In the last 3 months, I have only had the time to read two books. One book was on parenting – The Daddy Shift by Jeremy Adam Smith (a winner) & the other was a mindless beach read by James Patterson. Parenting and family time (with a bit of blogging and hanging with the dads group) seem to consume my life and leave little time for leisure reading. Now, I am considering making the time for another dad book.
The NY Times Style Magazine for Men distributed this weekend included an article by Holly Brubach, Make Room for Daddy: The newest kid on the memoir block? Fatherhood books. (Jared – thanks for sharing) Brubach writes “The literature of women writing about motherhood is by now so extensive that no pebble has been left unturned….you name it, it’s been duly recorded. Let us now turn our attention to what the men have been going through. In ‘‘Manhood for Amateurs: the Pleasures and Regrets of a Husband, Father and Son’’ (Harper), Michael Chabon echoes many of the same themes that Michael Lewis sounds in ‘‘Home Game: An Accidental Guide to Fatherhood’’ (W. W. Norton & Company), chief among them being that they’re making this fatherhood thing up as they go along. “
I have always had a small seed planted in the back of my mind that it would be worthwhile to publish a book about my at-home fatherhood experiences – good, bad, and ugly. For now, I try to use this blog to document some of my ups and downs of parenting. I am not surprised to learn that more and more dads are publishing books because there is such a lack of resources available to us. After reading this article, maybe it is time to pick up a book to read about how another dad is surviving/managing/excelling at this daddy gig.
I read the Michael Lewis book a few weeks ago, was drawn to it since I really enjoyed Moneyball and The Blind Side. I’ll say this – it was a fun, quick read, with a few great laugh out loud moments. That said, I read the whole thing in a handful of subway trips, so you should probably just take it out of the library.
There’s no doubt dads are the forgotten parent when it comes to parenting resources. It is true we blokes comprehend info differently to women. We don’t talk that well to each other on paretning issues, we often refrain from parenting groups and self help books. This is because too often the tone and format skews heavily to women folk, thus alientaing us blokes. In an age of restreicted time we need more concise lirerature with practical tips.