Don't Go Crazy Without Me

by Deborah A. Lott

Don’t Go Crazy Without Me tells the tragicomic coming of age story of a girl who grew up under the seductive sway of her outrageously eccentric father. He taught her how to have fun; he also taught her to fear food poisoning, other children’s infectious diseases, and the contaminating propensities of the world at large. Alienated from her emotionally distant mother, the girl bonded closely with her father and his worldview. When he plunged from neurotic to full-blown psychotic, she nearly followed him. Sanity is not always a choice, but for the sixteen-year-old, decisions had to be made and lines drawn between reality and what her mother called her “overactive imagination.” She would have to give up beliefs carried by the infectious agent of her father’s love.

Saving herself would require an unconventional reading of Moby Dick, sexual pleasure in the body that had confounded her, and entry into the larger world of political activism as a volunteer in Robert F. Kennedy’s Presidential campaign. After attending his last stop at the Ambassador Hotel the night of his assassination, she would come to a new reckoning with loss and with engagement beyond the confines of her family. Ultimately, she would find a way to turn her grief into love.

Genres: Nonfiction, Memoir

300 pages, ebook

First published April 7, 2020

About the author

Deborah A. Lott is a writer of narrative nonfiction and creative nonfiction. In addition to her two books, her essays, op-eds, and memoirs have been published widely. Recent publications include a Los Angeles Times op-ed, "Fear of Covid-19 Won't Make You Safer," and essays in the Alaska Quarterly Review, Scoundrel Time, the Rumpus, the Bellingham Review, the nervous breakdown, and other places. She teaches literature and creative writing at Antioch University, Los Angeles, where she is faculty editor of Two Hawks Quarterly.com

Reviews

[Thomas Kelley · Rating 3 out of 5]

Let me start with I would rate this book at 3 1/2 stars. How often do you read a book that really makes you mad but you cannot put it down. This one did it for me all the way. The story follows the author and her family which consist of two brothers and mom and dad. They are Jewish family living in La Cresenta California during the 1950's and 1960's. They run the family business out of the house and it makes you wonder how they manage this as this is truly a dysfunctional family. The suffers mental issues to the extreme. The mother seems to side and favor the boys and the father seems to favor the daughter (the author) and the parents to extreme cases play the kids against each other. The father has such an influence on the daughter that she begins to pick up his maladies until there is a point that she has to make some hard decisions. The description of this book says it is a tragicomic but I really did not see much humor in this book as there many things that make you scratch your head. It had me asking what made the mother marry the father in the first place and realize in the 50's and 60's divorce was not common but really what about the kids ? As I stated above all this being said there was something about this book that keep interested to finish it. I received an ARC from Edelweiss for a fair an honest review.

[Amy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Deborah Lott knows how to tell a story, and her sentences sing,. But there's more to Don't Go Crazy Without Me. This is one of those rare books that will leave you laughing through tears and suddenly you'll discover you have learned something new about love.  A very few memoirs  teach us new ways of seeing the world, but Lott does just that.  Yep, Dad was a challenging soul, and Mom was difficult, and the house out there on the outskirts of Los Angeles must have been a lonely place. But you will feel less lonely after reading this book--less misunderstood, less lost, and more capable of love. 

[Rachel Weinhaus · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was so blown away by the author's honesty and her deep examination of her relationship with her father. Her writing is a masterclass in how memoir writing should be done, the story unfolds in rich scenes that bring the past to life. It is a harrowing, heartbreaking story about mental illness and the ways in which her childhood was traumatic, but also, how she emerges and breaks free. Her journey is inspiring, and moving, and you will not regret reading this beautiful story ultimately about healing. She may not have followed in the footsteps of her father, but she created her own path, a path worth you traveling beside her.

[Madge · Rating 5 out of 5]

First, I must say I have seen Deborah perform stories on stage. And am Facebook friends She is a captivating storyteller. I wouldn’t describe this book as a tragic comedy. I found nothing to laugh about. To say her family was dysfunctional is an understatement. I kept thinking what was a Jewish family doing in LaCresenta. Even today I would bet no Jewish families live there as it is not welcome to Jews and has its fair share of anti semitism even today. But, besides that, her Dad had deep mental illness, which I assumed lead to PTSD for everyone. Her mother just tried to keep her head above water. It seemed Deborah was like her dad and the boys like their mom or this was perceived by the entire family. The entire book focuses on everyone coping with a father who could be tender to Deborah and a tyrant to his wife and his sons. I was surprised the mom stuck it out until she died. Not sure which died first. Deborah somehow came out with an understanding of her parents. I don’t know how she did this unless she had extensive therapy, which I believe she must have had. This is a memoir you will remember for its sincerity and what seems like true reporting of what happened. The fact that she found forgiveness for both her parents shows a brain power that was not squashed by madness, but just on the edge throughout most of her adolescence. Deep dive into craziness. Glad she didn’t dive in.

[Jody Keisner · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sometimes, you can judge a book by its cover. Consider the cover image for Deborah A. Lott’s memoir Don’t Go Crazy Without Me (Red Hen Press): a chubby adult male dressed in blue velvet shorts and jacket, ruffled cream shirt, black leather doll shoes and white socks, carrying a teddy bear. The peculiar image is of Ira, Lott’s father, and the impish grin on his face while wearing what he calls his “little boy suit” foretells of the dark humor—and family dysfunction—that unfolds in the pages that follow. Near Ira stands a dark-haired little girl, a young Lott, her presence symbolically overshadowed by his outlandish appearance.
Read the rest of my review at https://theadroitjournal.org/2020/04/...

[Laurel Digangi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Starting from early childhood, Deborah A. Lott had become an unwitting partner in her father's mental illness, rife with its bizarre beliefs, fears, rituals, and paranoid delusions. When, Lott, age 16, after her first psychiatric evaluation, enters the clinic's waiting room, her distraught mother cries, 'Do you want to wind up in a mental hospital in a bed next to your father's? They can give you matching straitjackets, too.' Such is the central conflict in this coming-of-age story: Will Lott be able to break free from a loving yet debilitating bond that threatens her own sanity, when she receives little affection from her emotionally distant mother?

Lott is both painfully honest and funny in her descriptions of her parents and siblings: a middle-class Jewish family uncomfortably settled in an elite gentile community. Her eccentric father, Ira, however, is the true star: A hypochondriac who works from home because he takes frequent naps and can barely get dressed in the morning, but is quick to don his Little Lord Fauntleroy costume to entertain Lott's ten-year-old guests at her first (and last) childhood birthday party.

Lott neither holds back when describing her own struggles as an outcast among her peers, as well as her own raw, guilt-filled reactions to the world she's forced to inhabit. Set in the mid-1950s to late 1960s, CRAZY captures the zeitgeist of the times. But those times would be a-changing, and perhaps, for Lott, they will bring her the promise of a new world view.

Engaging, filled with gorgeous prose that move the reader forward swiftly and magnificently through Lott's complex, heartbreaking, and bizarre world, CRAZY lets you temporarily join Lott's universe as you root for her to find a way out. I know I did."

[Sue · Rating 5 out of 5]

Oh my gosh. This memoir blew my mind. That anyone went through such things and then had the courage to write about it is astonishing. That this happened to Deborah, with whom I went to grad school, is even more, well, crazy. I foresee the movie offers rolling in. Deborah’s father was not like other people’s fathers. Loud, plagued by mysterious illnesses, and prone to inappropriate behavior, he embarrassed his children and twisted their minds until they couldn’t tell what was true and what was not. Lott writes that she was in a cult of one, with her father as the crazed leader and her mother as a helpless observer who could not get through to either one of them. Deborah was the only one who could get herself out, and that seemed unlikely. Lott flips back and forth between past and present—so we know she survived—to tell the story of a family forever in crisis and how she fought to find her way through the madness. It’s honest to the point of embarrassing, suspenseful, and wonderfully written. I came away grateful for my own relatively normal parents.

[Stephanie Weaver · Rating 5 out of 5]

Lott takes us into a family growing up in La Crescenta, CA in the late 60s, with a bipolar dad (undiagnosed, but most likely his diagnosis) and a reserved mother trying to hold things together. It’s truly a family in chaos for all of Lott’s childhood, where she struggles to fit in as a Jew, as a Highly Sensitive Person, and with a father constantly performing outrageous antics. Because she is more like him than her mother, he sucks her into a deeply disquieting and unhealthy alliance against her mother and brothers. With undercurrents of incest, a clear link between suggestibility and physical ailments, and a full-on psychotic breakdown, this isn’t a book for the fainthearted. I found myself cheering Lott on from the sidelines, hoping she wouldn’t go down with the ship.

[Yael · Rating 5 out of 5]

Such a raw, brutally honest, and poignant memoir! I'm super impressed by how much detail Lott was able to include from her memories, especially when she was very young. She weaves unique narratives through a vivid picture of what it was like growing up in 1960s La Crescenta, offering a full behind-the-scenes of her unusual family. It's ultimately her relationship with her father that is the most meaningful in her story, and I found it firstly beautiful though mysterious and disturbing. It's clear that she has gained perspective on her upbringing with time and that enables her chapters a greater depth. Highly recommend!

[Rochelle Newman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Deborah Lott has written a vulnerable, vivid memoir that brings the reader to tears -- the kind that flow from heart break and from laughing at life's absurdities. Her willingness to bring us into her most personal of family experiences is key to giving us a reading experience that is universal in its reflection on life, love and the bonds that hold a family together. It's the kind of read I didn't want to put down and, when I did get to the final page, I felt that pang of separation when you have to say goodbye to characters you have come to care about. No wonder writers like Abigail Thomas have given Don't Go Crazy Without Me such praise. Highly recommend.

[Angela · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a fantastic book! I couldn't put it down and ended up reading it in 48 hours. Beautifully written, many times I felt anxiety ridden alongside the narrator. The author has a gift for description and detail in this at times awkward and funny portrayal of an unconventional family. The characters come alive on the page and you can't help having complicated feelings towards them, just as she does. Can't recommend this book highly enough!

[Jody Forrester · Rating 5 out of 5]

Don't Go Crazy Without Me kept me glued to the pages from beginning to end. A talented writer, Deborah Lott brings the reader in so close that at times I felt myself going crazy along with her. She writes fearlessly, revealing dysfunctions in her family that must have been painful to plummet. Still, she persists until one gets the feeling that nothing has been held back. It's a riveting story, not anything like something that I've read before. Don't miss it!

[Eileen Collins · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this poignant and funny memoir. Deborah Lott's voice is down to earth and authentic. I felt like we were teenage friends and she was telling me about her dysfunctional family. Her story was so relatable as we shared the childhood experience of having a parent with mental illness. She made me feel normal. I could just picture those ceramic ducks he father made in arts and crafts.

[Pam Reeves · Rating 5 out of 5]

Worthwhile and Entertaining

Deborah Lott’s writing was clear and poignant and highly entertaining. As with some memoirs, I found it easy to identify with her dysfunctional family life. Her matter of fact reciting of sometimes tragic reality and hard truths was hilarious at times. She’s a master writer and storyteller and I highly recommend this book.

[Jean Egan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I wasn't sure what to expect, but after beginning this book, I was rapt with the eccentric character of Deborah's father and her open and uncensored experiences of family politics and how each person dealt with loss differently.

[Kirsten · Rating 5 out of 5]

Outstanding! Very well written and totally engaging! Great insights. I didn’t want it to end. I hope Deborah does a follow-up book!!! 🎉 I want to know HOW she and her family survived :-). There are some hints but I want to learn more. ☺️ My heart resonated with her

[Karlee Hughes · Rating 3 out of 5]

Vaguely interesting

I was interested in her story to a point. It seemed gratuitous in a way and I’m sure was very cathartic for her.

[Rebecca Kuder · Rating 5 out of 5]

Deborah Lott’s memoir, Don’t Go Crazy Without Me, is an embodied act of generosity. The narrator shares her life, turns everything inside out, paws through debris, so we can see how it’s possible for people to love and survive. She writes with unwavering clarity and precision. She never varnishes things, never looks away or shrinks from writing about the intricacy, the sticky quality of finding oneself born into a situation, and staying deeply tied to the other humans who live there.

Reading this narrative—enjoying how boldly and beautifully it’s told—I feel a sense of openhearted optimism. A sense of hope, of humanity’s possibility of survival.

Also delectable is how Lott shares a riveting glimpse into the early writer’s psyche, her awareness about what it is to be a writer. Here are a few bright bits:

p. 186:

“I wrote in the persona of an orphan, inspired by the cheesy Keane print of a huge-eyed, sad girl harlequin that adorned my bedroom wall as my patron saint. The girl in the painting, like the speaker in my poems, was an unloved, misunderstood waif. I wrote in the persona of a child grieving and then turning away from her mother, whose true state she finally recognizes: Look up at me, mother, and feel a moist eye / look up at me, mother / for mother I cry / …so bury your face / and I’ll cover your head. I must walk alone now / for mother you’re dead. I wrote as the confused, estranged girl who, a la some episodes of The Twilight Zone, suddenly realizes that she is dead herself: Don’t hate me / Don’t hate me with wet eyes / Talk to me / Don’t let me cry / …I’ll never know why you were that way / Why did you have to go? / Because I’m dead, you wouldn’t stay?”

[For me, this passage recalled that particular sheen of 1960s & 70s sadness…that ubiquitous art by Keane, from childhood…the images of freaky-sad children and animals that I remember spanned the walls of our veterinarian’s office…I hadn’t thought about how haunting those images were for a long time. Recalling them made me wonder if they were an early seed for my own writing about orphans, or the sense of being an orphan.]

p. 199:

“On the walls of my bedroom, I hung up my poems. They were close enough for a foot to touch when I lay in bed and stretched one leg out toward the cool wall. I’d copied them with colored markers onto butcher paper in my own approximation of calligraphy. In this graphic form, they provided an assertion of self larger than on the pages of my notebook or diary. I saw them when I woke up every morning, and they provided the backdrop as I fell asleep. This is who you are, they said, a writer, an observer, a fighter for freedom and justice. Hang on.”

And finally, on p. 250 (a conversation between the narrator and her brother, as adults)

“‘You know, I’m writing a memoir about our family,’ I say. ‘Do you want to read it?’

‘I’m not sure. I bet if I wrote it, though, it would be a much different story.’

‘To the writer belongs the story. You could write your own version; no one’s stopping you. Maybe if you wrote, you wouldn’t have to hold onto so much actual stuff. Maybe you could find some peace in writing about it.’

‘Has it given you peace?’

I laugh. My brother knows better.

‘At least it takes up less room in my house.’”

May you, too, enjoy this powerful and life-affirming memoir.

[Melissa Greenwood · Rating 5 out of 5]

Lott's memoir about growing up in a complicated, Jewish family resonated with me deeply. On the surface, her story is about her father's mental illness and the resulting divisions and alliances formed within her family unit. But it's more than that. It's a coming-of-age story, a story about feeling like an outsider within your community and in your own home, and a beautifully written and embodied account (she covers everything from masturbation to sex to enemas) of emerging, despite all odds, "intact and alive" and "for at least a time"--seen.

[Hailey Skinner · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book made me highly uncomfortable with its heavy detail… probably the point I guess but not in a way I liked