I’d been looking forward to reading My Fair Lazy since Jen Lancaster first announced it about 18 months ago. Her attempt to become more cultured and less reality TV-obsessed, it involves her “eating the world”, learning about wine, trying smelly cheese (and liking it!), falling in love with Edith Wharton and in hate with Eudora Welty, and learning to make polite conversation rather than getting drunk and talking about The Real Housewives of Wherever.
I have to admit to being a little disappointed that so much of Lancaster’s “Jenaissance” is reported to us after the fact, in conversations with her friends rather than a play-by-play of events themselves, and I would have loved it if she’d taken etiquette classes rather than just had lunch with a posh blogger, but she moved house, had pet problems, and was on a book tour during much of her research time, which all clearly put a crimp in her style.
Still, any book of Lancaster’s is always full of her trademark humour, and having read most of her previous memoirs, a glimpse into her world is like a visit from a very funny old friend (the Twitter transcript — the result of an Ambien + wine induced intoxication — is worth the cover price alone). Plus, it totally made me want to try some weird new food. What more do you want from a memoir?
*Thank you to Penguin/NAL for the review copy.
“If you’ve got time to spare, money to burn, and an desire to read Jay-Z‘s memoir Decoded before its release date, join the new Bing.com sponsored advertising campaign. Specific pages of Jay-Z’s memoir will be available at different locations. Fans can join the scavenger hunt and locate these pages using the Bing.com/Jay-Z site. There are prizes as well. Players who discover the pages first can win signed copies of Decoded. The grand prize is a trip to Las Vegas to see Jay-Z and Coldplay play a New Year’s Eve in concert.” —
I guess the prize would be worth having for a big fan, and it’s definitely a different way to promote a memoir, but I certainly couldn’t be bothered to chase around town searching for Jay-Z’s words of wisdom. If it was Beyonce, that would be a different matter.
Today might be Wednesday to you, but to me, it’s Apprentice day. Yay! The contestants may no longer call him “Surallen” (he’s a Lord now, you know) but Alan Sugar’s still showing up to teach those rapscallion wannabe business peeps a thing or two. (And boy do they need it, this series more than ever.) Anyhoo, inevitably, ol’ Alan has just released his autobiography about his rise from ‘umble cockney charmer (or something) to Viglen seller, TV star, and peer of the realm. According to the blurb, it’s “forthright, funny and sometimes controversial”.
“Salman Rushdie has revealed that he has already written 100 pages of the memoir that will tell the story of his decade in hiding under the threat of death.” —
Salman Rushdie at work on fatwa memoir
Now this sounds interesting.
The fact that I haven’t yet reviewed Shauna Reid’s The Amazing Adventures of Dietgirl shouldn’t be taken to mean that I didn’t read and love it, because I did, and I do. While some weight loss stories never really touch on the important stuff — like the feelings underneath over-eating — Shauna faces the truth about herself and her (for want of a better word) issues whilst remaining humble, funny, and inspiring. Her book’s not just about a young woman losing weight, but a woman learning to live. (I know, this is a bit of a gushfest, but you should read it.)
I’m so pleased Shauna (left) agreed to answer my probing questions:
We’re all about keeping things short and sweet here at Memoir Armoire, so could you describe your book in five words?
Lard lost, fun found… hilarity! (Dude that’s really hard!)
What are some of your favourite memoirs (apart from your own)?
Bit of Blur by Alex James (it’s OTT but irresistable if you’re a fan), A Homemade Life by Molly Wizenberg, This is Paradise! by Hyok Kang
What’s your top tip for aspiring memoir writers?
Ransack your life with a sense of humour and a big machete — be ruthless about cutting scenes and people who may be lovely but not good for the story.
What are you working on now and/or releasing next?
Working on a novel that is so rubbish right now it may never see the light of day. Help!
Please plug your website(s) and any other non-book projects we should know about:
Dietgirl [the blog that begat the book].
Podcast: Two Fit Chicks
“A new book is out from Fr. Gabriele Amorth, the Vatican’s chief exorcist. The title is Confessions of an Exorcist. It’s in paperback, and … in French. This is a bummer; but I hope it’s only a temporary bummer. (Of course it’s in Italian as well, titled Memoirs of an Exorcist.)” —
Gabriele Amorth publishes his ‘Confessions’
So this sounds… Different.
Thanks to lovely Red Editor Sam Baker’s twitter feed, I now know not only that Nora Ephron has a new memoir, I Remember Nothing, out next month but that you can read an extract in US Vogue right now. I expect I’ll have already read some of these pieces in The New Yorker or on the Huffington Post, but recycled Nora is better than new almost-everyone-else, and there’s bound to be some new and exclusive stuff, too.
I can’t wait.
Confession: when I hear the words “sex blogger”, I cringe a little. I’ve never bought into that whole “having loads of sex for the sake of it is super-feminist” myth.
But while Lena Chen became famous for her blog The Sex and the Ivy (about her sex life at Harvard) she doesn’t subscribe to the idea that having sex with a lot of people is in itself feminist. She’s more interested in challenging our expectations about sex, gender, and sexuality, like with her conference, Rethinking Virginity.
Now graduated, with an impressive list of publishing credits um, under her belt, she often mentions her desire to publish a memoir — and I’ve no doubt she will.
Until then, keep up with Lena’s freelance writing, globe-hopping, feminist-promoting adventures at The Ch!cktionary, her regularly-updated blog, or at GURL.com, where she’s the editor of the health, sex, and relationships channel.
[Photo credit: Patrick Hamm: via]
Previously: Memoirist of the Future: Jamie Varon.
It's Tina Fey's Book, "Bossypants"! -
I’m not one of those Tina Fey fangirls who think everything she does is wonderful, but I do think she’s interesting, clever, and talented, and I’ll definitely want to read her new memoir/essay collection.
Which this may or may not be the cover for, creepy man hands and all.
Will you be buying?
I first heard of Julie Klam in Jancee Dunn’s book. Any writer friend of Jancee’s is someone I want to read, I thought, and Klam’s own memoir, Please Excuse My Daughter, didn’t disappoint. A memoir-in-essays which explores her childhood as a pampered only daughter (her mom would get her out of school to go shopping, hence the title) and her reluctance to grow up and take charge of her life, Klam is funny, self-deprecating and easy to relate to. Although the true story of her Mafia-linked ex-boyfriend is a little less so… (But still completely compelling.) Her next book, You Had Me At Woof, is out on October 28, and I can’t wait.