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Crave: A Memoir of Food and Longing
Christine O'Brien remembers growing up in NYC's famous Dakota apartment with her powerful father, her beautiful mother, and a food obsesssion that consumed her.
Hunger comes in many forms. A person can crave a steak in the same way that she can crave a perfect family life. In her memoir, Crave: A Memoir of Food and Longing, Christine O'Brien tells the story of her own cravings. It's a story of growing up in a family with a successful, but explosive father, a beautiful, but damaged, mother and three brothers in New York City's famed Dakota apartment building. Christine's father was Ed Scherick, the ABC television executive and film producer who created ABC's Wide World of Sports as well as classic films like The Taking of Pelham One Two Three and The Heartbreak Kid. Her mother, Carol, was raised on a farm in Missouri.
With chestnut hair and the all-American good looks that won her the title of Miss Missouri and a finalist place in The Miss America Contest she looked to be the perfect wife and mother. But, Carol had a craving that was almost impossible to fill.
Seriously injured in a farming accident when she was a girl, she craved health even though doctors told her that she was perfectly fine. Setting out on a journey through the quacks of the East Coast, she began seeing a doctor who prescribed "The Program" as a way to health for her and her family. At first she ate nothing but raw liver and drank shakes made with fresh yeast. Then it was blended salads, the forerunner of the smoothie. And that was all she let her family eat.
This well-meant tyranny of the dinner table led Christine to her own cravings for family, for food and for the words to tell the story of her hunger. Crave is that story--the chronicle of a writer's painful and ultimately satisfying awakening.
Hunger comes in many forms. A person can crave a steak in the same way that she can crave a perfect family life. In her memoir, Crave: A Memoir of Food and Longing, Christine O'Brien tells the story of her own cravings. It's a story of growing up in a family with a successful, but explosive father, a beautiful, but damaged, mother and three brothers in New York City's famed Dakota apartment building. Christine's father was Ed Scherick, the ABC television executive and film producer who created ABC's Wide World of Sports as well as classic films like The Taking of Pelham One Two Three and The Heartbreak Kid. Her mother, Carol, was raised on a farm in Missouri.
With chestnut hair and the all-American good looks that won her the title of Miss Missouri and a finalist place in The Miss America Contest she looked to be the perfect wife and mother. But, Carol had a craving that was almost impossible to fill.
Seriously injured in a farming accident when she was a girl, she craved health even though doctors told her that she was perfectly fine. Setting out on a journey through the quacks of the East Coast, she began seeing a doctor who prescribed "The Program" as a way to health for her and her family. At first she ate nothing but raw liver and drank shakes made with fresh yeast. Then it was blended salads, the forerunner of the smoothie. And that was all she let her family eat.
This well-meant tyranny of the dinner table led Christine to her own cravings for family, for food and for the words to tell the story of her hunger. Crave is that story--the chronicle of a writer's painful and ultimately satisfying awakening.
272 pages, Hardcover
First published November 13, 2018
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 62 reviews
October 27, 2018
Thank you to St. Martin's Press who provided an advance reader copy via NetGalley.
Christine Scherick O'Brien is the daughter of late ABC broadcast executive Ed Scherick, who brought TV shows such as "That Girl!", "Batman" and "Peyton Place" to the screen as well as movies like "The Stepford Wives" and "The Taking of Pelham One Two Three". While a young child in the sixties, Christine was living in the iconic New York building The Dakota (John Lennon and Yoko Ono lived there years later), watching her parents hobnob with the likes of Alan Alda, Charles Grodin and Marlo Thomas. The movie "Rosemary's Baby" starring Mia Farrow was being filmed there at the time. One Halloween her Mom took the kids trick o' treating in the building and they encountered legendary actress Lauren Bacall, a longtime Dakota resident.
Christine was the oldest child and the only daughter, and she had three younger brothers. She was witness to her father's occasional explosive and surly encounters with Mom Carol. Carol grew up on a farm in Missouri where she very nearly died after being pulled under a tractor. But she didn't die, and she took up the bassoon (originally her sister Audrey's instrument) to strengthen her lungs. She also went on to become Miss Missouri, become a pianist and musical prodigy, and the glamorous wife of a successful entertainment executive.
The issue of food becomes a major preoccupation for Mom Carol when she turns to an extreme form of diet, not just for herself but the whole family. She shops at health food stores and spends many hours in the kitchen preparing "blended salads" and smoothie type drinks with fruits and vegetables. The whole family is pressured to adapt to "The Program" of this sparse eating regimen. Three day fasts spent in bed are also occasionally employed. While Christine is constantly hungry (especially for meat), she has to admit that her body looks toned and healthy. As Christine grows into an adult, there are moments when she loses the willpower to adhere to "The Program", and feels extremely guilty about it. For a time in college she even forced herself to vomit after eating so-called forbidden foods.
This is a very interesting book about a privileged family in the entertainment industry in which the mother was a forerunner / pioneer for her time in the health foods industry. However, it also is an honest account from daughter Christine's point of view of the major role food presented in her family, and the ramifications...both good and bad...this had on the lives of everyone involved.
Christine Scherick O'Brien is the daughter of late ABC broadcast executive Ed Scherick, who brought TV shows such as "That Girl!", "Batman" and "Peyton Place" to the screen as well as movies like "The Stepford Wives" and "The Taking of Pelham One Two Three". While a young child in the sixties, Christine was living in the iconic New York building The Dakota (John Lennon and Yoko Ono lived there years later), watching her parents hobnob with the likes of Alan Alda, Charles Grodin and Marlo Thomas. The movie "Rosemary's Baby" starring Mia Farrow was being filmed there at the time. One Halloween her Mom took the kids trick o' treating in the building and they encountered legendary actress Lauren Bacall, a longtime Dakota resident.
Christine was the oldest child and the only daughter, and she had three younger brothers. She was witness to her father's occasional explosive and surly encounters with Mom Carol. Carol grew up on a farm in Missouri where she very nearly died after being pulled under a tractor. But she didn't die, and she took up the bassoon (originally her sister Audrey's instrument) to strengthen her lungs. She also went on to become Miss Missouri, become a pianist and musical prodigy, and the glamorous wife of a successful entertainment executive.
The issue of food becomes a major preoccupation for Mom Carol when she turns to an extreme form of diet, not just for herself but the whole family. She shops at health food stores and spends many hours in the kitchen preparing "blended salads" and smoothie type drinks with fruits and vegetables. The whole family is pressured to adapt to "The Program" of this sparse eating regimen. Three day fasts spent in bed are also occasionally employed. While Christine is constantly hungry (especially for meat), she has to admit that her body looks toned and healthy. As Christine grows into an adult, there are moments when she loses the willpower to adhere to "The Program", and feels extremely guilty about it. For a time in college she even forced herself to vomit after eating so-called forbidden foods.
This is a very interesting book about a privileged family in the entertainment industry in which the mother was a forerunner / pioneer for her time in the health foods industry. However, it also is an honest account from daughter Christine's point of view of the major role food presented in her family, and the ramifications...both good and bad...this had on the lives of everyone involved.
June 25, 2018
Who is Christine O’Brien and what does she crave? After reading her memoir, I’m not sure.
But I do know that I enjoyed getting to know Christine and her family and I took pleasure in the well-tuned phrasing of this story. Although the book blurb promised painful revelations, I found instead the measured thoughts of a careful, good girl. I read this book over a few days, and when I had to put it down, I did so reluctantly and when I had time to read again, I looked forward to getting back to Christine’s world.
Christine was the oldest child of four, and the only girl. Her parents were remarkable. Her father was a successful entertainment executive and the tv shows and movies he produced are iconic. Her mother was raised in the Midwest on a farm and was also creative, intelligent and successful. Christine and her family lived in the Dakota, also iconic, in New York and then moved to Beverly Hills.
At this point in my description of the family you are probably picturing a crazy, out of control lifestyle beset by drugs and infidelity. Not so. In many ways, Christine’s family was typical All-American. Her mother stayed home, sewed Halloween costumes and spent time with the kids. Her father came home for dinner most nights and also seemed connected with his wife and kids. Although the father was high-strung, both parents seemed to love, and show love to their family. They enjoyed peaceful summers at the shore and other pleasant vacations. Christine and her younger brothers were close and enjoyed playing imaginary games together.
So, what was the painful problem? Well, it all began when the juicer bumped across the Formica. Christine’s mother suffered from hard to diagnose medical ailments and so she embarked on a quest to treat herself naturally with food. The juicer was the key to The Program. Christine’s mother bought crates of fresh lettuce, celery, and tomatoes each week and created fresh juice, and blended salads for every meal, for years. And thus began what the author called “the chain of control and rigidity and guilt.”
The author showed herself as a perceptive, quiet and contained girl and woman. As a child, one of her favorite books was The Five Little Peppers and How They Grew. I loved the Peppers, a book series that was published at the turn of the 20th century. I also had other feelings of kinship with the author, as I grew up at about the same time as she did, back when parents were strict and mothers tended to have issues.
Crave lets the author tell her own story after the death of her parents. Her story is not dramatic, thrilling, or traumatic. Rather, it is a descriptive poem about her life and times.
While the book is described as the chronicle of a writer’s painful and ultimately satisfying awakening, I did not sense pain, but rather a series of deftly told observations. I am also not sure if she had a successful awakening but the book does end with the author realizing that it is healthy to seek a balanced life.
I enjoy memoirs and slice of life stories, so this book appealed to me and I recommend it.
Thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for a review copy. This is my honest review.
But I do know that I enjoyed getting to know Christine and her family and I took pleasure in the well-tuned phrasing of this story. Although the book blurb promised painful revelations, I found instead the measured thoughts of a careful, good girl. I read this book over a few days, and when I had to put it down, I did so reluctantly and when I had time to read again, I looked forward to getting back to Christine’s world.
Christine was the oldest child of four, and the only girl. Her parents were remarkable. Her father was a successful entertainment executive and the tv shows and movies he produced are iconic. Her mother was raised in the Midwest on a farm and was also creative, intelligent and successful. Christine and her family lived in the Dakota, also iconic, in New York and then moved to Beverly Hills.
At this point in my description of the family you are probably picturing a crazy, out of control lifestyle beset by drugs and infidelity. Not so. In many ways, Christine’s family was typical All-American. Her mother stayed home, sewed Halloween costumes and spent time with the kids. Her father came home for dinner most nights and also seemed connected with his wife and kids. Although the father was high-strung, both parents seemed to love, and show love to their family. They enjoyed peaceful summers at the shore and other pleasant vacations. Christine and her younger brothers were close and enjoyed playing imaginary games together.
So, what was the painful problem? Well, it all began when the juicer bumped across the Formica. Christine’s mother suffered from hard to diagnose medical ailments and so she embarked on a quest to treat herself naturally with food. The juicer was the key to The Program. Christine’s mother bought crates of fresh lettuce, celery, and tomatoes each week and created fresh juice, and blended salads for every meal, for years. And thus began what the author called “the chain of control and rigidity and guilt.”
The author showed herself as a perceptive, quiet and contained girl and woman. As a child, one of her favorite books was The Five Little Peppers and How They Grew. I loved the Peppers, a book series that was published at the turn of the 20th century. I also had other feelings of kinship with the author, as I grew up at about the same time as she did, back when parents were strict and mothers tended to have issues.
Crave lets the author tell her own story after the death of her parents. Her story is not dramatic, thrilling, or traumatic. Rather, it is a descriptive poem about her life and times.
While the book is described as the chronicle of a writer’s painful and ultimately satisfying awakening, I did not sense pain, but rather a series of deftly told observations. I am also not sure if she had a successful awakening but the book does end with the author realizing that it is healthy to seek a balanced life.
I enjoy memoirs and slice of life stories, so this book appealed to me and I recommend it.
Thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for a review copy. This is my honest review.
June 18, 2018
Crave is very much a book of descriptions, descriptions of people, places, seasons. Early on, I began to long for more talk of feelings, instead of all of those descriptions. By the time the memoir got to extensively describing food and family meals, my interest in the story was seriously waning. Food became the focus of the author’s family, when obviously feelings were not being discussed. It was like reading a book about an eating disorder that affected everyone. I’m afraid I have no more interest in eating disorder memoirs than I do in foodie memoirs.
While Christine O'Brien does discuss her own "cravings" due to her mother’s food “program”, nothing was concrete enough to totally pull me back into the story. It was all so fragmented–-family, food, fame. Maybe it would have been wiser if the author had focused more on how a father’s fame affects a family, than on how a mother’s food obsession affects a family. For it's hard not to wonder if her mother's need to rigidly control the food her family ate was rooted in a deep need to do something really important, and to be highly successful in what she was doing; much like how a famous person is often seen as being really important and highly successful.
(Note: I received a free e-ARC of this book from NetGalley and the publisher.)
While Christine O'Brien does discuss her own "cravings" due to her mother’s food “program”, nothing was concrete enough to totally pull me back into the story. It was all so fragmented–-family, food, fame. Maybe it would have been wiser if the author had focused more on how a father’s fame affects a family, than on how a mother’s food obsession affects a family. For it's hard not to wonder if her mother's need to rigidly control the food her family ate was rooted in a deep need to do something really important, and to be highly successful in what she was doing; much like how a famous person is often seen as being really important and highly successful.
(Note: I received a free e-ARC of this book from NetGalley and the publisher.)
July 25, 2018
What a compelling telling of an interesting life, Christine draws you into her story and her family with ease. Every time I picked up Crave I found myself eager to find out what happened next-so much so that I finished in one day! Even though Carol was a flawed mother, you can’t help but root for her because Christine beautifully captures her complexity. Sick, but healthy. Vulnerable, but strong. It’s clear that Carol was bound and determined to make life better for her loved ones, no matter the cost.
June 26, 2018
Christine O’Brien’s writing is fabulously evocative with descriptions that compel you to turn the page, along with a gripping story that is as timely as it is deeply personal. Impossible to put down, and moving and resonant to the past page. I love this book!
June 27, 2018
I cannot describe how moved I was by this beautifully crafted work. CRAVE is an extremely moving story of an eccentric family. It is exquisitely written and the reader is taken inside of this family's dynamic in the most intimate way. This author is a remarkable talent and the writing is so mesmerizing. She brought this reader into her orbit and kept me there throughout the book. Move over, Mary Karr. This is one of best memoirs I have read in years. I love this book. It could be a best seller, so beautifully written, so original and so moving. What a unique voice this writer has!
July 26, 2018
A famous father, a health-obsessed mother and the iconic Dakota Apartments in NYC are just the beginning set up for what is a powerful memoir by author Christine O'Brien. Her skilled and delicately written story carries you in a dream-like state through childhood and into the resulting struggles and realizations she experienced as an adult.
O'Brien's story is as much her mother's as it is her own. Lovingly questioned as it is remembered-- searching, here in the written word, as it has been in real life for what she craves.
O'Brien could have easily written a tell-all or focused on the notoriety of her family but those details are here to serve as just the framework; enriching her own personal journey that navigates through an enchanted, perhaps haunted life. She becomes one with the reader allowing an exploration-- almost from the outside looking in -- at a unique and fascinating life.
The dreamy telling becomes colorful and vibrant as O'Brien reaches adulthood, experiences the joys and challenges of motherhood and starts to come into her own-- always questioning as well as embracing the cravings in her life.
This book is not so much a story about craving as in food obsession-- as it is craving life's truth and so much more.
I received an ARC copy from the wonderful publisher, St. Martin's Press, through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
O'Brien's story is as much her mother's as it is her own. Lovingly questioned as it is remembered-- searching, here in the written word, as it has been in real life for what she craves.
O'Brien could have easily written a tell-all or focused on the notoriety of her family but those details are here to serve as just the framework; enriching her own personal journey that navigates through an enchanted, perhaps haunted life. She becomes one with the reader allowing an exploration-- almost from the outside looking in -- at a unique and fascinating life.
The dreamy telling becomes colorful and vibrant as O'Brien reaches adulthood, experiences the joys and challenges of motherhood and starts to come into her own-- always questioning as well as embracing the cravings in her life.
This book is not so much a story about craving as in food obsession-- as it is craving life's truth and so much more.
I received an ARC copy from the wonderful publisher, St. Martin's Press, through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
July 7, 2018
Because this was a galley, I don't know if the formatting will change. Sometimes the author jumped around chronologically in a single chapter and it would make more sense to have line breaks or something. I also hope the print version has pictures.
This is a very interesting story about being raised by 2 very different parents and ultimately I was left wanting to know more!
This is a very interesting story about being raised by 2 very different parents and ultimately I was left wanting to know more!
December 5, 2018
This was a crazy book about a crazy family. It was all over the place, chronologically, emotionally, historically. But in a crazy way, I really liked it. The author had a strange relationship with her mother but then, don't we all?
July 23, 2018
This memoir was atypical, in that it wasn't a bad-mommy or bad-daddy -focused memoir. In fact, in a lot of ways, the author had a privileged childhood. As someone who grew up envying Buffy and Jody on A Family Affair, I was primed to envy Christine and her brothers in their huge, high-ceilinged Dakota apartment, partying with their parents' famous friends. However.
I'm about the same age as Christine, and honestly, whose father wasn't drinking and yelling in the evenings back then? A lot of us had either white-collar Don Draper or blue-collar Archie Bunker for dads. But it's Christine's mother's fixation on dietary perfection that sharpens the memoir, and Christine's search for giving that abusive starvation meaning that keeps you reading.
I kept waiting for Christine to realize she was being abused and it..never...really...happens?
Ultimately, Christine and her brothers all find a way out of the situation; Christine's escape is described, her brothers' is left for you to imagine. But there is never the hoped-for confrontation with her mother or father regarding the abuse or even an explanation of what the years of this horrible diet cost her health and/or body.
When I read a memoir like Crave, like a lot of people who had problem families, I look for a fellow traveler who survived and how they did it. I look for someone who would recognize me as I recognize them. Unfortunately, I think Christine would walk right by most of us while thinking about how nutritionally ahead of time her mother was, and how thankful we should be for her foresight.
I'm about the same age as Christine, and honestly, whose father wasn't drinking and yelling in the evenings back then? A lot of us had either white-collar Don Draper or blue-collar Archie Bunker for dads. But it's Christine's mother's fixation on dietary perfection that sharpens the memoir, and Christine's search for giving that abusive starvation meaning that keeps you reading.
I kept waiting for Christine to realize she was being abused and it..never...really...happens?
Ultimately, Christine and her brothers all find a way out of the situation; Christine's escape is described, her brothers' is left for you to imagine. But there is never the hoped-for confrontation with her mother or father regarding the abuse or even an explanation of what the years of this horrible diet cost her health and/or body.
When I read a memoir like Crave, like a lot of people who had problem families, I look for a fellow traveler who survived and how they did it. I look for someone who would recognize me as I recognize them. Unfortunately, I think Christine would walk right by most of us while thinking about how nutritionally ahead of time her mother was, and how thankful we should be for her foresight.
August 2, 2021
I recieved this book as a Netgalley ARC. Crave is based on the life of Christine O'Brien as she grows up with a famous, angry father and a mother who strives for control by forcing an extreme diet on her family. It has lasting effects, positive and negative, on the author and her three siblings. I found the authors life to be very exotic and interesting, so much different than the way most people live. The flow of the story is off at times but I think editing will remedy that.
This is overall a good book that I would recommend to memoir fans.
This is overall a good book that I would recommend to memoir fans.
February 4, 2019
This checked all the boxes for what I crave to read, but it left me kind of disappointed like a meal at Applebee's when I was promised Chez Panisse. It's like writing you've read a hundred times in any college writing course, although very polished, also very pedestrian and very forgetful. I wanted so badly to read this book. Eating issues, fancy New York apartments, rich and famous parents, neglect, hidden family dysfunction - what could be boring about that? She found a way. Too much self-indulgent jibber-jabber, too slow to get going, too plain. And she's a local! I was so hoping . . .
March 19, 2019
Thrown off by the subtitle here. You have to travel 100 pages in before food is mentioned. Even then the author struggles to foreground food issues. In fact, as she matures and moves to California her mother's food regime becomes normalized. Unfortunately this memoir deteriorates as it proceeds. By the end it is little more than a bland goulash thrown together with whatever comes to mind.
July 20, 2018
This memoir is refreshingly genuine and a wonderful read. Christine O’Brien holds her readers closely in her trust throughout the book. She kept a journal since she was a little girl, and I felt right there with her in age and perspective. Her father was undeniably brilliant and a tour de force in movie and TV production. His career achievements gave me both nostalgic and interesting glimpses into show business icons and classic productions of the era. Ironically, the book is set in real estate out of a movie-set…the Dakota in Manhattan, a turn-of-the century mansion in an old New York village, and a Beverly Hills mansion.
Like many mothers and daughters of the older generation and late baby boomer generation, the author and her mother’s experiences were vastly different. But her mother was definitely not my mother’s Betty Crocker variety. While Carol Scherick held onto some remnants of practical Midwest and depression-era sensibility, she was always looking for something deeper to satisfy many unmet needs. She was clearly loving to her children, but consumed with protecting her family’s health. She was obsessed with keeping her family on a rigid eating regiment that seemed tortuous. It would have been one thing if they were born into this food program; but instead one day their mother was buying Kelloggs' cereal and the next day only wheat germ and the blandest of vegetables. Later her mother moved onto other food remedies and journeys to enlightenment. Sadly during these several years of the food program, the family meals were endured rather than enjoyed. Though the program finally came to an end, there were lasting consequences for everyone in the family in their own personal way. The subtle humor throughout tells the reader the author survived this remarkably intact, and now she has written a remarkable memoir.
Like many mothers and daughters of the older generation and late baby boomer generation, the author and her mother’s experiences were vastly different. But her mother was definitely not my mother’s Betty Crocker variety. While Carol Scherick held onto some remnants of practical Midwest and depression-era sensibility, she was always looking for something deeper to satisfy many unmet needs. She was clearly loving to her children, but consumed with protecting her family’s health. She was obsessed with keeping her family on a rigid eating regiment that seemed tortuous. It would have been one thing if they were born into this food program; but instead one day their mother was buying Kelloggs' cereal and the next day only wheat germ and the blandest of vegetables. Later her mother moved onto other food remedies and journeys to enlightenment. Sadly during these several years of the food program, the family meals were endured rather than enjoyed. Though the program finally came to an end, there were lasting consequences for everyone in the family in their own personal way. The subtle humor throughout tells the reader the author survived this remarkably intact, and now she has written a remarkable memoir.
October 12, 2018
Christine grew up in the home of an ABC executive father and a former farm girl/beauty pageant queen mother. Her mother dealt with her bad-tempered husband by becoming obsessed with a "healthy" diet plan that included eating blended salad three times a day (I looked it up and it is a real thing). This memoir could have easily veered into "woe is me" area but she balanced the bad parts of her childhood with memories of parents that obviously cared for the children despite their flaws. At times her flowery descriptions were beautiful at other times, over-written but I do think this is a good addition to the genre of memoirs about unusual upbringings. I received a digital ARC of this book through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
July 29, 2018
I was offered this book from my Book Of The Month club. This is one of the better memoirs that I have read in a very long time. This is great book for a book club, so much to discuss in this well written read !
May 7, 2019
This wasn't bad, but it couldn't decide what it wanted to be. No clear voice or intent.
July 10, 2018
What a beautiful book! I was totally captivated from the very beginning. It is richly layered and pulled me in deeper with each page. It was very difficult to put down. The scenes are so richly animated. I can visualize the movie! I actually want to read it again, something I most never do but am still processing the richly woven tapestry of words. From the Prologue - “Just tell a good story,” her mother said. She most certainly did. It is quite a masterpiece.
July 30, 2018
I started this book, then put it down. Had to force myself to pick it back up and continue reading it. I was not a fan, and I’m rather shocked by all the 4 and 5 star reviews. I love memoirs and have read several... this memoir was so hard to get through. It was so disjointed and generally all over the place, it felt hard to follow and I had to go back and reread where I thought I missed a paragraph. Bizarre lifestyle but even then it felt like it mostly just touched on the part of her childhood that was about her mother’s different health choices.
January 28, 2021
There were some things I really liked about this book. In the early part of the story, O'Brien's recollections about living in the Dakota with her parents and younger siblings were charming, and her family, although privileged and ambitious, seemed relatively nice. But as the cracks in the foundation of their family widened, O'Brien begins to circle the wagons, protecting a mother who is unmistakably abusive, if unintentionally so. O'Brien doesn't reconcile herself to that obvious situation, and takes great pains to obscure her mother's mental illness, never calling it what it is.
Due to my own experience with people whose untreated mental illness has dramatically effected their children, I struggled with this story.
O'Brien's mother had a mostly normal upbringing, although a nearly fatal accident in her childhood may have changed her in fundamental ways. She became a Miss Missouri, going on to compete in the Miss America pageant. She met her future husband, Edgar Scherick, who would become a television and movie executive for ABC, through a mutual friend, and they soon married. But he had a volatile temper in private, and she had underlying control issues and some lingering health problems, which became increasingly powerful and manifested in an obsession with food habits. At first, these were only applied to herself. She saw an unlicensed doctor to obtain a prescription for a food diet, which consisted of cleansing juices and blended salads to eliminate toxins from the body. Eventually, she required her children and husband to adhere to "The Program," as well.
Christine O'Brien felt a loyalty to her mother to adhere to the diet, but she craved real food. She felt her mother was doing what she believed to be the right thing, and perhaps she was, but her obsession, especially as applied to her children, led to all of them having lifelong struggles with eating and guilt.
I feel that a book like this should share a lesson learned by the author, but I don't sense that at all. She doesn't suggest that her mother might have been better served by seeing a therapist instead of a bogus "doctor". She doesn't see her mother's continuing pursuit of alternative philosophies and lifestyles as troublesome. She doesn't see her refusal to recognize that these food obsessions are problematic directly influence her own choices years after moving away from home. And she doesn't seem to be getting the help she needs, herself, to do so. I worry about the generational effects of these unchallenged beliefs on her own children.
So I was left unsettled and unsatisfied by this book, perhaps a metaphor for O'Brien's own unsated hunger.
Due to my own experience with people whose untreated mental illness has dramatically effected their children, I struggled with this story.
O'Brien's mother had a mostly normal upbringing, although a nearly fatal accident in her childhood may have changed her in fundamental ways. She became a Miss Missouri, going on to compete in the Miss America pageant. She met her future husband, Edgar Scherick, who would become a television and movie executive for ABC, through a mutual friend, and they soon married. But he had a volatile temper in private, and she had underlying control issues and some lingering health problems, which became increasingly powerful and manifested in an obsession with food habits. At first, these were only applied to herself. She saw an unlicensed doctor to obtain a prescription for a food diet, which consisted of cleansing juices and blended salads to eliminate toxins from the body. Eventually, she required her children and husband to adhere to "The Program," as well.
Christine O'Brien felt a loyalty to her mother to adhere to the diet, but she craved real food. She felt her mother was doing what she believed to be the right thing, and perhaps she was, but her obsession, especially as applied to her children, led to all of them having lifelong struggles with eating and guilt.
I feel that a book like this should share a lesson learned by the author, but I don't sense that at all. She doesn't suggest that her mother might have been better served by seeing a therapist instead of a bogus "doctor". She doesn't see her mother's continuing pursuit of alternative philosophies and lifestyles as troublesome. She doesn't see her refusal to recognize that these food obsessions are problematic directly influence her own choices years after moving away from home. And she doesn't seem to be getting the help she needs, herself, to do so. I worry about the generational effects of these unchallenged beliefs on her own children.
So I was left unsettled and unsatisfied by this book, perhaps a metaphor for O'Brien's own unsated hunger.
August 7, 2018
I have a list of books written by new authors that I keep and recommend to friends. The book, Crave by Christine O'Brien will be added to that list.
Crave drew me in from the beginning and held my interest to the end. The book has many layers to it and Christine masterfully uncovers each one. The dietary restrictions that her mother enforced a.k.a. "the program",and how it affected the family and Christine personally is of course a main theme of the book. However, she als0 writes about her father, Edgar Scherick - a successful movie and TV producer,who has a volatile temperand instills fear in the family. She shares about some of the many celebrities who come to visit while they lived in the famous Dakota building in NYC. Christine had a very privileged upbringing, yet she does not appear to be at all fazed by it.. Nor is she bitter about her father's tirades, or her mother's lapses into depression, or the diet that she was put on that would always make her "different" than her peers. Christine "craved" more normalcy with her upbringing yet never wanted to disappoint her mother. Throughout the book, it becomes clear that Christine finds personal strength to overcome the difficulties of her childhood.
The more I read about "the program" and how Christine's mother kept striving for health and well being for both her and her family, the more I started to think that perhaps her mother was ahead of her time? Although she took her diet to extremes, much of what she discovered years ago has been utilized in today's healthier diets..
I thoroughly enjoyed the book and plan on recommending it to my book club. I feel the book will allow for an interesting discussion that will cover an array of topics. Crave is not just another "food/diet" book. It is a book about family, love, control, discipline and Christine's journey from hungry child to self assured adult.
Prior to writing the book, Christine asked her mother how she felt about it and she responded, "Just tell a good story". I believe Christine has done that. I highly recommend this book and I guarantee once you start reading it you will undoubtedly "crave" to read more.!
Crave drew me in from the beginning and held my interest to the end. The book has many layers to it and Christine masterfully uncovers each one. The dietary restrictions that her mother enforced a.k.a. "the program",and how it affected the family and Christine personally is of course a main theme of the book. However, she als0 writes about her father, Edgar Scherick - a successful movie and TV producer,who has a volatile temperand instills fear in the family. She shares about some of the many celebrities who come to visit while they lived in the famous Dakota building in NYC. Christine had a very privileged upbringing, yet she does not appear to be at all fazed by it.. Nor is she bitter about her father's tirades, or her mother's lapses into depression, or the diet that she was put on that would always make her "different" than her peers. Christine "craved" more normalcy with her upbringing yet never wanted to disappoint her mother. Throughout the book, it becomes clear that Christine finds personal strength to overcome the difficulties of her childhood.
The more I read about "the program" and how Christine's mother kept striving for health and well being for both her and her family, the more I started to think that perhaps her mother was ahead of her time? Although she took her diet to extremes, much of what she discovered years ago has been utilized in today's healthier diets..
I thoroughly enjoyed the book and plan on recommending it to my book club. I feel the book will allow for an interesting discussion that will cover an array of topics. Crave is not just another "food/diet" book. It is a book about family, love, control, discipline and Christine's journey from hungry child to self assured adult.
Prior to writing the book, Christine asked her mother how she felt about it and she responded, "Just tell a good story". I believe Christine has done that. I highly recommend this book and I guarantee once you start reading it you will undoubtedly "crave" to read more.!
September 24, 2018
(I received an advanced copy of this book via NetGalley in exchange for my honest review.)
This book was quite different than what I expected, but still so very interesting. I am a huge fan of food memoirs, but this definitely isn't the type of food memoir I'm used to. In fact, it took almost a third of the book before food really started playing a part in the story. Even then, it's more about disordered eating, how to use food as a form of control, and how the ways in which your parents treat food may have lifelong effects on you.
Ultimately, Cravings is probably better described as a memoir about family and especially the relationship between mother and daughter. Christine grows up in the 1970s in a privileged family- her dad is a famous movie producer and the family lives in a ritzy NYC apartment building amongst many of the rich and famous. Her dad has quite a temper and her mother is on a constant quest to be healthy. Nowadays, her mother's behavior may not seem so odd, but in the 70s, seeing "quack" doctors and going on strict diet regiments involving consuming mostly liquids was indeed odd. And though these things may be more socially acceptable these days, what remains controversial is forcing these strict diets onto your children.
This memoir focuses a lot on where Christine's mother's issues come from (tracing back to her childhood) and the effects they have on Christine and her brothers. Christine is constantly seeking her mother's approval and even into adulthood is terrified of disappointing her with her own food choices and struggles with the cravings she experiences.
O'Brien is a beautiful writer, but her writing is very flowery, which may be a turn-off to some. At times, the descriptions felt unnecessary to the story. The scenes tend to flow into each other often without transition and it felt almost like reading a diary or watching a movie. At first, this felt odd, but after a little bit, I actually liked it.
Overall, I enjoyed this memoir and think Christine's story is one that should be told. I believe our adult relationships with food are based so much on how our parents treat it and her story truly exemplifies this.
This book was quite different than what I expected, but still so very interesting. I am a huge fan of food memoirs, but this definitely isn't the type of food memoir I'm used to. In fact, it took almost a third of the book before food really started playing a part in the story. Even then, it's more about disordered eating, how to use food as a form of control, and how the ways in which your parents treat food may have lifelong effects on you.
Ultimately, Cravings is probably better described as a memoir about family and especially the relationship between mother and daughter. Christine grows up in the 1970s in a privileged family- her dad is a famous movie producer and the family lives in a ritzy NYC apartment building amongst many of the rich and famous. Her dad has quite a temper and her mother is on a constant quest to be healthy. Nowadays, her mother's behavior may not seem so odd, but in the 70s, seeing "quack" doctors and going on strict diet regiments involving consuming mostly liquids was indeed odd. And though these things may be more socially acceptable these days, what remains controversial is forcing these strict diets onto your children.
This memoir focuses a lot on where Christine's mother's issues come from (tracing back to her childhood) and the effects they have on Christine and her brothers. Christine is constantly seeking her mother's approval and even into adulthood is terrified of disappointing her with her own food choices and struggles with the cravings she experiences.
O'Brien is a beautiful writer, but her writing is very flowery, which may be a turn-off to some. At times, the descriptions felt unnecessary to the story. The scenes tend to flow into each other often without transition and it felt almost like reading a diary or watching a movie. At first, this felt odd, but after a little bit, I actually liked it.
Overall, I enjoyed this memoir and think Christine's story is one that should be told. I believe our adult relationships with food are based so much on how our parents treat it and her story truly exemplifies this.
June 13, 2022
The Millennium Cohort study gathered information regarding 13K U.K. couples with a child born in 2000 or 2001. They looked at how satisfied the couple was with their relationship when the child was nine months old. They then fast-forwarded 14 years to determine how happy the couple was, whether they were even still together, if their teenagers were displaying mental health problems, and how close the parents reported being with their teenagers.
It turns out that all four outcomes were more linked with the mother's initial happiness, compared with the father's. For example, Mom's happiness was twice as important than Dad's when it came to whether or not they would stay together. Mom's happiness was also twice as important when it came to predicting mental health issues in boys. As for girls, only their mother's happiness was found to be linked to their mental health as teens.
In this memoir, the eldest daughter of a glamorous television and movie executive wrestles with her relationship to food, a complex struggle that she inherits from her beauty-queen mother.
Our relationship with food is tangled up with our concepts of self-image, desire, willpower, purity, pleasure and so much more.
It's our biological fate to figure out how to fuel our bodies, and our mothers are the prototype for our concepts in this area.
It was fascinating to read about the privileged life of the author, but as ever with well-written memoirs I found plenty of room to identify with the author and extend compassion as I learned.
It turns out that all four outcomes were more linked with the mother's initial happiness, compared with the father's. For example, Mom's happiness was twice as important than Dad's when it came to whether or not they would stay together. Mom's happiness was also twice as important when it came to predicting mental health issues in boys. As for girls, only their mother's happiness was found to be linked to their mental health as teens.
In this memoir, the eldest daughter of a glamorous television and movie executive wrestles with her relationship to food, a complex struggle that she inherits from her beauty-queen mother.
Our relationship with food is tangled up with our concepts of self-image, desire, willpower, purity, pleasure and so much more.
It's our biological fate to figure out how to fuel our bodies, and our mothers are the prototype for our concepts in this area.
It was fascinating to read about the privileged life of the author, but as ever with well-written memoirs I found plenty of room to identify with the author and extend compassion as I learned.
July 29, 2018
I so enjoyed this book!! This is an honest, genuine and almost raw account of growing up in what would seem to an outsider as a very privileged life. It is the “cycle of life” of Christine’s mother and father, and then how her life plays off of her relationship with them and their powerful influence and eccentricities. Christine’s beautiful descriptions paint a vivid picture of an unusual childhood with a genius but raging father and her mother’s attempt at control of their lives with a restrictive diet. It is New York and Hollywood glamor that is not really so glamorous...
What was striking to me too was the interwoven effect of parents and families on our character and then how that plays out in one’s life along with the carried on effect to one’s own children. I, myself, had a father who had read the same Adele Davis book as Carol and he had taken many health and diet ideas to extremes and those affected our family as well. I felt that we were different and I had cravings for desserts and candy to the point of hiding huge Hershey bars in my underwear drawer. Ultimately, what we feel might be different or difficult in our own lives is put into perspective with reading a story such as this. Christine is a very human and talented writer and she would have made her mother proud by “telling a good story”.
What was striking to me too was the interwoven effect of parents and families on our character and then how that plays out in one’s life along with the carried on effect to one’s own children. I, myself, had a father who had read the same Adele Davis book as Carol and he had taken many health and diet ideas to extremes and those affected our family as well. I felt that we were different and I had cravings for desserts and candy to the point of hiding huge Hershey bars in my underwear drawer. Ultimately, what we feel might be different or difficult in our own lives is put into perspective with reading a story such as this. Christine is a very human and talented writer and she would have made her mother proud by “telling a good story”.
November 9, 2018
Just finished this beautiful literary memoir in one sitting. I was glued to my seat - I loved loved LOVED it!! The author's voice shines through and it’s a lyrical, poetic and heart-wrenching voice that tells the tale. Beyond the smokey seventies glamour that framed her youth, beneath the surface of the grotesque Stepford like reality and complexity of her childhood, underneath the misogyny, the green sludge she was force-fed and enemas endured, there is a softer underbelly to O’Brien’s prose that lifts the soul, especially when it turns to the natural world, to the landscape and people she loves. Ponies and piglets, harrowed fields and muscle-bound rivers of silt, there is such joy In the writing of these elements that you almost forget the terrible drama unfolding with every marcel consumed. This joy is where I feel the spirit of the author really lies and I cannot wait to read more. ‘Crave’ is a wonderful debut - all the more poignant in its timing as the TV adaptation of The Handmaid’s Tale fills our screens. O’Brian is the starving daughter of Stepford - who gobbled up the wolf, spat him out all over the page, and then lived happily ever after.
August 7, 2018
I thoroughly enjoyed Christine O'Brien’s memoir, Crave. She and her three brothers simultaneously experienced a childhood filled with privilege and deprivation.
This beautifully crafted book takes the reader on O’Brien's complex journey to independence and self-awakening. Untangling herself from a controlling, but troubled mother is a challenging process. It’s finally through marriage, motherhood and a home situated on the wild hillsides of Northern California that the author blossoms into her own person.
O'Brien’s vivid descriptions bring so many interesting places to life - from her family’s oversized New York City apartment in the historic Dakota, to the movie sets of The Heartbreak Kid and The Stepford Wives, to her grandparents well-worn farmhouse in Missouri. Scherick writes convincingly about the fascinating people and places that have shaped her life.
I would highly recommend Crave and my book group will definitely be reading this mesmerizing memoir when it is released in November.
This beautifully crafted book takes the reader on O’Brien's complex journey to independence and self-awakening. Untangling herself from a controlling, but troubled mother is a challenging process. It’s finally through marriage, motherhood and a home situated on the wild hillsides of Northern California that the author blossoms into her own person.
O'Brien’s vivid descriptions bring so many interesting places to life - from her family’s oversized New York City apartment in the historic Dakota, to the movie sets of The Heartbreak Kid and The Stepford Wives, to her grandparents well-worn farmhouse in Missouri. Scherick writes convincingly about the fascinating people and places that have shaped her life.
I would highly recommend Crave and my book group will definitely be reading this mesmerizing memoir when it is released in November.
December 10, 2018
This memoir was written by the daughter of Ed Scherick, the successful TV and film producer who created shows and films like ABC's Wide World of Sports and The Stepford Wives. Mr. Scherick was a man with an explosive temper. His lovely wife, Carol, had survived a horrific accident when she was a child and after she was married had four children and an angry husband to deal with. It seemed she needed a way to control what must have felt to her like an out of control life. Carol began to embrace a life of strange nutritional diets. Beginning in junior high, the author and her brothers, ate only vegetable drinks for breakfast, blended (as in a blender) salads for lunch, and steamed rice and vegetables for supper. This went on for years. What was amazing to me, was that the whole family went along with this odd diet and stuck with it for years. Unfortunately, when they became adulst, the children had issues with food. Mr. Scherick and his wife eventually split up. This is story of family dysfunction and how a child comes back from that to lead a normal life.
November 6, 2018
Author Christine O’Brien artfully describes a childhood spent somewhere in the figurative space between celebrity and abuse; she is not quite certain herself and leaves her readers unclear as well. Her father was unknown outside of the entertainment industry, yet his work entertained the public widely in the mid and late 20th Century. Her mother was a fragile beauty whose health and insecurities led her towards alternative treatments with such gusto that she lost sight of any balance. O’Brien was the oldest of 4 children caught in the middle of this strange brew, literally starving as her mother put them through her ‘Programs’ for health. The memoir is fascinating but ultimately lacks perspective. O’Brien can’t bring herself to fully assess her parents even as she brings her readers deep inside her story. She is still withholding judgement all these years later, still being the good daughter. I received my copy from the publisher through NetGalley.
November 9, 2018
Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for the ARC of this book in return for my honest review. For some reason, I had assumed that this book would be about the author's eating disorder but that really simplifies what it was about. This is O'Brien's story of years of her mother's trying to control their environment and her children's health through their diet. O'Brien's father was a famous producer and her mother was from a farm in the Midwest -the two fought frequently and their home was a stressful one. O'Brien recounts a childhood spent in the Dakota apartment building, the Bahamas, Long Island, etc while her mother had her and her 3 siblings eating "The Program"-basically liquid salads. To say that this influenced her relationship with her mother, with food and with others into adulthood is an understatement. O'Brien longed for compassion, empathy, control and love. Great story.
March 2, 2019
I saw this book on the shelf of new releases and was interested in the title, so I checked it out. This is an easy read and I finished it in a few days. I enjoyed the authors writing, it was relatable and to the point. However, she would jump so far in time within chapters (example her daughter goes from a baby to a toddler within a few paragraphs) that you felt like you were zipping through time. The first half of the book was more about her childhood (privileged but oftentimes stressful) and it wasn’t till the second half that her mothers health obsession became a focus. I have to admit, I was surprised her father played along with the celery juice/blended salads for as long as they did. Either way,a story of being defined by your parents and their influence to finally finding your own- it was interesting, quick and overall enjoyable.
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