughout the narrative, relieving what might otherwise be an oppressively gut-wrenching tale of maternal anguish.
May 13, 2024
Almost didn’t finish it because I was annoyed by the back and forth between the two stories. Finished it only because I was interested in what was happening with her son. I still don’t understand why both stories were in one book.
June 13, 2024
Interesting and heart rending, though it raises many questions about a mother’s right to tell stories like these. Very thought provoking.
December 9, 2016
This tells the story of a mother whose son stops going to school, who becomes a different person. It takes the parents months to realize that more is going on than just teenagerhood, that their previously happy, well-adjusted son has become a drug addict. Then there's the longer stretch where they discover that love and support aren't going to help him, and finally the point, after he's stolen and lied and intimidated and hit her, that he has to leave for the sake of the remaining family members. Then they let him return, because they miss him, because the thought of him sleeping in a doorway or going hungry is intolerable. This story is raw and honest and powerful. It's well worth reading, whether or not you have children, just to understand a little of what so many people go through.
This is, however, a relatively small part of the book. The larger portion is where Myerson researches the life of a nineteenth century family, and especially the second youngest child, who dies young. They were an ordinary upper class family, and the details are sometimes sketchy. One gets the feeling that Myerson is using this research as a way of retreating from her son's story; it's certainly how this is used in the book. As the situation at home intensifies, she pulls the reader away to the slow process of research, dusty documents and bemused decedents. It's interesting, but in a slower, subdued way. It doesn't mesh with the wrenching drama of the modern segments.
The book ends when it ends, without resolution. Myerson's son is still out there, denying his problem. Myerson includes several of her son's poems and they are exactly what one would expect from a self-pitying teenager.
This book is flawed, but it's important, being an honest and raw account of how a parent feels and adapts to losing a beloved child to addiction. It's not a misery memoir or a how-to guidebook. It doesn't preach or whine, but simply lays out a good parent's anguish at discovering that one can provide all the love and security in the world and still be unable to protect the very person one loves the most.
This is, however, a relatively small part of the book. The larger portion is where Myerson researches the life of a nineteenth century family, and especially the second youngest child, who dies young. They were an ordinary upper class family, and the details are sometimes sketchy. One gets the feeling that Myerson is using this research as a way of retreating from her son's story; it's certainly how this is used in the book. As the situation at home intensifies, she pulls the reader away to the slow process of research, dusty documents and bemused decedents. It's interesting, but in a slower, subdued way. It doesn't mesh with the wrenching drama of the modern segments.
The book ends when it ends, without resolution. Myerson's son is still out there, denying his problem. Myerson includes several of her son's poems and they are exactly what one would expect from a self-pitying teenager.
This book is flawed, but it's important, being an honest and raw account of how a parent feels and adapts to losing a beloved child to addiction. It's not a misery memoir or a how-to guidebook. It doesn't preach or whine, but simply lays out a good parent's anguish at discovering that one can provide all the love and security in the world and still be unable to protect the very person one loves the most.
September 14, 2009
This is my first win in the Advance Copy Giveaways and I was very excited to receive it in the mail. It was a compelling read for me. My ex-husband was in the US Air Force and was stationed at RAF Upper Heyford in England back in the 70's. I gave birth to my two youngest children at the John Radcliffe Maternity Hospital in Oxford. This English author took me back to when I lived in Brill. We were the only Americans in the tiny town. I took the double decker bus on Tuesdays to the Thames Market. I lived in the Square which was really a triangle. I lived in the last little rowhouse opposite the village Doctor and Apothecary and opposite the Vicarage and the Butcher shop. I loved it there and I remember walking through the old graveyard beside the stone church. I saw the centuries old stones with barely legible names and dates etched in them. I recognize the English but not our American English. My 3 and 4 year old daughters came in from preschool asking for 'squash and biscuits' just like the English children did. (For those that don't know, that means 'juice and cookies' to us.)
Julie Myerson takes you on a journey of joys and despairs that motherhood can bring. You feel her helplessness, hopelessness and her heartbreak. I don't mind to tell you that I shed tears with her, too. I don't know how she found the energy to continue with her book research while going through such turmoil in her personal life. I imagine she felt like she was constantly holding her breath. It is so interesting the way she intertwined her own life with the research of the girl that has been dead for 2 centuries. I love her reference to her son as 'our boy'. And, I especially liked his bits of perspective and his poetry that she included. I hope they are both well and good. I would recommend this book, wholeheartedly; but, keep the tissues close at hand.
Julie Myerson takes you on a journey of joys and despairs that motherhood can bring. You feel her helplessness, hopelessness and her heartbreak. I don't mind to tell you that I shed tears with her, too. I don't know how she found the energy to continue with her book research while going through such turmoil in her personal life. I imagine she felt like she was constantly holding her breath. It is so interesting the way she intertwined her own life with the research of the girl that has been dead for 2 centuries. I love her reference to her son as 'our boy'. And, I especially liked his bits of perspective and his poetry that she included. I hope they are both well and good. I would recommend this book, wholeheartedly; but, keep the tissues close at hand.
September 3, 2017
Frankly, I don't like the book.
There are 3 stories interwoven in this book. It is not a book of friction and perhaps because of this it is hard for me to absorb because reality is there.
There is a story of a family that happened more than a hundred years ago.
There is also the author's relationship with her father, and her relationship with her teenage son.
It is with this reality that it is not an leisure read for me where heaps of emotions are written in this book.
Perhaps the author need to release the challenges she was faced with during that time, and dealing with her son that maybe it is best to pen it down to get out of the stress that she faced during that time and the deadline to complete the other story.
The reason I am uncomfortable reading it was because I felt that I was reading someone else's diary. Maybe being an Asian, we tend to keep family matters private.
I don't know why I wanted to read this book. Perhaps the initial story was the curiosity of reading the author's ability to assume and to write the background of a young girl and her family; the art of Julie's pen and writing style and the challenges of finding information of a young girl who died in the eighteen century.
The first book I read was The Stopped Heart and I was in awe so much so that I wasn't able to let go of the book once I started reading.
Julie is gifted to write things of yester years and in the theme of the supernatural.
Much as my thoughts are on this book, I rate it 3.5 stars.
There are 3 stories interwoven in this book. It is not a book of friction and perhaps because of this it is hard for me to absorb because reality is there.
There is a story of a family that happened more than a hundred years ago.
There is also the author's relationship with her father, and her relationship with her teenage son.
It is with this reality that it is not an leisure read for me where heaps of emotions are written in this book.
Perhaps the author need to release the challenges she was faced with during that time, and dealing with her son that maybe it is best to pen it down to get out of the stress that she faced during that time and the deadline to complete the other story.
The reason I am uncomfortable reading it was because I felt that I was reading someone else's diary. Maybe being an Asian, we tend to keep family matters private.
I don't know why I wanted to read this book. Perhaps the initial story was the curiosity of reading the author's ability to assume and to write the background of a young girl and her family; the art of Julie's pen and writing style and the challenges of finding information of a young girl who died in the eighteen century.
The first book I read was The Stopped Heart and I was in awe so much so that I wasn't able to let go of the book once I started reading.
Julie is gifted to write things of yester years and in the theme of the supernatural.
Much as my thoughts are on this book, I rate it 3.5 stars.
November 9, 2010
I received this after entering the first reads on Goodreads.
I have to say that the potential for 2 compelling stories were contained in this book. It can be debated whether the stories were compelling in and of themselves or if the writing style interfered with creating the full impact.
The author is writing about a girl who died in the 1800's. A book of watercolors begins her journey into the past in order to discover the path the girl walked in her short life. There are present mysteries explored and historical items unearthed in the current day that add to the story. She also has images of the past as she reflects.
As she is working on this project, her own home life is ravaged by her son's descent. He has been using drugs and she feels forced to dispel him from the household to protect the family structure. She discusses her own feelings about having to take this path of action, her son's responses and how this impacts the rest of the family.
I have to say, there were times when I just reacted to her inability to set limits and boundaries. I guess conceptually I understand the way a mother would struggle in these situations; unfortunately, I had a hard time relating when her choices added to the chaos.
Overall, I did read the story, finish it and gain some enjoyment. I felt much more intrigued before reading than while I was actually reading the book.
I have to say that the potential for 2 compelling stories were contained in this book. It can be debated whether the stories were compelling in and of themselves or if the writing style interfered with creating the full impact.
The author is writing about a girl who died in the 1800's. A book of watercolors begins her journey into the past in order to discover the path the girl walked in her short life. There are present mysteries explored and historical items unearthed in the current day that add to the story. She also has images of the past as she reflects.
As she is working on this project, her own home life is ravaged by her son's descent. He has been using drugs and she feels forced to dispel him from the household to protect the family structure. She discusses her own feelings about having to take this path of action, her son's responses and how this impacts the rest of the family.
I have to say, there were times when I just reacted to her inability to set limits and boundaries. I guess conceptually I understand the way a mother would struggle in these situations; unfortunately, I had a hard time relating when her choices added to the chaos.
Overall, I did read the story, finish it and gain some enjoyment. I felt much more intrigued before reading than while I was actually reading the book.
November 7, 2010
"The carriage is pulled by two drenched old horses that have seen better days, whipped b y a tired fat man in a scratchy woolen coat-a man who should not have had ale before he set out from Ipswich-windy, sweaty, drink-stained, trying without success to swallow his burps. The wheels squeak and bump, slamming hard over dirt and shale...." What a great beginning to actually 3 stories in one. First the story of Mary Yelloly, the child artist. Trying to find her story and to understand the person when there is so little evidence of her life. I understood the thrill of finding little passages that told so little, yet so much. Maybe this comes from my own desire to know about ancestors long gone and how they lived and felt. Then the story of the boy, her son, who is addicted to cannibas, etc. The emotions of how this plays out in a family reminded me of my own son who struggled with this. I went through and highlighted his story through his mother's eyes because it told my own story. Finally, Julie's story, a mom who sets out to write about Mary Yelloly, a child artist prodigy, and her short life. In the background her son dodges in and out depleting her emotions, and ultimately her life at this point. I felt she blended everything together quite well. I couldn't decide which story I was most interested in. Ultimately I had to cheer for Julia for what she helped me understand. This was life, fair or unfair.
October 7, 2010
I found this book curiously lacking in insight.
As many critics have already remarked, the sections in which the author describes her attempts to find out more about the water colour painter Mary Yelloly are rather laboured. Although she strains to make the artist come alive Mary remains a slight, elusive and really rather uninteresting figure.
In writing about her unnamed male child - who is heavily dependent on cannabis - Julie Myerson is too engaged to be able to stand back and narrate from any perspective other than that of the 'hurt' and bewiledered mother. Other viewpoints, even those within the family, are either marginalised or excluded entirely.
So the writing gets repetitive and claustrophobic. Although there's plenty of emotion in these sections - buckets of it - I found the writing oddly uninformative. There was no sense at all of why a young person might choose to smoke heavily, no analysis of the arguments about the extent to which cannabis may (or many not)cause long-term damage to users - and no sense of how larger social factors could have affected an adolescent growing up in South London in the early 21st centruy.
It was interesting to read a book that had triggered such a lot of a debate. Yet ultimately disappointing.
As many critics have already remarked, the sections in which the author describes her attempts to find out more about the water colour painter Mary Yelloly are rather laboured. Although she strains to make the artist come alive Mary remains a slight, elusive and really rather uninteresting figure.
In writing about her unnamed male child - who is heavily dependent on cannabis - Julie Myerson is too engaged to be able to stand back and narrate from any perspective other than that of the 'hurt' and bewiledered mother. Other viewpoints, even those within the family, are either marginalised or excluded entirely.
So the writing gets repetitive and claustrophobic. Although there's plenty of emotion in these sections - buckets of it - I found the writing oddly uninformative. There was no sense at all of why a young person might choose to smoke heavily, no analysis of the arguments about the extent to which cannabis may (or many not)cause long-term damage to users - and no sense of how larger social factors could have affected an adolescent growing up in South London in the early 21st centruy.
It was interesting to read a book that had triggered such a lot of a debate. Yet ultimately disappointing.
November 14, 2009
Overall I did like the book. When I had read the synopsis it sounded very intersting, but I have to agree with Julie's son in the Afterword that I was not very interested in the Mary Yelloly part of the story. I feel it was important for it to be there because it was what Julie was going through at the time and the two stories did intertwine for her. Parts of the history were certainly interesting and the descriptions Julie gave were amazing; at times I felt like I was there with her reading through the Yelloly family history or touring Narbourgh togehter. The part of the story about her son was the more interesting side of the story. I have read "A Beautiful Boy" and "Tweak" and Julie's story was very similar to that of David Sheff. I could feel her heartache and the strain on her marriage and friendships. I do recommend this book; it is very well written and description to the point where you can get lost in the details and feel as though you are right there with Julie sharing her experiences.
February 11, 2010
The Lost Child is a book by Julie, a mother, who suffers daily physically and emotionally of her lost boy. A boy lost to the addiction of drugs. She struggles with giving him tough love or just enabling him. Also during this time she is researching for this book on the story about Mary Yelloly's short life in the 1820's and 1830's.
Julie's most valuable lesson from writing this book and coming to terms with her life is as follows (which is taken from her acknowledgements): "that you can make your babies and you can love them with every single cell of your being, but you can't make them safe, you can't in the end chose how their lives turn out." This is a profound point in Julie's life learnings. This book is not really about Mary, or even her son and his drug addiction, it is about herself.
At times this book was very difficult to follow with it jumping from the 1800's to present day drug addiction.
Julie's most valuable lesson from writing this book and coming to terms with her life is as follows (which is taken from her acknowledgements): "that you can make your babies and you can love them with every single cell of your being, but you can't make them safe, you can't in the end chose how their lives turn out." This is a profound point in Julie's life learnings. This book is not really about Mary, or even her son and his drug addiction, it is about herself.
At times this book was very difficult to follow with it jumping from the 1800's to present day drug addiction.
November 1, 2009
Is it out of fashion to use quotation marks in books now? It seems that i've been reading a lot of books lately where the auther chooses not to use them. In the case of this book, it got really confusing at times. She writes the book to a historical character (perhaps real but i've never heard of Mary Yelloly) so when she is actually talking to someone else or to Mary it's sometimes hard to tell. But it is also about her son and their problems, her father's issues, and random bits of Yelloly history thrown in. I stopped reading the history parts and only finished the book because it was free from goodreads. The part about her son was interesting, enough to keep me reading. ANd then, near the end she has odd conversations with Mary Yelloly (who's been dead for hundreds of years) about her son. I think it would have been better for her to write about her her issues of her son and only put in some of what she was working on at the time.
October 30, 2009
This was a copy from the First Reads program. Overall I liked the book. I was not interested in the Mary Yelloly story. I felt that part could have been left out of the book entirely. I did like the writing style, I found it easy to read. The secondary story was very compelling. I found the author's challenge with her son very realistic. I felt her honest descriptions and retelling of her story were true to how she must have been feeling. I can only imagine being in her situation as a mother and dealing with the "tough love" concept. Every decision she makes must be based on what she knows, what she feels and ultimately, what she is capable of following through with. The story is depressing, but real. It offers no solutions and no happy ending but provides insight to her experience. Any mom going through this situation would feel less alone and more understood by reading this book.
November 2, 2009
It's always a good idea to read a book that you wouldn't usually, under normal circumstances, read. It gives you a chance to expand your horizons, but this book was so far out of my comfort zone, that I could not even attempt to enjoy it. There were parts that were semi-interesting, her struggles with her drug-addicted son, which reminded me a lot of other novels I've read about drug addiction. Then there were parts that were so completely uninteresting, that at times I really wanted to stop reading or skim over them; the parts about the young girl from the 1800's that died at a young 21 years of age. While I appreciate that during this point in her life Myerson was having a tough time trying to find out more about this young girl and dealing with her in denial, drug-addicted son, I just could not muster any sympathy or compassion or interest.
December 2, 2009
I received this book as a Goodreads First Read winner, which always excites me! The book is actually two stories, it seems. The author writes about a young lady that grew up and died at a young age in the 1800's, and also writes about her drug addicted son. Throughout the entire book, I kept looking for a connection. The parts about her son were very heart-wrenching and interesting. The parts about the Yelloly family were okay. I did find it interesting that instead of a "story" about Mary Yelloly, it was more a journey of her research and writing process, which as an aspiring author myself, was entertaining. It was not until the afterword that I felt any kind of connection between her son and the Yelloly girl. I did enjoy her writing style and could feel her pain as she wrote about her son.
April 24, 2010
I read this book before I knew of Myerson as an established author and columnist and it was only after reading the story that I googled her and became bombarded with all the controversy surrounding the fact that she has written about her family repeatedly both in her books and in a weekly column on childcare in the Guardian. It made me rethink my original opinion that it was a moving account of her boy's journey into drugs and an interesting biography about a Regency girl who, in her short life, left behind a legacy of the period in which she lived equally as poignant as the literary gems by Jane Austen of the same period. I still stick with my opion that The Lost Child was a book which moved me and made me look again at my own offspring and the difficult life they have in these modern drug-filled times to stay on the straight and narrow.
November 19, 2010
The Lost Child: A Mother's Story is a memior. At the beginning I couldn't quite get interested, but towards the end there wasn't anything someone could do to get my nose out of this book.
Julie is a happily married woman with three kids. She is trying to write a novel about Mary Yelloly, and at the same time trying to cope with the fact that her son is becomming a drug addict. She starts finding more and more things out about Mary and is getting farther away from her own son, so she thinks. She is trying to be a loving mother, even though another mother is critisizing how she is raising her son. After the loss of a friend that has two sons, she feels like she is still losing her son. The ending was by far my favorite when she learns more about Mary and more about her son. But will her son ever come back to her?
Julie is a happily married woman with three kids. She is trying to write a novel about Mary Yelloly, and at the same time trying to cope with the fact that her son is becomming a drug addict. She starts finding more and more things out about Mary and is getting farther away from her own son, so she thinks. She is trying to be a loving mother, even though another mother is critisizing how she is raising her son. After the loss of a friend that has two sons, she feels like she is still losing her son. The ending was by far my favorite when she learns more about Mary and more about her son. But will her son ever come back to her?
September 25, 2014
I can't keep focus while reading the book. First of all, the subject is not interesting to me. The writing style is also almost dreamy, no quotation marks to show that people were speaking. It gets you confused sometimes, making it harder to focus. Then, the chapters were too long. Only 9 chapters in 315 pages. The writing is also not very well-organized, no real separation or indication of the next scene. Take note that there were three stories in the book, being told not in any chronological or even logical fashion. I skimmed the last 200 pages or so just so I can say that I've finished reading this. Maybe this book can interest someone but definitely not me. I remember that the cover was interesting and it was the sole reason that I bought this book. However, the writer is a very good writer.
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