What do you think?
Rate this book
I Was a Child
Here is the first non-fiction book by Bruce Eric Kaplan. It is a book wholly unique in form and feeling. This memoir is both full of wonder and anxiety, and is altogether side-splitting and heart-breaking.
Above all, it captures what it was like for Bruce Eric Kaplan, and perhaps some of you, to be a child.
Above all, it captures what it was like for Bruce Eric Kaplan, and perhaps some of you, to be a child.
208 pages, Hardcover
First published April 14, 2015
16 people are currently reading
1299 people want to read
About the author
Bruce Eric Kaplan
19 books93 followersBruce Eric Kaplan, known as BEK, is an American cartoonist whose single-panel cartoons frequently appear in The New Yorker. His cartoons are known for their signature simplistic style and often dark humor. Kaplan is also a screenwriter and has worked on Six Feet Under and on Seinfeld (funnily enough, one of his most well-known episodes is one where Elaine becomes increasingly frustrated over what she takes to be an utterly nonsensical cartoon in The New Yorker). He graduated from Wesleyan University where he studied with Professor Jeanine Basinger.
Kaplan joined the crew of Six Feet Under during the first season in 2001 as a supervising producer. He scripted two episodes of the first season – "The Foot" and "The New Person". He was promoted to co-executive producer for the second season in 2002 and wrote a further two episodes – "The Invisible Woman" and "The Secret". He remained a co-executive producer for the third season in 2003 and wrote a further episode entitled "The Trap". He was promoted to executive producer for the fourth season in 2004 and wrote another episode "The Dare". He served as executive producer during the fifth and final season and wrote his last episode "The Silence". Kaplan wrote seven episodes in total for the series.
He has authored and illustrated six adult titles for Simon & Schuster: the cult classic The Cat That Changed My Life; the collections, I Love You, I Hate You, I'm Hungry, No One You Know and This is a Bad Time; and Every Person on the Planet and Edmund and Rosemary Go to Hell, both featuring the wonderfully neurotic Brooklyn couple, Edmund & Rosemary. He lives in Los Angeles with his wife and two children.
Kaplan joined the crew of Six Feet Under during the first season in 2001 as a supervising producer. He scripted two episodes of the first season – "The Foot" and "The New Person". He was promoted to co-executive producer for the second season in 2002 and wrote a further two episodes – "The Invisible Woman" and "The Secret". He remained a co-executive producer for the third season in 2003 and wrote a further episode entitled "The Trap". He was promoted to executive producer for the fourth season in 2004 and wrote another episode "The Dare". He served as executive producer during the fifth and final season and wrote his last episode "The Silence". Kaplan wrote seven episodes in total for the series.
He has authored and illustrated six adult titles for Simon & Schuster: the cult classic The Cat That Changed My Life; the collections, I Love You, I Hate You, I'm Hungry, No One You Know and This is a Bad Time; and Every Person on the Planet and Edmund and Rosemary Go to Hell, both featuring the wonderfully neurotic Brooklyn couple, Edmund & Rosemary. He lives in Los Angeles with his wife and two children.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 191 reviews
November 14, 2017
I Was a Child is Bruce Eric Kaplan's (BEK) memoir and is written in a stream-of-consciousness style with small, hand-drawn cartoons interspersed throughout the text. Each blurb is a recollection of an event, time, television show, piece of furniture in the house, anything and everything from BEK's childhood.
I'm not familiar with BEK's work but his bio talks about his cartoons appearing in The New Yorker. I can see why he's so popular.
The drawings are simple but somehow manage to convey a great depth of emotion and meaning.
They reminded me of the small drawings in Roald Dahl's books. I looked up the illustrator for those and Google tells me it's Quentin Blake.
Both share a sparse, black-line look with no color to bright up the design. However, there's something very powerful about the pictures... it's hard to describe.
I Was A Child may be a book that one has to read to really experience what it's all about.
I'm not as old as the author, but I connected with many of his memories because, despite what other people may tell you, we were all children once.
This memoir is quite unique but if you like it, you may want to try Today is the Last Day of the Rest of Your Life. It is more of a graphic novel than this, but it is also a memoir about growing up and change that is drawn with simplistic black and white panels.
I received a free advanced reader's copy of this book through Goodreads First Reads. FTC guidelines: check!
I'm not familiar with BEK's work but his bio talks about his cartoons appearing in The New Yorker. I can see why he's so popular.
The drawings are simple but somehow manage to convey a great depth of emotion and meaning.
They reminded me of the small drawings in Roald Dahl's books. I looked up the illustrator for those and Google tells me it's Quentin Blake.
Both share a sparse, black-line look with no color to bright up the design. However, there's something very powerful about the pictures... it's hard to describe.
I Was A Child may be a book that one has to read to really experience what it's all about.
I'm not as old as the author, but I connected with many of his memories because, despite what other people may tell you, we were all children once.
This memoir is quite unique but if you like it, you may want to try Today is the Last Day of the Rest of Your Life. It is more of a graphic novel than this, but it is also a memoir about growing up and change that is drawn with simplistic black and white panels.
I received a free advanced reader's copy of this book through Goodreads First Reads. FTC guidelines: check!
March 23, 2016
I just yesterday reviewed a Big Important Spiritual Travel Book, The Snow Leopard by Peter Matthiessen, with lovely rich poetic writing and legit spiritual insights, one of my all time favorites, so you have to consider my reading I Was a Child in this context. But I did like this book, the more I reflect on it. It's maybe a 3.5 for me, though I am acknowledging it might have been higher had I not just reviewed the Matthiessen. And a lot of people dislike it for lots of reasons--fragmented story, muted, sometimes confusingly related emotions, dry sense of humor--all the reasons I liked it.
I read Kaplan's memoir mainly because I had seen it on a GR list of books by New Yorker cartoonists and I recalled liking his quick sketch style and pretty sardonic approach. I also have just read Monsters Eat Whiny Children, which features this sardonic wit and I liked it though most people seem to hate in on Goodreads. I also found Kaplan is a Seinfeld/Six Feet Under TV writer and I like those shows. So his ironic tone works for me.
This book is short, with short simple stream-of-consciousness sentences and short episodes, the topic of which are sometimes deliberately random, topic hopping, from I Love Lucy to Cheezits, which can be fun, punctuated by quick sketch illustrations, about one per page. So it has this feeling of sort of being tossed off, but that's an effect he creates. It's not just tossed off. He creates this glib and fun and funny surface discussing the culture and time he grew up, but underneath it's clear his was not a happy family. So there is a vein of sadness that runs through this. I laughed quite a bit, though, and I saw he was unsentimental and unsorry and ironic about himself and everything.
I happen to be just about the right age for this book, as he is just a little younger than me. Like me, he grew up watching a lot of television. We don't get a litany of broad games or friend sleepovers or rollicking in the park. It's endlessly watching tv, and tv movies, which I suppose helps explain his being a tv writer and producer, but it felt like most of those days watched tv a lot. There's other stuff, too, vignettes about Scotch tape, Cub Scouts/Pinewood Derby, GI Joe, Green Stamps, thin white bread sandwiches, and so on. This all is told in this glib wry dry staccato cadence, often very funny, as I said, even when it is sad underneath. And then it is suddenly not funny at all, it is wrenching and sad, as if he earns the right to the sadness after all the random trivial pop culture growing up kid stuff. Or the really hard part bubbles up out of all the randomness. He didn't feel a strong purpose in his life. Stuff is just there. Life happens. I liked that aspect of it a lot, though it feels somewhat alienating and, of course, sad. Funny/sad!
Here's an interview with Kaplan on NPR. He's pretty funny:
http://www.npr.org/2015/04/02/3970630...
PS: To add to my review, an old friend, a Jewish New Yorker, read it at my suggestion, and it was five stars for her. She said the book was essentially written for Jewish New Yorkers; she thought Kaplan was her brother, and that some books are just like that, they are books for family. She also said that a few times, reading it on the train, she laughed so loud the whole car could hear her. That never happened to me, a non-NY-goy, THAT level of connection. . . but I had fun talking to her about it.
I read Kaplan's memoir mainly because I had seen it on a GR list of books by New Yorker cartoonists and I recalled liking his quick sketch style and pretty sardonic approach. I also have just read Monsters Eat Whiny Children, which features this sardonic wit and I liked it though most people seem to hate in on Goodreads. I also found Kaplan is a Seinfeld/Six Feet Under TV writer and I like those shows. So his ironic tone works for me.
This book is short, with short simple stream-of-consciousness sentences and short episodes, the topic of which are sometimes deliberately random, topic hopping, from I Love Lucy to Cheezits, which can be fun, punctuated by quick sketch illustrations, about one per page. So it has this feeling of sort of being tossed off, but that's an effect he creates. It's not just tossed off. He creates this glib and fun and funny surface discussing the culture and time he grew up, but underneath it's clear his was not a happy family. So there is a vein of sadness that runs through this. I laughed quite a bit, though, and I saw he was unsentimental and unsorry and ironic about himself and everything.
I happen to be just about the right age for this book, as he is just a little younger than me. Like me, he grew up watching a lot of television. We don't get a litany of broad games or friend sleepovers or rollicking in the park. It's endlessly watching tv, and tv movies, which I suppose helps explain his being a tv writer and producer, but it felt like most of those days watched tv a lot. There's other stuff, too, vignettes about Scotch tape, Cub Scouts/Pinewood Derby, GI Joe, Green Stamps, thin white bread sandwiches, and so on. This all is told in this glib wry dry staccato cadence, often very funny, as I said, even when it is sad underneath. And then it is suddenly not funny at all, it is wrenching and sad, as if he earns the right to the sadness after all the random trivial pop culture growing up kid stuff. Or the really hard part bubbles up out of all the randomness. He didn't feel a strong purpose in his life. Stuff is just there. Life happens. I liked that aspect of it a lot, though it feels somewhat alienating and, of course, sad. Funny/sad!
Here's an interview with Kaplan on NPR. He's pretty funny:
http://www.npr.org/2015/04/02/3970630...
PS: To add to my review, an old friend, a Jewish New Yorker, read it at my suggestion, and it was five stars for her. She said the book was essentially written for Jewish New Yorkers; she thought Kaplan was her brother, and that some books are just like that, they are books for family. She also said that a few times, reading it on the train, she laughed so loud the whole car could hear her. That never happened to me, a non-NY-goy, THAT level of connection. . . but I had fun talking to her about it.
March 2, 2015
This is a delight of a book. It is not a traditional memoir; the book is written in short paragraphs but the sharpness of the picture Kaplan gives is amazing. This is a truly talented writer (as you would expect from someone who has been writing for the New Yorker, Seinfeld, Six Feet Under etc). Bruce Eric Kaplan is most known as an artist, though, and his trademark cartoons enhance every page of this book. This is a poignant, honest, amusing and very relatable book. Like most reviewers I read it in one sitting and then read it again a few days later. Here's one sample of the humor that I loved:
Emotions were a confusing thing for me, and still are. "I'm not angry!" my father would shout, when you asked him if he was angry.
"I'm not upset!" my mother would say in an upset way, when you asked her if she was upset.
"I'm upset," I would tell my father, who would say firmly, "You're not upset."
But really this book needs to be read cover to cover to get the sense of child-like wonder and bewilderment we all feel growing up. BEK is epically talented. Go read this charmer of a book.
Emotions were a confusing thing for me, and still are. "I'm not angry!" my father would shout, when you asked him if he was angry.
"I'm not upset!" my mother would say in an upset way, when you asked her if she was upset.
"I'm upset," I would tell my father, who would say firmly, "You're not upset."
But really this book needs to be read cover to cover to get the sense of child-like wonder and bewilderment we all feel growing up. BEK is epically talented. Go read this charmer of a book.
December 14, 2016
Poignant, funny, at times heart-breaking. The drawings, about one to a page, are perfect. I'm a huge fan of BEK (the New Yorker cartoonist), and his memoir did not disappoint.
It brought to mind Joe Brainard's I Remember, as different as they are, I suppose beacuse of the era they evoke, a time left behind with all of the relics, objects, ways of behaving--from heavy black dial phones to tin crates for milk bottles, to expressions like "dumb bunny."
Emotions were confusing things for me and still are. "I'm not angry!" my father would shout, when you asked him if he was angry.
"I'm not upset!" my mother would say in an upset way when you asked her if she was upset.
"I'm upset," I would tell my father, who would say firmly, "You're not upset."
I think I loved the clarity of emotions on television. Everyone was what they were. I loved how direct Rick and Lucy were, even when they were not being direct with each other." (156).
This could have been my home BEK is describing. Only that we weren't allowed to watch "I Love Lucy."
It brought to mind Joe Brainard's I Remember, as different as they are, I suppose beacuse of the era they evoke, a time left behind with all of the relics, objects, ways of behaving--from heavy black dial phones to tin crates for milk bottles, to expressions like "dumb bunny."
Emotions were confusing things for me and still are. "I'm not angry!" my father would shout, when you asked him if he was angry.
"I'm not upset!" my mother would say in an upset way when you asked her if she was upset.
"I'm upset," I would tell my father, who would say firmly, "You're not upset."
I think I loved the clarity of emotions on television. Everyone was what they were. I loved how direct Rick and Lucy were, even when they were not being direct with each other." (156).
This could have been my home BEK is describing. Only that we weren't allowed to watch "I Love Lucy."
June 25, 2015
I loved this book! It was funny and heartwarming and sad, and I think the author and I might have had the same set of parents. I loved the way the memoir was structured with each memory being its own little random paragraph. It makes me want to write something similar, not for the public, just for future generations.
Read it!
Read it!
February 23, 2015
Can I give the rare FIVE STARS to a book that took me about an hour to read ? Sure, why not! This book is much better than a lot of the turgid, humorless memoirs out there, and there's a lot of amusing oddball drawings too!
It might be because we were both born in the mid-60's that so much of what he writes about is very familiar to me. The clock on my parent's kitchen wall that didn't work, and was still left on the wall for more than 20 years. The anticipation of watching the Saturday afternoon 'Creature Feature', though in my case it was actually called 'The Creature Double Feature'. And you just had to see both movies because everyone in your third grade class would be talking about what movie they showed at school on Monday. If you missed it you were like some kind of strange misfit. You missed it because of piano lessons, what a weirdo! That strange Halloween candy that no one liked. Fights after school, that were actually brief shoving matches and were over in about five seconds. The only vegetables were from cans. Wonder bread! Spaghetti-O's! Drive-in movies! Those odd TV shows they showed in the summer when they had nothing else left to show! So much more...
And yet it's more than just a pile of amusing stories about those odd things from a mid 70's childhood. It's also a touching remembrance of parents. Parents who really did try to do the best they could, even when they were so exasperated that they sat the kids in front of the TV for hours. Or left them in the car so they could go into the supermarket by themselves. Never, never looking or acting like any of the parents of the families from those perfect TV sitcoms. By the time they are teenagers both the parents and the kids are driving each other crazy. Yet, as the kids of the 70's grow older, we return to those parents when we are adults. We return and we take care of our parents as they age, and as they continue to drive us crazy, and we drive them crazy too.
This is what it was like to grow up in the 70's. The title is "I Was a Child", and by the end you'll see why he's not a child anymore.
It might be because we were both born in the mid-60's that so much of what he writes about is very familiar to me. The clock on my parent's kitchen wall that didn't work, and was still left on the wall for more than 20 years. The anticipation of watching the Saturday afternoon 'Creature Feature', though in my case it was actually called 'The Creature Double Feature'. And you just had to see both movies because everyone in your third grade class would be talking about what movie they showed at school on Monday. If you missed it you were like some kind of strange misfit. You missed it because of piano lessons, what a weirdo! That strange Halloween candy that no one liked. Fights after school, that were actually brief shoving matches and were over in about five seconds. The only vegetables were from cans. Wonder bread! Spaghetti-O's! Drive-in movies! Those odd TV shows they showed in the summer when they had nothing else left to show! So much more...
And yet it's more than just a pile of amusing stories about those odd things from a mid 70's childhood. It's also a touching remembrance of parents. Parents who really did try to do the best they could, even when they were so exasperated that they sat the kids in front of the TV for hours. Or left them in the car so they could go into the supermarket by themselves. Never, never looking or acting like any of the parents of the families from those perfect TV sitcoms. By the time they are teenagers both the parents and the kids are driving each other crazy. Yet, as the kids of the 70's grow older, we return to those parents when we are adults. We return and we take care of our parents as they age, and as they continue to drive us crazy, and we drive them crazy too.
This is what it was like to grow up in the 70's. The title is "I Was a Child", and by the end you'll see why he's not a child anymore.
February 26, 2015
Note: I won a Good Reads giveaway and my review is for the ARC copy.
This book is hilarious. But it is dark humor. I think if you like the type of humor that is on the cartoon called Bob's Burger's on Hulu, you would like this. The story is basically an autobiography from day 0 (earliest recollection) to semi cognizant childhood of a very observant kid & the interactions he has had with his family. Bruce was probably an overly intelligent kid who noticed everything. What makes it funny is the deadpan and the cartoons. The humor is understated. He will say something but then make a drawing to show you what he means. It's loveable because of the odd ball factor.
The only negatives I am listing is that I do not like the current format of the book. There are some typos in formatting, where random words will sporadically have huge spaces between them. The font makes the text difficult to read. I think this book would be better served as a comic strip or manga style with little comic sans serif font above it.
The vignettes from the guys life are humorous but too choppy to be read as a traditional book. However, the book itself is very unique and I have not really read anything that similar to it so far.
This book is hilarious. But it is dark humor. I think if you like the type of humor that is on the cartoon called Bob's Burger's on Hulu, you would like this. The story is basically an autobiography from day 0 (earliest recollection) to semi cognizant childhood of a very observant kid & the interactions he has had with his family. Bruce was probably an overly intelligent kid who noticed everything. What makes it funny is the deadpan and the cartoons. The humor is understated. He will say something but then make a drawing to show you what he means. It's loveable because of the odd ball factor.
The only negatives I am listing is that I do not like the current format of the book. There are some typos in formatting, where random words will sporadically have huge spaces between them. The font makes the text difficult to read. I think this book would be better served as a comic strip or manga style with little comic sans serif font above it.
The vignettes from the guys life are humorous but too choppy to be read as a traditional book. However, the book itself is very unique and I have not really read anything that similar to it so far.
December 8, 2014
****An Advanced Reading Copy of I Was a Child: A Memoir by Bruce Eric Kaplan was generously provided to me via NetGalley in exchange for honest review.
The illustrations are adorable! That's what popped into my head the first time I read it. These illustrations and the short story are simple. About Mr. Kaplan's childhood memory that when he think again now when he's all grown, those memories are sad but innocently sweet at the same time.
I enjoyed reading this book, though I rarely read this kind of genre. I liked the simplicity, I liked how short but deep the story is and I liked that it reminds me of my own thought as a child. This book made me think about what I think when I was a child.
Good one. :)
The illustrations are adorable! That's what popped into my head the first time I read it. These illustrations and the short story are simple. About Mr. Kaplan's childhood memory that when he think again now when he's all grown, those memories are sad but innocently sweet at the same time.
I enjoyed reading this book, though I rarely read this kind of genre. I liked the simplicity, I liked how short but deep the story is and I liked that it reminds me of my own thought as a child. This book made me think about what I think when I was a child.
Good one. :)
February 22, 2017
Growing up is like riding a roller coaster on one big psychedelic dream.
Everyone is clueless.
Most adults have either forgotten that fact, or are pretending really hard that it isn't true.
Kaplan is 12 years younger than I am, and though his childhood might have varied from mine in its details, he captured the essence perfectly.
I laughed, often out loud.
I wonder if the advent of ubiquitous technology has changed the experience of childhood so much that those in their 20s will no longer "get" the world that Kaplan recreates. That would be too bad.
Everyone is clueless.
Most adults have either forgotten that fact, or are pretending really hard that it isn't true.
Kaplan is 12 years younger than I am, and though his childhood might have varied from mine in its details, he captured the essence perfectly.
I laughed, often out loud.
I wonder if the advent of ubiquitous technology has changed the experience of childhood so much that those in their 20s will no longer "get" the world that Kaplan recreates. That would be too bad.
April 18, 2015
3 1/2 stars actually. A beautiful little book about being a child. The simplistic language is deceiving. There's more here than meets the eye at first glance. Wonderful illustrations.
August 7, 2020
Truly unique. Heart-warming. The observations of childhood with emphasis on staying connected to the important things of childhood (from the viewpoint of the child) in order to keep your inner child alive. Especially as an adult.
Otherwise, you will be just another boring grown-up, talking about your dumb house; your kid's acceptance into some dumb college; and your damn, dumb, golf game.
Otherwise, you will be just another boring grown-up, talking about your dumb house; your kid's acceptance into some dumb college; and your damn, dumb, golf game.
March 1, 2017
I want to like Ernest Hemmingway's writing, because it is (supposedly) so sparse and direct and clear. But I can't get into it.
This is not Hemmingway, but it's more my level. :-)
A simple, sad reflection on a childhood, a family, a marriage, an era. Told in stream-of-consciousness vignettes and cartoons.
I've read several books lately from very different authors all harking back to simpler times when children roamed free and parents didn't worry too much--Free Range Kids, How to Destroy the Imagination of Your Child, the Three Martini Playdate.
This shows the darker side of that life.
And the takeaway of the book is that, if you are a mother and suffer depression, treat it! Because if mamma ain't happy, ain't nobody happy.
This is not Hemmingway, but it's more my level. :-)
A simple, sad reflection on a childhood, a family, a marriage, an era. Told in stream-of-consciousness vignettes and cartoons.
I've read several books lately from very different authors all harking back to simpler times when children roamed free and parents didn't worry too much--Free Range Kids, How to Destroy the Imagination of Your Child, the Three Martini Playdate.
This shows the darker side of that life.
And the takeaway of the book is that, if you are a mother and suffer depression, treat it! Because if mamma ain't happy, ain't nobody happy.
April 6, 2015
I think Kaplan is a funny guy based on his comics that have been published in The New Yorker, so I was excited when I found out he was coming out with a memoir. The book read really quickly, and I enjoyed the combination of short blurbs and drawings. There were a few pages when I laughed out loud, but overall I found my mind wandering and waiting for the next blurb that I could identify with. I would encourage people who were born in the 60's to check this out as I think they would identify a whole lot more with the subjects of his musings than I did.
Note: I received an advanced reading copy of this book through NetGalley
Note: I received an advanced reading copy of this book through NetGalley
August 22, 2015
Slight, but funny illustrated memoir of growing up in suburban north Jersey in the 60s and 70s. This is the New Yorker cartoonist known as BEK, who also writes and produces for HBO's Girls among other shows. I laughed out loud (alone, in a room) at least twice reading this, which always surprises me. Roz Chast's Can't We Talk about Something More Pleasant? did it a lot better (i.e., more substance, better illustrations) but this has the same kind of humor and poignancy. It also takes almost no time to read.
February 16, 2015
* I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. *
This is a fantastic example of someone making something beautiful out of the ordinary and mundane. Bruce Eric Kaplan writes small snippets - usually no longer than a paragraph - about various parts of his childhood and accompanies them with simple drawings. It is a quick read but is still quite poignant and emotional.
Readers who enjoy memoirs, particularly non-conventional ones, should like this as well. I'm certainly glad I read it and hope Kaplan continues to publish stories from his life.
This is a fantastic example of someone making something beautiful out of the ordinary and mundane. Bruce Eric Kaplan writes small snippets - usually no longer than a paragraph - about various parts of his childhood and accompanies them with simple drawings. It is a quick read but is still quite poignant and emotional.
Readers who enjoy memoirs, particularly non-conventional ones, should like this as well. I'm certainly glad I read it and hope Kaplan continues to publish stories from his life.
May 3, 2015
I hated this book for a few pages and then fell madly in love with it. It took me a minute to recall BEK's New Yorker cartoons but when I did the cartoons in the book made more sense - some are aggressively bad, which was baffling at first until I came to recognize the sort of crude urgency of memory that he was communicating through both the drawings and written words. His writing has the same sort of stripped down bizarreness that his cartoons do, but he will just get you with these little gut punches of perfection in this book. A favorite.
March 30, 2015
Deceptively simple, this is a memoir that should not be missed. Poignant and sad, but loving and understanding at the same time--at the end, we have a clear sense of why BEK became the artist he is. This is a book more difficult to describe than it is to read, which is why you should just go do that.
August 14, 2015
My wife knew the author in high school, and so she picked up this book last night. I picked it up this morning and couldn't put it down. It's sweet, melancholy, and funny. I could totally relate to some of his observations. It's a quick read... I think I read the whole thing in less than an hour.
November 30, 2015
Perfect quick blast through someone's childhood that felt EXACTLY LIKE MINE. Except it wasn't, so that makes it amazing (that he made it seem as if it were). Every candy bar, every bad smell, every odd thing he remembers. It is like a list, but with the most exquisite frosting of detail and revelation.
March 3, 2016
This book was awesome! I was a little disappointed with how it ended, though! With all that skipping around, it could have ended things at a different point. I also think that it could have been more effective if written in chronological order, instead of skipping around so much. But, all that put aside, I really enjoyed it!
March 30, 2017
This book rocks. It is a childhood memoir (though it extends as far as the death of the author's parents when he is an adult) that is both hysterically funny and sharply poignant, without being sentimental at all. I really enjoyed the author's straightforward uncluttered style and awesome crude drawings that accompany the text. A very quick (and excellent) read.
February 13, 2016
It is better than a 3 star but too tiny for 4 stars. I actually loved this book and felt really inspired to write one like it of my own. It was so much more accessable and unintimidating than a regular autobiography. I could do this!
October 10, 2015
Haunting, austere, and full of the sensory memories that define our conception of our childhoods from the other side. Moving, wise, and a book that seems to me to get at universal feelings and senses almost effortlessly.
August 25, 2016
Not bad. Certainly more a collection of memories than an memoir since there is no connecting narrative except perhaps chronology. There are things about the book that are wonderful memories and delightful moments. There are very obvious, mundane observations as well making for a mixed bag.
Read
April 26, 2015This book mentioned one of my favorite commercials: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pcW5v...
May 30, 2015
wry
nostalgic
quippy
brief
honest
nostalgic
quippy
brief
honest
January 9, 2025
This was incredibly sad without being overwhelming. Kaplan tells a story of a child who grew up feeling confused and different and was only able to get past those feelings after he moved out. Simple parts of life like getting rid of things you don’t need or accepting your emotions were parts that Kaplan was not familiar with during his childhood. We try our best to forgive our parents for the things they did wrong, and the best we can offer them as a means of forgiveness is, “They tried.”
March 10, 2018
I loved this book so much, but I would almost have to. Bruce Kaplan was born the same year as I, and lived an almost identical life to mine, except that he grew up in New Jersey and came to Queens to visit his grandmother and I grew up in Queens and went to New Jersey to visit my grandmother. SO MUCH of what he talked about resonated SO DEEPLY with me that, even though this is really just a series of short thoughts--almost just captions for this illustrations--I couldn't stop grinning. I felt like I knew him. For example, he describes the following, which is EXACTLY WHAT WE USED TO DO when I was little:
"Whenever we arrived home from visiting my grandparents or from anywhere at all that wasn't nearby, we would sing a song when we turned on our street and drove up to our house.
"'We're here because we're here because we're here because we're here,' we all sang. 'We're here because we're here because we're here because we're here!'
"And really that was the only reason we were here."
It's hard to explain it, but a) I don't think I've thought about that since I was 12 years old at the outside and b) it never occurred to me that anyone else had done that...or that, if they did, they would think it worth noting in a memoir. It made me like Kaplan so very much. As did all of this book. There was so much in here to savor.
"Whenever we arrived home from visiting my grandparents or from anywhere at all that wasn't nearby, we would sing a song when we turned on our street and drove up to our house.
"'We're here because we're here because we're here because we're here,' we all sang. 'We're here because we're here because we're here because we're here!'
"And really that was the only reason we were here."
It's hard to explain it, but a) I don't think I've thought about that since I was 12 years old at the outside and b) it never occurred to me that anyone else had done that...or that, if they did, they would think it worth noting in a memoir. It made me like Kaplan so very much. As did all of this book. There was so much in here to savor.
April 14, 2015
I Was a Child is a memoir written in short unconnected vignettes interspersed with drawings. I don't like this memoir for several different reasons. I wasn't born until the eighties. Kaplan escaped from a complicated upbringing through the T.V. shows of his childhood. I was born several decades too late and didn't recognize the majority of the shows he's reminiscing about. For an older reader I imagine this memoir would be hugely nostalgic. Because I'm younger than Kaplan, the many pop culture references didn't resonate at all, it felt flat. I also wish that the narrative thread was stronger. The vignettes seemed totally unrelated to each other. It felt like the author couldn't write well enough to make a cohesive memoir and instead just threw out whichever random memories came to mind. I listened to an interview with him on NPR and loved it. I was really excited to read the book. Too bad the book wasn't as interesting as the interview.
May 27, 2015
Well, that was weird. I picked this book up because I thought it was written by someone who went to my high school who had a book published last year. Who also works in tv. Whose name is very similar to this author's. It wasn't, they are different people.
This guy grew up in Maplewood, NJ which is not far from where I live now. It was interesting to hear location names and imagine them through his eyes back when he was growing up in the 70s and 80s, which was also when I was growing up (in the neighborhood his grandmother lived in, as it turned out).
Parts of this book, his recollections of his mom who was clearly an anxious person, rang so true of myself as a middle-aged mom...it had me gulping and grimacing.
So, even though I read this by mistake, there was quite a lot to appreciate and I love a strong connection, regardless.
ETA: Ha! Just saw that the author and I graduated from the same university. Funny.
This guy grew up in Maplewood, NJ which is not far from where I live now. It was interesting to hear location names and imagine them through his eyes back when he was growing up in the 70s and 80s, which was also when I was growing up (in the neighborhood his grandmother lived in, as it turned out).
Parts of this book, his recollections of his mom who was clearly an anxious person, rang so true of myself as a middle-aged mom...it had me gulping and grimacing.
So, even though I read this by mistake, there was quite a lot to appreciate and I love a strong connection, regardless.
ETA: Ha! Just saw that the author and I graduated from the same university. Funny.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 191 reviews