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Breakfast for Dinner
A feel-good book about when everything goes wrong.
Breakfast for Dinner is a memoir-in-essays about family, failure, and the long, stumbling effort of becoming the adult you always needed as a kid.
Across thirteen funny and unflinchingly honest stories, Ryan Staples revisits the strange and humiliating moments that somehow shape a life: the end of childhood friendships, a near-death experience in U.S. Navy boot camp, middle school bullies, sucking at sports, living with a Turkish immigrant he met on the internet, and the deeply uncomfortable realization that his father waited about five years too long to deliver the sex talk.
Told by someone who has absolutely no business giving advice, Breakfast for Dinner captures the awkwardness of growing up, the pain of not being seen, and what it takes to become someone the people you love can rely on.
Breakfast for Dinner is a memoir-in-essays about family, failure, and the long, stumbling effort of becoming the adult you always needed as a kid.
Across thirteen funny and unflinchingly honest stories, Ryan Staples revisits the strange and humiliating moments that somehow shape a life: the end of childhood friendships, a near-death experience in U.S. Navy boot camp, middle school bullies, sucking at sports, living with a Turkish immigrant he met on the internet, and the deeply uncomfortable realization that his father waited about five years too long to deliver the sex talk.
Told by someone who has absolutely no business giving advice, Breakfast for Dinner captures the awkwardness of growing up, the pain of not being seen, and what it takes to become someone the people you love can rely on.
249 pages, Kindle Edition
First published September 2, 2026
About the author
Ryan Staples
1 book29 followersRyan Staples is a recipient of the commissioner's award for "Most Misleading Athletic Appearance" in the Boston Comedy Softball League. He has performed in New England's finest VFW halls, hotel function rooms, dive bars, casinos, failing movie theaters, and college cafeterias. Breakfast for Dinner is his debut essay collection. He lives in Massachusetts with his wife and their two children.
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Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews
September 2, 2026
Hilarious and relatable and cooks. A great debut collection
Review of advance copy received from Author
A collection of seemingly disjointed stories that make up the life of Ryan J. Staples, Breakfast for Dinner will keep you smiling in your seat like a lunatic. Underscored with love for family, friendships, and the city he was born and bred in, Ryan’s humor weaves together a story that readers will certainly enjoy and may even find deeply relatable. Down to earth, witty, and pumped full of gratitude, choose Breakfast for Dinner for your next comfort read!
September 4, 2026
Breakfast for Dinner by Ryan Staples is a touching, funny, generous collection of 13 stories about life, from the awkwardness of adolescence into the absurdity of adulthood.
Like the best memoirs, it understands that the personal becomes universal when someone is willing to focus on the seemingly insignificant moments that shaped them.
His stories will spark memories of who you sat next to in seventh grade history and just how steep those three steps onto the school bus felt on the first day of school. It will have you taking a mental inventory of the contents of that shoe box of treasures you had hidden under your bed. His narratives bring back the crushing embarrassments and the rare, hard won victories of being a teenager, while somehow ( for this 80’s kid ) evoking the cloying taste of Bartles & Jaymes wine coolers.
And depending on your present station in life, it may also remind you that your parents are/were just human beings, doing the best they could with whatever limited capacity (mental , educational, emotional, economic ) they had at the time. Now , like myself, you probably possess the experiential wisdom that you cannot stop and never could stop them from making a spectacularly unhinged public admission at the most inappropriate moment, embarrassing and confounding you beyond reason. If not, my sage advice to is : Let it rip, grin (menacingly if you must) and shrug.
What I loved most about this book is how Staples makes you like or at least offer some grace to a discarded self that you may have not thought about in a long time. For some reason, we leave our past selves standing at the side of the road instead of going back for them, sitting beside them, and trying to make sense of the stories that made us.
Ryan Staples invites you to take a tour through his past, and along the way encourages you pick up some very endearing passengers that look a whole lot like versions of you.
I really enjoyed this book for its humor and its generosity. Beneath all the angst and absurdity of coming of age, he reminds us that there were, in fact, people looking out for us. Sometimes, ironically, they were the very people protecting us from those who should have been doing the job. But they were there for us and that has to count for something right? Even if it’s the realization that your life is better without them in it now.
Those hard revelations may be loveliest things about Ryan Staples’ book. He leaves you wanting to become one of the protectors of the littles in your own life. To recognize that their candor, weirdness, interests, awkwardness, and very existence are gifts. They’re truth tellers and it is in your best interest to listen with an expansive heart.
Breakfast for Dinner is funny, nostalgic, tender, and deeply human. It made me remember things I had forgotten and, perhaps more importantly, made me want to be a little kinder to the person I used to be.
Like the best memoirs, it understands that the personal becomes universal when someone is willing to focus on the seemingly insignificant moments that shaped them.
His stories will spark memories of who you sat next to in seventh grade history and just how steep those three steps onto the school bus felt on the first day of school. It will have you taking a mental inventory of the contents of that shoe box of treasures you had hidden under your bed. His narratives bring back the crushing embarrassments and the rare, hard won victories of being a teenager, while somehow ( for this 80’s kid ) evoking the cloying taste of Bartles & Jaymes wine coolers.
And depending on your present station in life, it may also remind you that your parents are/were just human beings, doing the best they could with whatever limited capacity (mental , educational, emotional, economic ) they had at the time. Now , like myself, you probably possess the experiential wisdom that you cannot stop and never could stop them from making a spectacularly unhinged public admission at the most inappropriate moment, embarrassing and confounding you beyond reason. If not, my sage advice to is : Let it rip, grin (menacingly if you must) and shrug.
What I loved most about this book is how Staples makes you like or at least offer some grace to a discarded self that you may have not thought about in a long time. For some reason, we leave our past selves standing at the side of the road instead of going back for them, sitting beside them, and trying to make sense of the stories that made us.
Ryan Staples invites you to take a tour through his past, and along the way encourages you pick up some very endearing passengers that look a whole lot like versions of you.
I really enjoyed this book for its humor and its generosity. Beneath all the angst and absurdity of coming of age, he reminds us that there were, in fact, people looking out for us. Sometimes, ironically, they were the very people protecting us from those who should have been doing the job. But they were there for us and that has to count for something right? Even if it’s the realization that your life is better without them in it now.
Those hard revelations may be loveliest things about Ryan Staples’ book. He leaves you wanting to become one of the protectors of the littles in your own life. To recognize that their candor, weirdness, interests, awkwardness, and very existence are gifts. They’re truth tellers and it is in your best interest to listen with an expansive heart.
Breakfast for Dinner is funny, nostalgic, tender, and deeply human. It made me remember things I had forgotten and, perhaps more importantly, made me want to be a little kinder to the person I used to be.
September 23, 2026
Ryan Staples showcases his talent for non-linear storytelling in Breakfast for Dinner. In each chapter, Ryan transports you through time and into different perspectives as he seeks to reflect and understand the moments and relationships that shaped his life - both big and small. His writing is nostalgic, emotional, and funny and I could not recommend this book more.
Review of advance copy received from Author
With a title that any lower/middle class family can understand and relate to, Breakfast for Dinner is a refreshing memoir that is full of anecdotes that will make you laugh, cry, and question if Ryan is truly okay (spoilers, he turns out perfectly fine).
This coming-of-age memoir takes you through the highs and lows of growing up a crunchy New England kid. Through these series of stories, I truly felt Ryan's heart poured out on the pages. It is also a great example of the fact that you will go through life's ups and downs, but it is your choice on what you make of it.
One of my favorite quotes:
"You spend years believing that endings are big and loud and unmistakable.
But most of the time, they aren't.
They're a silence you mistake for a pause.
And by the time you finally realize it, the lights have already gone out."
and:
"As a baby, my mother worried I wasn't getting enough nourishment, so she poured rice cereal into my formula. At my one-year appointment, I weighed thirty pounds. My pediatrician literally wrote on my chart, 'Ryan is a moose.'"
Thank you Ryan for an early copy and I am so excited for the world to read your writing!
This coming-of-age memoir takes you through the highs and lows of growing up a crunchy New England kid. Through these series of stories, I truly felt Ryan's heart poured out on the pages. It is also a great example of the fact that you will go through life's ups and downs, but it is your choice on what you make of it.
One of my favorite quotes:
"You spend years believing that endings are big and loud and unmistakable.
But most of the time, they aren't.
They're a silence you mistake for a pause.
And by the time you finally realize it, the lights have already gone out."
and:
"As a baby, my mother worried I wasn't getting enough nourishment, so she poured rice cereal into my formula. At my one-year appointment, I weighed thirty pounds. My pediatrician literally wrote on my chart, 'Ryan is a moose.'"
Thank you Ryan for an early copy and I am so excited for the world to read your writing!
Review of advance copy received from Author
Read the first chapter and you’ll be hooked. It is very difficult to pull off the right mix of humorous and heartfelt in a single essay, let alone a whole book of them. Lean too much in one direction and the sporadic humor can undercut the seriousness of the underlying message. Lean too much in the other direction and it looks like you can’t even take your own life lessons seriously. The author pulls off the exact right balance throughout this memoir, all while effortlessly connecting his past to his present to illustrate the themes of the stories.
My favorite chapter was the one about haircuts. Not only is it one of the funniest stories in the book, but Ryan is such a skilled writer I felt like I was in the boot camp infirmary with him. Even if you haven’t lived through the same experiences, you will find something to relate to in each story. Highly recommended.
My favorite chapter was the one about haircuts. Not only is it one of the funniest stories in the book, but Ryan is such a skilled writer I felt like I was in the boot camp infirmary with him. Even if you haven’t lived through the same experiences, you will find something to relate to in each story. Highly recommended.
Review of advance copy received from Author
This is like NoFX wrote 'Chicken Soup for the Soul'.
"It wasn't about trying to be funny. It was about seeing if the things I loved meant something to anyone else. ... Some moments you can't plan your way into. You just have to be willing to go back to your mark and let the song start over."
* caveat: the author is a rad human and a friend
"It wasn't about trying to be funny. It was about seeing if the things I loved meant something to anyone else. ... Some moments you can't plan your way into. You just have to be willing to go back to your mark and let the song start over."
* caveat: the author is a rad human and a friend
Review of advance copy received from Author
Breakfast for Dinner by Ryan Staples (Foxhole Ink 2026) is a thoroughly delightful baker’s dozen of heartwarming and hilarious autobiographical essays. Reading it felt like having the best seats in the house at a comedy club. I wholeheartedly recommend Breakfast for Dinner to everyone who needs an enjoyable escape.
Review of advance copy received from Author
This book really hits home for me. It is engaging from the start, relatable, funny, and full of nostalgia. Ryan is an exceptional writer, and has an ability to deliver these essays in a unique way that shouldn't be missed!
Review of advance copy received from Author
Breakfast for Dinner is funny, touching and bittersweet all in the exact right amounts. Ryan Staples shares stories that navigate family, heartbreak and the best haircut ever. The nostalgia factor makes Breakfast for Dinner especially relatable to anyone who grew up in the 80's or 90's, and fans of David Sedaris will definitely have a new favorite author after reading it.
September 2, 2026
Funny and endearing. Relatable while painting such a specific portrait of this man. Great collection. No duds!
October 1, 2026
no like eating breakfast at dinner time
October 8, 2026
Awesome 👍
Review of advance copy received from Author
This is a series of essays about Ryan's life. There are so many laugh out loud one-liners in these stories that just keep me coming back to read more. As in any story of someone's life, there are sad parts too but they are written in a way that didn't make me cry too much. I don't know if these stories are truly "accurate" but some artistic license makes them fun and they are well written and engaging. And I don't think this gives away anything, but after reading this book, I'm glad that I never joined the military and I don't regret waiting until my 30s to do anything remotely athletic.
Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews