There is a passage early in Augusten Burroughs s harrowing and highly entertaining memoir, Running with Scissors, that speaks volumes about the author. While going to the garbage dump with his father, young Augusten spots a chipped, glass-top coffee table that he longs to bring home. I knew I could hide the chip by fanning a display of magazines on the surface, like in a doctor s office, he writes, And it certainly wouldn t be dirty after I polished it with Windex for three hours. There were certainly numerous chips in the childhood Burroughs describes: an alcoholic father, an unstable mother who gives him up for adoption to her therapist, and an adolescence spent as part of the therapist s eccentric extended family, gobbling prescription meds and fooling around with both an old electroshock machine and a pedophile who lives in a shed out back. But just as he dreamed of doing with that old table, Burroughs employs a vigorous program of decoration and fervent polishing to a life that ma...

#Yuck. (2009-03-26) This book was on my wish list for a long while. I bought it and was very disappointed. I find it hard to believe that so many people actually liked it. I did not laugh, not even once. I stopped reading this book around about the time he discussed the toilet habits of his pseudo-guardian. Terrible, awful and appalling.

#A Real Runaway! (2009-01-25) I had never heard of this book untill a classmate of mine had introduced it to me. I really enjoy books about real life and what people have experienced. When I picked up Running with Scissors I could NOT put it down! This book is the biography of Augusten Burroughs childhood. As a child Augusten was very lonely. His father was an alcoholic and his mother was an insane poet, frantic to become famous. They fought constantly, up to the point where they went to a therapist named Dr. Finch. When Augustens father wouldn t participate, he abandoned them, le...

#Entertaining? Yes. Truthful? I don t think so.. (2008-12-15) This is one wildly odd yet entertaining ride. However I just couldn t get past the fictional flavor of this memoir . Yes, I m certain his family is as strange and let s face it, creepy, as he writes, but you get the feeling there s a lot of creative license here, you know?If you re looking for a quick read with some laugh out loud moments and more than a few uncomfortable ones, then this is the book for you. Just don t necessarily believe everything you read.

#A phony memoir and bad fiction....uggh. (2008-04-19) First the authentic memoir that he had to settle out of court. Then the moaning about being an alcoholic, now he writes a book about his father. A little self-obsessed are we? Anyone who would change their name from Chris Robison to Augesten Xon Burroughs must have a little bit of an ego problem. Was the name Obi-Wan Charlemagne taken already? Get over it already and get over yourself. I mean what s next, a memoir about loosing your hair? So you re a bald white guy, not happy about your family or your upbringing. Then when...

#what a story teller! (2008-03-22) running with scissors is a great book. the author s writing style is fantastic, so much so that the words just draw you in. little effort is required on your part to get into the story, the words just leap off the page. an example of this would be near the beginning when he was cleaning the pennies, that scene sticks out in my mind for some reason as an example of his writing style. the story over all is great though. i m sure other people have summarized the book so i won t do that. i ll just say that the characterization was amazingly well done...