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- Augusten Burroughs Written Works
- Running With Scissors Augusten Burroughs
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- Augusten Burroughs Books In Order
Augusten Burroughs' Mother Speaks Out. I met Augusten Burroughs there. But Augusten Burroughs and Chris are not quite the same.' In Running with Scissors, Burroughs writes that he was 'just a. Running with Scissors is the true story of a boy whose mother (a poet with delusions of Anne Sexton) gave him away to be raised by her unorthodox psychiatrist who bore a striking resemblance to Santa Claus.
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Not the book you’re looking for?Preview — Running with Scissors by Augusten Burroughs
The true story of an outlaw childhood where rules were unheard of, the Christmas tree stayed up all year round, Valium was consumed like candy, and if things got dull an electroshock-therapy machine could provide entertainment.
Running with Scissors is the true story of a boy whose mother (a poet with delusions of Anne Sexton) gave him away to be raised by her unorthodox ps...more
Running with Scissors is the true story of a boy whose mother (a poet with delusions of Anne Sexton) gave him away to be raised by her unorthodox ps...more
Published June 1st 2003 by Picador USA (first published July 10th 2002)
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KinseyI would say borderline personality disorder with some narcissistic personality disorder.
ChristineShe understood him in all his weird quirkiness and stood by him.
Best Books of the Decade: 2000s 6,601 books — 27,999 voters
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Rating details
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Jul 22, 2007Oriana rated it liked it · review of another edition
I talk about this all the time, so here, definitively, is my explanation of the four categories of memoir.
1) People who have had seriously interesting / crazy lives, and who also happen to be terrific writers, able to render their stories in a compelling, original way (like David Small's brilliant Stitches, or what I consider the gold-standard memoir, Nick Flynn's breathtaking Another Bullshit Night in Suck City).
2) People whose lives are interesting / crazy enough that it really doesn't ma...more
Dec 31, 2007Martin rated it did not like it · review of another edition1) People who have had seriously interesting / crazy lives, and who also happen to be terrific writers, able to render their stories in a compelling, original way (like David Small's brilliant Stitches, or what I consider the gold-standard memoir, Nick Flynn's breathtaking Another Bullshit Night in Suck City).
2) People whose lives are interesting / crazy enough that it really doesn't ma...more
Recommends it for: Anyone mentally healthy enough not to be tortured by it
I found this book profoundly disturbing and torturous to read. I understand that it is cleansing and theraputic for those that have been traumitized to write/talk aobut their problems to help with the healing process. There are very few things that my ironclad stomach can't suffer and my brain is developed enough to handle even the most shocking of situations. This book tested my patience from begining to end and in the end I was very dissapointed.
First off, from reviews and the book cover I was...more
First off, from reviews and the book cover I was...more
She wasn't 'Let's paint the kitchen red' crazy. She was full on head in the oven, toothpaste sandwich, I am God crazy..
paraphrased, but you get it..
Jun 26, 2008Tina rated it did not like itparaphrased, but you get it..
Recommended to Tina by: book group
I learned, along with the rest of my reading group, that running with scissors is preferable to reading this book.
I read this book in about four hours. & maybe that's as good an encapsulation for the experience as I can give.
I like the eccentric, non-plot-driven memoir that sounds too strange to be true... and because it exists, because it ACTUALLY happened (unlike you, James Frey!), it merits thoughts about American families in addition to the ironies of self-obsessed psychologies.
Written in cute concise prose, even if some jokes do not actually make you laugh but sicken you to the point of feeling tru...more
Feb 12, 2009Will Byrnes rated it liked itI like the eccentric, non-plot-driven memoir that sounds too strange to be true... and because it exists, because it ACTUALLY happened (unlike you, James Frey!), it merits thoughts about American families in addition to the ironies of self-obsessed psychologies.
Written in cute concise prose, even if some jokes do not actually make you laugh but sicken you to the point of feeling tru...more
Augusten Burroughs Written Works
Shelves: biography, autobiography, memoir, nonfiction
Burroughs offers a book that is supposedly a memoir. If so, then truth is definitely stranger than fiction. Let’s say I am skeptical. If you thought you had a tough adolescence a look at Burroughs’ tale will put your experience into a little perspective.
He grew up in western Massachusetts to a mother who was probably bi-polar, in what seems like ground zero for inappropriate behavior. She was seeing a peculiar psychiatrist who had a fondness for having patients come to live at his home, a chaot...more
Feb 10, 2018Carol rated it liked it · review of another editionHe grew up in western Massachusetts to a mother who was probably bi-polar, in what seems like ground zero for inappropriate behavior. She was seeing a peculiar psychiatrist who had a fondness for having patients come to live at his home, a chaot...more
Shelves: non-fiction, buddy-read-jean, memoir, read-2018, mental-health, autobiography
After digesting for over a month now, I still feel this autobiography-memoir beyond bizarre and belief....Can all of it really be true?Can I believe the doctor depict herein holds a medical degree from one of the most prestigious universities in America, i.e.....Yale? Hmmmmm....pretty hard to believe, and disheartening too.
Anyway, it's the 1970's and all hell breaks loose when 12 year old Augusten's disturbed poetry writing mother and alcoholic father divorce and mother dear ultimately sends him
...moreFamily settles with 'Running with Scissors' author, publisher
By Rodrique Ngowi, Associated Press Writer | August 29, 2007
BOSTON --A family that claimed author Augusten Burroughs defamed them in his best-selling book 'Running with Scissors' has settled a lawsuit against the author and his publisher, their attorney said Wednesday.
Burroughs and his publisher, St. Martin's Press, agree to call the work a 'book' instead of 'memoirs,' in the author's note and to change the acknowledgments page in futu...more
By Rodrique Ngowi, Associated Press Writer | August 29, 2007
BOSTON --A family that claimed author Augusten Burroughs defamed them in his best-selling book 'Running with Scissors' has settled a lawsuit against the author and his publisher, their attorney said Wednesday.
Burroughs and his publisher, St. Martin's Press, agree to call the work a 'book' instead of 'memoirs,' in the author's note and to change the acknowledgments page in futu...more
Feb 06, 2019Michael rated it really liked it
Frenetic and sensational, Running with Scissors explores what it means to endure a dysfunctional childhood. Over the course of dozens of fast-paced vignettes, Augusten Burroughs recounts his unconventional upbringing: his parents divorced, his mother granted legal custody of her gay son to her eccentric psychiatrist, a 33-year-old pedophile living nearby soon started to prey on him. Burroughs recollects traumatic event after traumatic event, but a perverse kind of humor pervades the narrative, w...more
(Today's review is much longer than Goodreads' word-count limitations. Find the entire essay at the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography [cclapcenter.com]. I am the original author of this essay, as well as the owner of CCLaP; it is not being reprinted here illegally.)
I've mentioned here regularly the entire idea of there being an 'underground-arts canon;' that is, that just like the academic community, what we call the modern cutting-edge arts has now been around long enough (arguably...more
Dec 07, 2018Rebecca McNutt rated it did not like itI've mentioned here regularly the entire idea of there being an 'underground-arts canon;' that is, that just like the academic community, what we call the modern cutting-edge arts has now been around long enough (arguably...more
Shelves: non-fiction, memoir, mental-illness, child-abuse
Where to begin with Running With Scissors? I had read it way back in the 10th grade and disliked it, but decided to go back and try to re-read it to see if I'd missed something. What's worse? The lawsuit against Burroughs from the 'Finch' Family, especially 'Natalie', who never wanted her private domestic and sexual abuse revealed to the public? Some friend Augusten Burroughs is! Or maybe it's simply how vulgar and totally random he is as a writer. No, it's really not necessary (and I suspect no...more
Jun 12, 2008Will N Van rated it it was amazingRecommends it for: People with absurd, dark sensibilities.
It has been said that Truman Capote's last book, 'Answered Prayers,' cost him the friendship of almost everyone he knew at that time in his life, and it has even been speculated that this contributed to his demise. He had mined the personal secrets and character flaws of those around him for literary gold, and most probably embellished as brilliant authors often do. The characters were apparently easily correlated to their real-life counterparts.
And so, things haven't changed all that much. Augu...more
When I read this book, I was really appalled that people would classify it as a comedy, and that the makers of the film would treat it as such. I thought it was one of the most tragic things I have ever read in my life. The fact that this kid had to deal with not only his crazy parents, but an entirely crazy family is heartbreaking. And it's not just that they're quirky, like everyone seems to make them out to be, but they really are insane. And in the worst possible way. And then he gets totall...more
My brother's account of our childhood and life with the Finches
Feb 12, 2008Annalisa rated it did not like it
This book is supposed to be funny?! I kept waiting for the amusement as I waded through increasingly appalling characters that were not likable, interesting, or remotely relatable. Crazy and abusive is not quirky and lovable. Well I suppose there is a way to write it that way, but this is written with a tinge of bitterness. What is so amusing about royally screwing up a child's life?
Between books I'd try to get back into this story that was ok but not good enough to grab my attention. But it's a...more
Between books I'd try to get back into this story that was ok but not good enough to grab my attention. But it's a...more
I was interested in reading this after getting hints of the story in Burroughs' brother's memoir 'Look Me in the Eye'. My honest reaction? This book made me deeply uncomfortable. Oh, I kept reading it, the same way I and everyone else would keep eyeballing a car accident, as the old cliché goes. But there was a part of me that honestly couldn't believe that all of this stuff was real. And if it was, how could Burroughs write about it almost as if it was a years-long romp? (I know I go against al...more
Funny and very well written.
The graphic homosexual sex scenes will be too much for some readers but were contextually relevant. I have tried since reading this to understand Burroughs' quirky, angst obsessive postmodernist world view, and perhaps he cannot put a definite label on it either, but then on the other hand, Burroughs' may be one of those special writers whose opinions and style rightly fit into the 'other' category of literary genres and upon which a label does not easily apply.
For t...more
Jan 11, 2018Luís C. rated it liked itThe graphic homosexual sex scenes will be too much for some readers but were contextually relevant. I have tried since reading this to understand Burroughs' quirky, angst obsessive postmodernist world view, and perhaps he cannot put a definite label on it either, but then on the other hand, Burroughs' may be one of those special writers whose opinions and style rightly fit into the 'other' category of literary genres and upon which a label does not easily apply.
For t...more
Shelves: biography, picador, us-canada-author, reading-the-world, 21st-century, humour, queer-lgbt, on-my-own
In his diary, the young Augusten a little gay and very stuck tells his arrival in the mad house Finch, that of his mother's psychologist and just as crazy!
Burroughs is certainly good at writing American series scripts with humor and imagination ... It's nice but I regret that this factory with heavy gags erases all the sensitivity of the first part.
(You will see everything you can imagine worse in a psychiatric hospital, boring kids on the carpet, scraping dandruff, ... and he outbid with blowjo...more
Burroughs is certainly good at writing American series scripts with humor and imagination ... It's nice but I regret that this factory with heavy gags erases all the sensitivity of the first part.
(You will see everything you can imagine worse in a psychiatric hospital, boring kids on the carpet, scraping dandruff, ... and he outbid with blowjo...more
I know the family, I know the ego-crazed and self-indulgent overgrown baby who wrote this book, and I find it not only sloppily written but vicious and hate-filled. It's a mother-bashing, lesbian-bashing, lying heap of crap. You can see I am worked up about it. I wouldn't mind if it were called a novel (which it is). I only object to its being called a 'memoir.' Read instead Jackie Leyden's beautiful hymn to the mixed blessings of growing up with a mother who had bipolar disorder, DAUGHTER OF TH...more
Feb 25, 2008Felicia rated it it was amazing · review of another edition
I love this book. The abysmal movie that was made of it was a travesty, because this book...I relate to the crazy family part, that's all I'm saying about it :)
This book was hilarious and horrifying, at once raucous and deeply disturbing. Burroughs writes like a man who has not entirely made peace with his madhouse childhood but has found a certain kind of solace in his off-center coping mechanisms. His anecdotes are hysterical but mingled with catharses that are simply stated and give the impression of a friendly confidence. This was Burroughs' biggest claim-to-fame book, quite possibly because of the sheer shock value compared with his other novels [...more
I read this when it first came out in 2003 and was instantly smitten with Augusten Burroughs. He cracks me up! You won't believe that the things he writes about really happened, but allegedly, they did. I read something recently about the shrink's family and their denial about several things in the book. If you were them, wouldn't you try to deny it too, though? Anyway, great read, will have you laughing out loud. This is not your mother's kind of book, you've got to be young and hip and open-mi...more
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.
Mar 02, 2014Carmen rated it Running With Scissors Augusten Burroughs
did not like it Shelves: non-fiction, traditionally-published, he-says
Burroughs is a good author, but this book made me sick to my stomach.
This book is about Burroughs childhood. He lives with his crazy mother and alcoholic father until he's ten. Then his mom moves him in with her crazy psychologist. They live in squalor.
I can't even describe to you all the horrible things that go on in this book. A lot of pedophilia. When Burroughs is 13 his 33-year-old stepbrother starts having sex with him. His step-sister, Natalie, gives her first blowjob at age 11 and is sol...more
May 26, 2007J.G. Keely rated it did not like it · review of another editionThis book is about Burroughs childhood. He lives with his crazy mother and alcoholic father until he's ten. Then his mom moves him in with her crazy psychologist. They live in squalor.
I can't even describe to you all the horrible things that go on in this book. A lot of pedophilia. When Burroughs is 13 his 33-year-old stepbrother starts having sex with him. His step-sister, Natalie, gives her first blowjob at age 11 and is sol...more
Shelves: abandoned, fiction, non-fiction, autobiographical
Boring Prose sprinkled with the kind of sensationalism that can only come from a man with the hubris to change his name from Chris Robinson to Augusten Xon Burroughs.
I wanted this to be a one-sentence review, because that's all it deserves, but I just can't: XON!!!??? FUCKING XON!!!???? WHERE IS MY GODDAMN INTERROBANG!!!!????? JUST CALL YOURSELF XENU FOR SHIT'S SAKE. CHRISTING FUCKBELLY TURDSQUABBLE.
I wanted this to be a one-sentence review, because that's all it deserves, but I just can't: XON!!!??? FUCKING XON!!!???? WHERE IS MY GODDAMN INTERROBANG!!!!????? JUST CALL YOURSELF XENU FOR SHIT'S SAKE. CHRISTING FUCKBELLY TURDSQUABBLE.
Aug 06, 2007Stephanie rated it it was ok · review of another edition
I have to warm you that I am going to give a spoiler here, the spoiler I happened upon as I had just begun reading this book and was just hooked enough by the descriptive style of writing and interesting content that I wanted to continue regardless. However, the spoiler ultimately affected my experience of the book and may affect yours as well. So don't read this, unless you've already read the book.
The family that 'Augusten Burroughs' focuses most of his memoir around are suing him. They say th...more
The family that 'Augusten Burroughs' focuses most of his memoir around are suing him. They say th...more
Mar 16, 2010Ellen rated it it was ok
Leo Tolstoy writes, “Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”
I’ve always read “happy families” in that quotation as meaning normal families, and assumed by its positioning that normal, happy families were more prevalent. I wonder. Tolstoy’s dichotomy seems simplistic. I’m not sure I know any family that is routinely happy or normal. My parents and brother always ensured I’d win any “crazy family” contest hands down, but even the ostensibly “happy” families I...more
Augusten Burroughs Husband
Jun 16, 2017Don rated it it was amazing
I began this memoir only knowing that it was controversial -- some of the people depicted in these pages claim that Burroughs greatly embellished past events, while Burroughs himself maintains the book's veracity. After doing some online research, I still can't determine who's telling the truth here, and so I can only judge the book's literary merit.
And in that regard I have to say that Running with Scissors lives up to its hype. Burroughs' prose is crisp, his descriptions memorable -- e.g., 'M...more
And in that regard I have to say that Running with Scissors lives up to its hype. Burroughs' prose is crisp, his descriptions memorable -- e.g., 'M...more
Read this when it first came out ---GREAT!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The movie: They trashed the book!
The movie: They trashed the book!
Jul 09, 2014Bill rated it it was ok
I won this copy of Running with Scissors in a Goodreads Giveaway. This is my fair and honest review!
2.5/5.0 Stars
Okay I’ve procrastinated long enough on this one. I really, really wanted to love this book but, despite all the rave reviews and critical acclaim, I just didn’t feel it. Please don’t hate me all you Augusten Burroughs fans out there. This book confused the heck out of me and I simply could not get past the pedophilia.
Confused? You bet! This is a memoir about some pretty serious and...more
| topics | posts | views | last activity |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mother Memoirs | 1 | 3 | Mar 27, 2019 07:21AM |
| Banned Book Society:Running with Scissors by Augusten Burroughs - TR (June 16- August 16) | 2 | 3 | Aug 09, 2016 02:41PM |
| The Mad Antics Bo...:August 2016 Group Read | 1 | 1 | Aug 03, 2016 09:29PM |
| Around the Year i...:Running with Scissors, by Augusten Burroughs | 2 | 15 | Jul 11, 2016 06:01AM |
| Bookworm Bitches :November 2015: Running with Scissors | 9 | 64 | Dec 29, 2015 02:59PM |
| Nonfiction Naviga...:Running With Scissors | 1 | 3 | Dec 02, 2015 09:08AM |
| Augusten Burroughs | 3 | 22 | Nov 06, 2015 06:34PM |
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Augusten Burroughs New Book
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Augusten Burroughs born Christopher Robison, son of poet and writer Margaret Robison and younger brother of John Elder Robison.
Burroughs has no formal education beyond elementary school. A very successful advertising copywriter for over seventeen years, he was also an alcoholic who nearly drank himself to death in 1999. But spurned by a compulsion he did not understand, Burroughs began to write a...more
Burroughs has no formal education beyond elementary school. A very successful advertising copywriter for over seventeen years, he was also an alcoholic who nearly drank himself to death in 1999. But spurned by a compulsion he did not understand, Burroughs began to write a...more
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“I know exactly how that is. To love somebody who doesn’t deserve it. Because they are all you have. Because any attention is better than no attention. For exactly the same reason, it is sometimes satisfying to cut yourself and bleed. On those gray days where eight in the morning looks no different from noon and nothing has happened and nothing is going to happen and you are washing a glass in the sink and it breaks-accidentally-and punctures your skin. And then there is this shocking red, the brightest thing in the day, so vibrant it buzzes, this blood of yours. That is okay sometimes because at least you know you’re alive.” — 867 likes
Augusten Burroughs Mother
“It’s a wonder I’m even alive. Sometimes I think that. I think that I can’t believe I haven’t killed myself. But there’s something in me that just keeps going on. I think it has something to do with tomorrow, that there is always one, and that everything can change when it comes.” — 390 likes
More quotes…The Tenth Anniversary Edition of the New York Times bestselling book that has sold over half a million copies in paperback.
'I was addicted to 'Bewitched' as a kid. I worshipped Darren Stevens the First. When he'd come home from work and Samantha would say, ‘Darren, would you like me to fix you a drink?' He'd always rest his briefcase on the table below the mirror in the foyer, wipe his forehead with a monogrammed handkerchief and say, ‘Better make it a double.' (from Chapter Two)
Augusten Burroughs Books In Order
You may not know it, but you've met Augusten Burroughs. You've seen him on the street, in bars, on the subway, at restaurants: a twentysomething guy, nice suit, works in advertising. Regular. Ordinary. But when the ordinary person had two drinks, Augusten was circling the drain by having twelve; when the ordinary person went home at midnight, Augusten never went home at all. Loud, distracting ties, automated wake-up calls and cologne on the tongue could only hide so much for so long. At the request (well, it wasn't really a request) of his employers, Augusten lands in rehab, where his dreams of group therapy with Robert Downey Jr. are immediately dashed by grim reality of fluorescent lighting and paper hospital slippers. But when Augusten is forced to examine himself, something actually starts to click and that's when he finds himself in the worst trouble of all. Because when his thirty days are up, he has to return to his same drunken Manhattan life—and live it sober. What follows is a memoir that's as moving as it is funny, as heartbreaking as it is true. Dry is the story of love, loss, and Starbucks as a Higher Power.