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In the Early Times: A Life Reframed
In this memoir, acclaimed New Yorker staff writer Tad Friend reflects on the pressures of middle age, exploring his relationship with his dying father as he raises two children of his own.
Almost everyone yearns to know their parents more thoroughly before they die, to solve some of those lifelong mysteries. Maybe, just maybe, those answers will help you live your own life. But life doesn't stop to wait. In his fifties, New Yorker writer Tad Friend is grappling with being a husband and a father as he tries to grasp who he is as a son. Torn between two families, he careens between two stages in life. On some days he feels vigorous, on the brink of greatness when he plays tournament squash. On others, he feels distinctly weary, troubled by his distance from millennial sensibilities or by his own face in the mirror, by a grimace that's so like his father's.
His father, an erudite historian and the former president of Swarthmore College, has long been gregarious and charming with strangers yet cerebral with his children. Tad writes that "trying to reach him always felt like ice fishing." Yet now Tad's father, known to his family as Day, seems concerned chiefly with the flavor of ice cream in his bowl and, when pushed, interested only in reconsidering his view of Franklin Roosevelt.
Then Tad finds his father's journal, a trove of passionate confessions that reveals a man entirely different from the exasperatingly logical father Day was so determined to be. It turns out that Tad has been self-destructing in the same way Day has--a secret each has kept from everyone, even themselves. These discoveries make Tad reconsider his own role, as a father, as a husband, and as a son. But is it too late for both of them?
Witty, searching, and profound, In the Early Times is an enduring meditation on the shifting tides of memory and the unsteady pillars on which every family rests.
Almost everyone yearns to know their parents more thoroughly before they die, to solve some of those lifelong mysteries. Maybe, just maybe, those answers will help you live your own life. But life doesn't stop to wait. In his fifties, New Yorker writer Tad Friend is grappling with being a husband and a father as he tries to grasp who he is as a son. Torn between two families, he careens between two stages in life. On some days he feels vigorous, on the brink of greatness when he plays tournament squash. On others, he feels distinctly weary, troubled by his distance from millennial sensibilities or by his own face in the mirror, by a grimace that's so like his father's.
His father, an erudite historian and the former president of Swarthmore College, has long been gregarious and charming with strangers yet cerebral with his children. Tad writes that "trying to reach him always felt like ice fishing." Yet now Tad's father, known to his family as Day, seems concerned chiefly with the flavor of ice cream in his bowl and, when pushed, interested only in reconsidering his view of Franklin Roosevelt.
Then Tad finds his father's journal, a trove of passionate confessions that reveals a man entirely different from the exasperatingly logical father Day was so determined to be. It turns out that Tad has been self-destructing in the same way Day has--a secret each has kept from everyone, even themselves. These discoveries make Tad reconsider his own role, as a father, as a husband, and as a son. But is it too late for both of them?
Witty, searching, and profound, In the Early Times is an enduring meditation on the shifting tides of memory and the unsteady pillars on which every family rests.
288 pages, Hardcover
First published May 10, 2022
23 people are currently reading
2201 people want to read
About the author
Tad Friend
5 books37 followersTad Friend has been a staff writer at "The New Yorker" since 1998. His memoir "Cheerful Money" was chosen as one of the year's best books by "The Washington Post," "The Chicago Tribune," The San Francisco Chronicle," and NPR. His new book about his search for his father, "In the Early Times," comes out in May of 2022.. He lives in Brooklyn with his wife, Amanda Hesser--the founder of Food 52--and their fifteen-year-old twins.
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Displaying 1 - 29 of 29 reviews
May 31, 2022
In The Early Times: A Life Reframed (2022) is a deeply profound and beautifully written family memoir and tribute to his late father, that highlights the father-son bond with an intense insight and clarity. Tad Friend is an award -winning author and staff writer for the New Yorker Magazine (1998-).
Theodore Wood Friend III, (1931-2020) known as “Dorie” to his colleagues and “Day” to his family, was a highly intelligent distinguished professional academic, administrator-educator, world traveler, and notable scholar. Gerald R. Ford and George H.W. Bush were included in a cherished family photograph related to Day’s service at the Eisenhower Exchange Fellowship (1984-96)—although he was primarily recognized for his presidency at Swarthmore College. When he was 65, Day retired to care for his wife Elizabeth that later died from cancer (2003), he never remarried.
As Day faced his declining years, he was cared for by a professional team of 24-hour care staff in the family home in Villanova. Tad wrote about this end-of-life period with the utmost dignity and respect. Tad read nearly everything Day wrote for publication and was surprised to learn that he was his father’s favorite living writer-- Day was usually critical and seldom offered any praise for his son’s work. Eventually Tad would examine undisclosed unpleasant truths and betrayals about his father’s private life— and how closely his own role as a husband and family man was similar. An agonizing courageous examination of his own life would follow that would lead him in a direction of genuine happiness and fulfillment. **With appreciation to the Seattle Public Library.
Theodore Wood Friend III, (1931-2020) known as “Dorie” to his colleagues and “Day” to his family, was a highly intelligent distinguished professional academic, administrator-educator, world traveler, and notable scholar. Gerald R. Ford and George H.W. Bush were included in a cherished family photograph related to Day’s service at the Eisenhower Exchange Fellowship (1984-96)—although he was primarily recognized for his presidency at Swarthmore College. When he was 65, Day retired to care for his wife Elizabeth that later died from cancer (2003), he never remarried.
As Day faced his declining years, he was cared for by a professional team of 24-hour care staff in the family home in Villanova. Tad wrote about this end-of-life period with the utmost dignity and respect. Tad read nearly everything Day wrote for publication and was surprised to learn that he was his father’s favorite living writer-- Day was usually critical and seldom offered any praise for his son’s work. Eventually Tad would examine undisclosed unpleasant truths and betrayals about his father’s private life— and how closely his own role as a husband and family man was similar. An agonizing courageous examination of his own life would follow that would lead him in a direction of genuine happiness and fulfillment. **With appreciation to the Seattle Public Library.
July 13, 2022
Tad Friend what a great book. The hardships that are written about may not have the intensity you see in other memoirs, but the author humanizes things so well. The writing in this part memoir, part biography of the author's father, is absorbing, and I found the exploration of the lives of the various actors compelling, far more than I would have expected, considering they are writing from points of privilege that few of us will ever experience. Highly recommend.
Want to read
May 20, 2022A DNF for me.
First off, thank you Goodreads for giving me the opportunity to read this book. I love the Goodreads Giveaway program!
The book: A memoir of sorts, jumping from one time period to another as a man tries to understand a somewhat difficult-to-understand father. Maybe. It does appear to me, that from what I read - all the anecdotes, the written work his father left, the home movies, etc. - that Mr. Friend was left with a FULL READING of who and what and why his father was. Most of us don't get half this.
Okay, I'm speaking for that nebulous 'most of us.' When actually I can only compare to my own experience: I adored my father, full-on, but he was the quietest man on Earth. So, there's my background and what I bring to reading a book like this.
But well-written, amusing in part, though also tedious as one 'cute thing' the author's children did, or that he did, or that they said, or he said, and how his wife reacted goes on and on and on...
I found it tiresome and the kind of book that means the most to those who knew the man, lived with him, loved him, saw him on a regular basis etc. This means family, friends, close colleagues and associates. I quit about a third of the way in...
And I'm a WASP, too.
First off, thank you Goodreads for giving me the opportunity to read this book. I love the Goodreads Giveaway program!
The book: A memoir of sorts, jumping from one time period to another as a man tries to understand a somewhat difficult-to-understand father. Maybe. It does appear to me, that from what I read - all the anecdotes, the written work his father left, the home movies, etc. - that Mr. Friend was left with a FULL READING of who and what and why his father was. Most of us don't get half this.
Okay, I'm speaking for that nebulous 'most of us.' When actually I can only compare to my own experience: I adored my father, full-on, but he was the quietest man on Earth. So, there's my background and what I bring to reading a book like this.
But well-written, amusing in part, though also tedious as one 'cute thing' the author's children did, or that he did, or that they said, or he said, and how his wife reacted goes on and on and on...
I found it tiresome and the kind of book that means the most to those who knew the man, lived with him, loved him, saw him on a regular basis etc. This means family, friends, close colleagues and associates. I quit about a third of the way in...
And I'm a WASP, too.
May 12, 2022
My thanks to Crown Publishing and NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review an early copy of In the Early Times: A Life Reframed.
This book tells the story of New Yorker writer Tad Friend, who is grappling with being a husband and a father as he tries to grasp who he is as a son.
In reviews, the book has been called witty, searching, and profound. I'm sad to say that I'm apparently not the target audience. I struggled with the chapters not being in chronological order and also with how wordy the book was. Ultimately, it was a DNF for me.
Don't let my review prevent you from giving Early Times a try, though!
This book tells the story of New Yorker writer Tad Friend, who is grappling with being a husband and a father as he tries to grasp who he is as a son.
In reviews, the book has been called witty, searching, and profound. I'm sad to say that I'm apparently not the target audience. I struggled with the chapters not being in chronological order and also with how wordy the book was. Ultimately, it was a DNF for me.
Don't let my review prevent you from giving Early Times a try, though!
July 14, 2022
I tend to read memoirs written by women, not one about a man looking back at his relationship with his father and then his own with his children. I’ve followed Tad Friend’s writing in The New Yorker for years, and have been a devoted follower of his wife, Amanda Hesser, and her career, from The New York Times to the creation of Food52 (and if you’ve read her own memoir, he’s Mr. Latte), so I wanted to read this. I follow Amanda on Instagram and watch her perfect Brooklyn life with green-eyed envy; her writer husband (who always looks like an old curmudgeon) and whip-smart twins (of course, a boy and a girl), spending the month of August on Long Island at the family home every year and taking long family trips around the world. But as always, nothing is as real as it seems from your phone. Friend examines his relationship with his father, and the way I see it, he wanted him to be a different person. When you’re in your 50s and dad is in his 80s, isn’t it time to just accept that is the way he is? That push and pull grew weary. But it is only in the last chapter, 25 pages, that he reveals his wife’s discovery that he’d been cheating for almost their entire 20-year marriage (although the reader knew this all along). But he didn’t want to delve deeply, finishing the book with a few therapy sessions, a couple of fights, a picture of the two of them smiling at the camera, and a nice bow.
Perhaps there was a reason this book, which came out in May, already was found on the remainder table less than two months later. Friend is a fantastic writer, a bit pretentious (“I was a lanky sprig”), but clearly writes only about what he wants to and skirts those issues he doesn’t want to examine. A writer’s prerogative, yes, but one that makes for a less than deep and satisfying memoir.
Perhaps there was a reason this book, which came out in May, already was found on the remainder table less than two months later. Friend is a fantastic writer, a bit pretentious (“I was a lanky sprig”), but clearly writes only about what he wants to and skirts those issues he doesn’t want to examine. A writer’s prerogative, yes, but one that makes for a less than deep and satisfying memoir.
June 22, 2022
The first three quarters was amazing, a perfect memoir. The last couple of chapters seemed like a driver way over correcting on a highway.
Still highly recommend.
Still highly recommend.
January 6, 2023
A longtime New Yorker writer, Tad Friend can write some beautiful sentences. However, I found this memoir to be overly intellectualized, self indulgent, and not terribly engaging.
April 9, 2024
Aside from the 20 odd pages about this man’s sorry affairs, this book failed to captivate. The author has a meandering style that is maddening and tries much too hard to show off his vocabulary. A waste of time.
May 9, 2022
I received an ARC of this book free through a Goodreads giveaway. While I found this intetresting, the shifting from one time frame to another tended to be a bit confusing. This pages shows my copy as hardback, but I have a paperback edition.
November 10, 2022
I kind of went out of my way to read this and although I'm not sad I did, it was more of a chore than I thought it would be.
I've read Tad Friend in the New Yorker for years and I'm familiar with his wife Amanda Hesser through the New York Times cookbook as well as Food52. This memoir promised to detail Friend's infidelity and that piqued my interest. But then I had a couple feelings: first, it's none of my business and I felt weird reading about something so personal that is only being made more public because the couple is (semi) famous. Second, I couldn't help but judge him!
The writing for this memoir is great. I liked the observations Friend made about his relationship with his father and especially his kids. Yeah, it jumps around but I felt that's how life is. We think about the past while also focusing on acute family things in present time.
There was too much about squash! Which really means there is too much about WASPs. I knew this going in and still had to hold my face to keep my eyes from rolling out of my head.
I understand this was revised after Hesser discovered the infidelities but it's all still too close in time and I just didn't see real reflection.
I just really fall in the middle of liking this.
I've read Tad Friend in the New Yorker for years and I'm familiar with his wife Amanda Hesser through the New York Times cookbook as well as Food52. This memoir promised to detail Friend's infidelity and that piqued my interest. But then I had a couple feelings: first, it's none of my business and I felt weird reading about something so personal that is only being made more public because the couple is (semi) famous. Second, I couldn't help but judge him!
The writing for this memoir is great. I liked the observations Friend made about his relationship with his father and especially his kids. Yeah, it jumps around but I felt that's how life is. We think about the past while also focusing on acute family things in present time.
There was too much about squash! Which really means there is too much about WASPs. I knew this going in and still had to hold my face to keep my eyes from rolling out of my head.
I understand this was revised after Hesser discovered the infidelities but it's all still too close in time and I just didn't see real reflection.
I just really fall in the middle of liking this.
July 29, 2022
Okay, so I like Friend's author voice. I came to enjoy his father's struggles with being a good man, grappling with what he felt to be the right thing to do, failing, etc. And then I found myself questioning the story arc, as in, why are we spending so much time on the wife and children when we were initially led to believe the book was about the author's father? So I course-corrected and let the author lead me elsewhere. However, I was then led to page after page after page of writing about the game of squash. Squash??? So I again wondered where the author was leading me. I must say, his wife was FAR, FAR, FAR quicker to forgive than seemed realistic. This leads me to believe that we were not let in fully on her struggle to grapple with and forgive, for her process appeared quite linear and uncomplicated.
And although I enjoyed hearing about the cute things his children said and did, this contributed to my confusion regarding what the book was really about. If anyone asked me, I'd have to say, "It's about the author's family." It's not that Friend isn't a good writer, I just didn't grasp a cohesive theme.
And although I enjoyed hearing about the cute things his children said and did, this contributed to my confusion regarding what the book was really about. If anyone asked me, I'd have to say, "It's about the author's family." It's not that Friend isn't a good writer, I just didn't grasp a cohesive theme.
August 9, 2022
Friend's story was engrossing from the first page. I have already read, "Cheerful Money," so I was familiar with his family and his life. He was very open about his struggles with money and his conflicts with his father who was also a writer. But the love for his family comes through.
My husband Asad is a squash player so I found the whole chapter about squash fascinating. It answers the questions about the appeal of this intense, ultra-competitive sport. In fact, Asad beat Tad in the Milt Ross semifinals one year!
Friend writes openly about his infidelities and his wife's anger and hurt when she finds out by reading his journals. I would have liked to read more introspection about why he had the affairs, especially the one with Martha who lives in New York. I thought writing about them in a journal his wife could find was a way of letting her find out.
I wondered if he had changed the names of the women.
Having grown up in Africa I found this story about a WASP family revealing and I learned a lot about social mores. Even if you are not married to a squash fanatic, "The Early Times," is well worth reading.
My husband Asad is a squash player so I found the whole chapter about squash fascinating. It answers the questions about the appeal of this intense, ultra-competitive sport. In fact, Asad beat Tad in the Milt Ross semifinals one year!
Friend writes openly about his infidelities and his wife's anger and hurt when she finds out by reading his journals. I would have liked to read more introspection about why he had the affairs, especially the one with Martha who lives in New York. I thought writing about them in a journal his wife could find was a way of letting her find out.
I wondered if he had changed the names of the women.
Having grown up in Africa I found this story about a WASP family revealing and I learned a lot about social mores. Even if you are not married to a squash fanatic, "The Early Times," is well worth reading.
May 30, 2022
The writing in this part memoir, part biography of the author's father, is superb, and I found the exploration of the lives of the various actors compelling, far more than I would have expected, considering they are writing from points of privilege that few of us will ever experience. The hardships that are written about may not have the intensity you see in other memoirs, but the author humanizes things so well, and writes so masterfully, that it becomes a very absorbing read. There is a confessional element, which becomes well evident in the latter half of the book, that may not appeal to some readers as much, but it becomes clear why the author had to write about his own painful journey.
June 4, 2022
I received an advanced proof of the book from goodreads which is always nice. The book jumps back and forth so much between people and time frames that was confusing at times and caused me to lose interest quickly. I found I hated their pet names for each other, not sure why. Just another poor little rich family that wants you to feel sorry for them. Oh, come on. Couldn't bring myself to finish it. Additionally, very early in the book there is one very disgusting passage regarding sex that was so gross that I almost threw the book out and I am no prude. There was no need for that to be in the book and I feel it should be removed before the final copy of the book is published.
June 12, 2022
This writing is proscribed to all. Why do I comment? Because some of the subject matter was irrelevant to me (squash), (tennis), yet I read with gusto. Some of it was upsetting, yet blithely noted, yet I read with gusto. Tad Friend tells many tales of his childhood WASP life, along with family life of Brooklynites, glances into the career of his wife, founder of Food 52(longtime subscriber), amid many other topics of interest. Memoirs do not usually engage me. This one kept me guessing. It is to be noted that his honesty is blatant, which is a trait which would gather me back to read his next installment.
April 14, 2023
I loved Cheerful Money, so I was really looking forward to this read. Sadly, I was so disappointed. Day Friend did not, to me, seem worthy of his son’s efforts. The book paints him to be a cold, entitled, egotistical, self-centered, intellectual snob. I’m not sure if the son wanted to be the man his father was or if the father wanted to be the man his son is. Either way, both came up lacking. I’m also sad to discover that Tad has true feet of clay. Amanda Hesser deserves a Nobel Prize for hanging in there with him. At any event, I do hope the two men are not and were not the the bastards this book portrays them to be.
September 3, 2022
Really extraordinary. It won’t strike everyone the same way but for me it’s of a piece with Four Thousand Weeks and The Rules of Inheritance and Crying In H Mart. What do you hang on to when there’s only so much time left, when you lose people you love, when you can see you’re losing yourself? Friend’s dry, quiet delivery in the audiobook makes the story more powerful.
October 2, 2022
I really enjoy memoirs and this one was very well written. Maybe because I am of a certain age, am from a waspy family and live in Brooklyn that Tad Friend’s memoir of his relationship with his parents resonated with me. I also think his wife is very brave to have this out in the world exposing their marriage.
October 17, 2022
It took me a while to get into this book. Though beautifully written, the author's preoccupation with his father and dithering opinion of himself kept me at a distance. It became human to me towards the end, when his father is infirm yet as gregarious as ever, and the author has access to the journals his father kept. It was as if a black and white memory suddenly became full color.
June 6, 2022
Friend has a wonderfully precise way with words and consice expression of ideas.
His life story mirrored many of my own experiences growing and being a parent. Though, I think he may have done better because of his willingness to be introspective early on.
His life story mirrored many of my own experiences growing and being a parent. Though, I think he may have done better because of his willingness to be introspective early on.
February 21, 2023
Author Tad Friend has apparently been quite successful, but this book just didn't work for me. I wound up skipping most of it, as it seems to be mostly filled with his worries about things that wound up never happening.
February 16, 2024
Wow do I have some thoughts about this memoir. Mostly, the audacity of the author to bare others' inner lives, with and without their consent. More I could say, but this is not a recommended read for me.
June 13, 2022
Beautifully written about family—both your family of origin and the one you create.
August 26, 2022
I won this book in a Goodreads giveaway.
So excited to read this memoir, but DNF
Part of it was the hopping around in time, but also partly felt that some things just shouldn’t be shared in print.
So excited to read this memoir, but DNF
Part of it was the hopping around in time, but also partly felt that some things just shouldn’t be shared in print.
January 18, 2023
Don't waste your time. This book tells the uninteresting story of the Friends life using big words. After reading this book you will hate the Friend family.
January 24, 2023
Eh. Interesting and satisfyingly salacious at times, droning and self-pitying at others. I hope Mr. Friend continues to worship his wife, because she's a saint as far as he's concerned.
September 27, 2024
How the author finds how similar he is to his father. Won on Goodreads.
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October 21, 2022Not to my taste. I remind myself: everyone should be able to tell their own story, and the author is a good writer who attempts to be mostly truthful in the telling (although I agree with the comment by GR reviewer, Roxanne, who writes that the last third of the book reminded her of a driver who overcorrects. I would add: after nearly driving over a cliff. To me, the section feels quickly patched in and performative).
I liked the kids and their various observations and comments, though I rolled my eyes at the scene in which the eight-year-old daughter announces she wanted to be a poet and the author reports that his wife was "vigorously shaking her head," presumably because poetry is a low-earning career.
Ultimately, the entire memoir feels choppy and uneven and I think it could have been much better with one more round of structural editing.
Finally, I'm not sure that it was worth the price of admission, but I liked this clever line written by the author's father: “A poem,” he wrote, “is the child of an instant mated with a constant.”
I liked the kids and their various observations and comments, though I rolled my eyes at the scene in which the eight-year-old daughter announces she wanted to be a poet and the author reports that his wife was "vigorously shaking her head," presumably because poetry is a low-earning career.
Ultimately, the entire memoir feels choppy and uneven and I think it could have been much better with one more round of structural editing.
Finally, I'm not sure that it was worth the price of admission, but I liked this clever line written by the author's father: “A poem,” he wrote, “is the child of an instant mated with a constant.”
December 25, 2023
Friend, a writer for The New Yorker, is a gifted wordsmith, and I really enjoyed his work here. Say what you will, the man can turn a phrase. Others have been put off by the way this memoir jumps around in time, but I found that that somewhat disorienting structure helped me feel Friend's challenge and maybe his own disorientation in trying to understand his complex relationships with his father, his family, his marriage, his grief, the social construct into which he was born, and ultimately himself. It would be easy to dismiss this story - oh, these poor privileged rich white people, who cares? But everyone has a story, and it's impossible to know what's going on inside someone else. That's what's important. I wish that Friend had been able to let this draft of the story rest for awhile, that he could have picked it up again and finished it, say, five years from now. He's a well-connected pro writer, though, so maybe (probably) there'll be a follow up. I'm skeptical of the happy ending: I came clean, my amazing wife forgave me, we both worked hard in therapy, we saved our marriage, and now I've undone a whole lifetime and a few prior generations of conditioning in less than a year and everything is fine. Like I said, I'd be curious to see where they're all at in five years.
Displaying 1 - 29 of 29 reviews