The New York Times Review for DFMIL
January 5th, 2010 by Richard under dontfollowmeimlost. No Comments.
The Gray Lady approves.
Inevitable movie they say. You listening, Hollywood?
Archive for 'dontfollowmeimlost'
Some Very Pleasant Reviews
December 31st, 2009 by Richard under dontfollowmeimlost. No Comments.
A couple nice reviews out there for Don’t Follow Me, I’m Lost out across the internet.
Patrick Brown at the The Millions begins
This is the first book review I’ve written in nearly three years, since I hung up my reviewing socks following a stint at Publishers Weekly’s online division, where I was paid handsomely in American currency to review books about sports and music. Those books were assigned to me based on a rough affinity for the subject matter. I liked baseball and Phil Spector music and funny writing, so I was assigned books about baseball, Phil Spector and the music industry, naturally.
Despite my purported interest in the subject matter, however, I often disliked the books assigned to me. Perhaps this was a residual effect of years of assigned reading at school. These books, looming over my reading list like a colonoscopy, found me angry and tired. Still, I gave them a fair shake. A few rose above to really impress me. Others offered diversion or momentary entertainment before lapsing into unrelenting mediocrity. Several were nearly too dreadful to finish.
Read it all here.
And on the blog of the great Pasadena book mecca Vrommans, a completely different Patrick was also very kind.
There are also a handful of not-friendly reviews out there, which strangely I don’t have the links to handy, but having written plenty of not-friendly things in my life about others’ work, I say all the better; slams are very welcome.
Overall, if you look at the Goodreads ratings for instance, seems my little memoir either gets zero to one stars or four-to-five stars; readers either love it or throw it down in disgust. Which is the most one can ask for. The most common question from the critics seems to be, why should I care about these inert, cretinous characters? My first reaction to that is, if you don’t, then you shouldn’t. I can’t convince to care about something that didn’t evoke empathy on the page.
But I think I need a better answer than that. My first new year’s resolution is to come up with one. Watch this space.
And as ever, complete info and ordering links right here.
Don’t Follow Me Returns to Hampshire Soil
December 12th, 2009 by Richard under dontfollowmeimlost. 1 Comment.
This week I returned to Hampshire College to read from my memoirs of the my long-forgotten time there, Don’t Follow Me, I’m Lost. All in all a delightful visit and I especially enjoyed hearing from the current students their thoughts on the book. The crowd seemed about evenly divided between boos and applause, as it should be.
Below are video excerpts from the Q and A session. The audio is pretty rough in spots unfortunately.
Many thanks to current Hampshire student Christopher Blyler for putting the event together; truly an inquiring young man in the classic Hampshire mold who ended up asking me the toughest question of the night.
First video is below. The rest are after the jump.
My Visit to the Red Eye
December 10th, 2009 by Richard under dontfollowmeimlost. No Comments.
As with everything in my life, the shadow of Blind Date blocks out all other light.
Memoiring in the Facebook Age
November 28th, 2009 by Richard under dontfollowmeimlost. No Comments.
I’ve got a piece up on The Daily Beast about the pressures of trying to write a memoir in this new social networking age when the past is online ready to chat all day and won’t stand back far enough to let you form detached theories about it. It begins:
Around 2004, I began writing the memoirs of my wayward college years in the mid-1980s. My writing was initially inspired by news of the death of one of my old classmates. It had been more than a decade since I had last seen my friend, whom I call Frank in the book—and his death from a drug overdose came after years spent adrift, floating through life; a road that many of my peers had taken. On learning of Frank’s death, my thoughts drifted back to those chaotic times 20 years ago, when the party of the ’70s and ’80s had given way to the earnestness of the ’90s, and many of my generation, caught between the two eras, had made their stand by checking out in a nihilistic wave that would become known as grunge.
Looking back in time, I saw that in that brief moment, something had been permanently knocked loose for many of my peers, and I began writing my book to figure out what it had been. When I started writing, I was only in contact with a handful of college acquaintances, and reflecting back on my wayward youth, reading through old papers and journals, became a pleasantly wistful bit of therapy.
Read the rest here.
DFMIL In and Around the Media
November 18th, 2009 by Richard under dontfollowmeimlost. No Comments.
Some nice notices for and about the book around the internet for all your Don’t Follow Me, I’m Lost, a Memoir of Hampshire College in the Twilight of the 80’s needs.
• My former LA Times colleague Scott Timberg did a very nice interview with me for his blog, which you can read right here.
• The NY Post gave us a very nice review.
• We had a lovely write-up on The Readers Book Blog.
• And this is from a week back but was interviewed by Media Bistro’s Tina Dupuy about me and the media.
More to come! As ever, click here to find out much more more about this thrilling adventure.
Don’t Follow Me, I’m Lost news – 1 Week To Go
October 27th, 2009 by Richard under dontfollowmeimlost. No Comments.
Just a week left until the story will be told. Getting down to the wire and hearing some interesting murmurs both of curiosity and anger from the Hampshire campus.
Got a lovely plug today from Daily Candy, which recommended reading DFMIL on a spa weekend.
Things are heating up over at the Facebook group, where the forces for and against the book are firing their first salvos. Why not do yourself a favor and join today?
And as ever, check out all the pertinent links to buy or learn more right here.
And then here is your old Hampshire pic #006. Enjoy.
100 Old Hampshire Photos #005
October 21st, 2009 by Richard under dontfollowmeimlost. No Comments.
All part of the thrilling countdown to the release of my book, Don’t Follow Me, I’m Lost: A Memoir of Hampshire College at the Twilight of the 80’s. To buy it today or to learn more, click here.
100 Old Hampshire Photos #005
October 15th, 2009 by Richard under dontfollowmeimlost. 2 Comments.
All part of the thrilling countdown to the release of my book, Don’t Follow Me, I’m Lost: A Memoir of Hampshire College at the Twilight of the 80’s. To buy it today, click here.
At last, the story will be told
October 14th, 2009 by Richard under dontfollowmeimlost. No Comments.
Click here to order today!
