Heather B. Armstrong is best known for her blog, Dooce.com. She has become a major presence on the internet, and now she has made the leap to the page. Armstrong, along with several other prominent bloggers, has put together a book called Things I Learned about My Dad (in Therapy).
Things I Learned about My Dad (in Therapy) is a collection of essays about, what else? Fatherhood! In this book, fatherhood is discussed from the point of view of both the father and the child. The essays are hilarious, thought provoking and a few will definitely leave you feeling choked up. Far from a preachy tome of “how to be a good father,” this book is more of “here’s a story of me as a Dad or here’s what I remember about my Dad.” It approaches fatherhood in much the way family members share memories when they gather together at family reunions.
The book easily could delve into the older “do as I say, not as I do” teaching style of other fatherhood books but instead delivers a wonderful look at fatherhood as seen from the eyes of fathers, children, and spouses. Far from a book on parenting, this is more a collection of memoirs that happen to be around the same subject.
The book was compiled and edited by Heather B. Armstrong who chose the subject because “as a woman and a mother, I am intrigued by the male perspective on parenthood, what it means to men, and what it has meant to their children.”
Essay authors include (among others) Matthew Baldwin, Alice Bradley, Greg Allen, Greg Knauss, Leah Peterson, Eden Marriott Kennedy, Bill Farrell and Jon Armstrong (Heather’s husband).
The book is broken down into sections of essays and can either be read from cover to cover or you can pick and choose the authors you want to read first!
