Publication
Penguin (2015), 368 p.
Original publication date
2014
Collections
Genres
Awards
National Book Critics Circle Award (Finalist — Autobiography — 2014)
National Jewish Book Award (Finalist — 2014)
Wingate Literary Prize (Shortlist — Non-Fiction — 2015)
Spear's Book Award (Shortlist — Memoir — 2014)
Publishers Weekly's Best Books of the Year (Nonfiction — 2014)
NPR: Books We Love (2014)
Kirkus Reviews Best Book of the Year (Nonfiction — 2014)
San Francisco Chronicle Best Book of the Year (Nonfiction — 2014)
Description
Biography & Autobiography. Nonfiction. Humor (Nonfiction.) HTML: NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER � NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD FINALIST NAMED ONE OF THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY MICHIKO KAKUTANI, THE NEW YORK TIMES � NAMED ONE OF THE TEN BEST NONFICTION BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY TIME NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY MORE THAN 45 PUBLICATIONS, INCLUDING The New York Times Book Review � The Washington Post � NPR � The New Yorker � San Francisco Chronicle � The Economist � The Atlantic � Newsday � Salon � St. Louis Post-Dispatch � The Guardian � Esquire (UK) � GQ (UK) Little Failure is the all too true story of an immigrant family betting its future on America, as told by a lifelong misfit who finally finds a place for himself in the world through books and words. In 1979, a little boy dragging a ginormous fur hat and an overcoat made from the skin of some Soviet woodland creature steps off the plane at New York�s JFK International Airport and into his new American life. His troubles are just beginning. For the former Igor Shteyngart, coming to the United States from the Soviet Union is like stumbling off a monochromatic cliff and landing in a pool of Technicolor. Careening between his Soviet home life and his American aspirations, he finds himself living in two contradictory worlds, wishing for a real home in one. He becomes so strange to his parents that his mother stops bickering with his father long enough to coin the phrase failurchka��little failure��which she applies to her once-promising son. With affection. Mostly. From the terrors of Hebrew School to a crash course in first love to a return visit to the homeland that is no longer home, Gary Shteyngart has crafted a ruthlessly brave and funny memoir of searching for every kind of love�family, romantic, and of the self. BONUS: This edition includes a reading group guide. Praise for Little Failure �Hilarious and moving . . . The army of readers who love Gary Shteyngart is about to get bigger.��The New York Times Book Review �A memoir for the ages . . . brilliant and unflinching.��Mary Karr �Dazzling . . . a rich, nuanced memoir . . . It�s an immigrant story, a coming-of-age story, a becoming-a-writer story, and a becoming-a-mensch story, and in all these ways it is, unambivalently, a success.��Meg Wolitzer, NPR �Literary gold . . . [a] bruisingly funny memoir.��Vogue �A giant success.��Entertainment Weekly.… (more)
User reviews
LibraryThing member datrappert
You don't have to be Russian, or Jewish, or an immigrant to appreciate Gary Shteyngart's memoir. Born in Leningrad (St. Petersburg), he and his parents immigrated to New York City (Queens) when he was 7. The stories he tells of his new life, his loneliness, and the partial acceptance he gained
I am inclined to believe in the essential truth of the story Shteyngart tells because he is the worst person in the book. His parents have their faults, but in the end we come to appreciate their achievement of making a successful life in America. Their son, on the other hand, in addition to the drugs and alcohol, also takes pleasure in treating other people badly, even the ones who are trying to help him. Anyone who tells so many embarrassing stories about his own behavior just has to be believed.
All this makes it sound like the book is a real downer--and I haven't even told you about the fate of most of the author's Russian ancestors--but it isn't. By telling the story non-chronologically, Shteyngart apportions the gloom appropriately throughout the narrative so that it never overwhelms the keen observations and sharp, mostly self-deprecating humor that the book is filled with. I'm not sure I'd call it laugh out loud funny (that would be Jack Lemmon getting caught in the periscope in The Great Race), but it is definitely giggle under your breath funny.
As perhaps one of the few readers of this memoir who hasn't read Shteyngart's fiction, this book makes me want to do so. I wonder, though, if the autobiographical parts in his novels will have the same effect after reading the true story. I am confident, however, that his work will continue to evolve, since one lesson from the events in this memoir is that Shteyngart seems to be a better person from having lived through them.
So by all means dive into this fascinating, quirky, memoir. You won't regret it.
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through his humor and taking on an alternate personality will resonate with many readers. But the heart of this book is the evolving relationship with his parents--or rather his evolving perception of the relationship. His father, a would-be opera singer who ended up an Engineer, and his mother, a piano teacher, were very tough on their son, tagging him with a variety of unflattering names, including the "Little Failure" of the book's title. Nor were they too happy to see him want to become a writer instead of a lawyer, especially after he was accepted into New York City's best high school, where he spent most of his time drinking and taking drugs. Nevertheless, they supported him as he headed to college at Oberlin, a perfect place to do even more drinking and drug taking.I am inclined to believe in the essential truth of the story Shteyngart tells because he is the worst person in the book. His parents have their faults, but in the end we come to appreciate their achievement of making a successful life in America. Their son, on the other hand, in addition to the drugs and alcohol, also takes pleasure in treating other people badly, even the ones who are trying to help him. Anyone who tells so many embarrassing stories about his own behavior just has to be believed.
All this makes it sound like the book is a real downer--and I haven't even told you about the fate of most of the author's Russian ancestors--but it isn't. By telling the story non-chronologically, Shteyngart apportions the gloom appropriately throughout the narrative so that it never overwhelms the keen observations and sharp, mostly self-deprecating humor that the book is filled with. I'm not sure I'd call it laugh out loud funny (that would be Jack Lemmon getting caught in the periscope in The Great Race), but it is definitely giggle under your breath funny.
As perhaps one of the few readers of this memoir who hasn't read Shteyngart's fiction, this book makes me want to do so. I wonder, though, if the autobiographical parts in his novels will have the same effect after reading the true story. I am confident, however, that his work will continue to evolve, since one lesson from the events in this memoir is that Shteyngart seems to be a better person from having lived through them.
So by all means dive into this fascinating, quirky, memoir. You won't regret it.
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LibraryThing member bobbieharv
I had a hard time with this book. I disliked Sheyngart intensely despite how difficult his childhood and his parents were. I agreed with his friend John's harsh criticisms. I hated his ironic, self-pitying tone as he regarded himself. I'm happy John finally lent him money for psychoanalysis, but
Just to give a sense of my exasperation: The whole business of the panic attacks and the Chesme church and the helicopter, foreshadowed throughout the book, I never quite got. Yes his father hit him there, but he hit him many other times. (I feel bad quibbling about this, but it just gives a sense of my frustration with this book.)
And who wants to read excerpts from books people wrote as children? Tedium.
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the results, the ability to look upon one's life more dispassionately, were not evident. And the writing was pedestrian.Just to give a sense of my exasperation: The whole business of the panic attacks and the Chesme church and the helicopter, foreshadowed throughout the book, I never quite got. Yes his father hit him there, but he hit him many other times. (I feel bad quibbling about this, but it just gives a sense of my frustration with this book.)
And who wants to read excerpts from books people wrote as children? Tedium.
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LibraryThing member fist
Ostensibly, "Little Failure" is about Shteyngart's complicated relationship with his parents, and how they crippled him emotionally, but basically it is just about why Gary Shteyngart is an asshole. David Sedaris, Augusten Burroughs: they too were subjected to unorthodox parenting, and lived to
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write good books about it. Shteyngart: not so much. I ended up with sympathy for his Soviet mother and father, who tried to make a new living in the USA, only to see their son squander his opportunities on drugs and alcohol, and hide his insecurities behind douchey behaviour. I liked Shteyngarts ficion so far (Debutante and especially Absurdistan); there were just some aspects that made me queasy - I now know it's the passages where his own personality comes through. Show Less
LibraryThing member OccassionalRead
You don't have to be a Russian, Jewish, immigrant, New Yorker to appreciate Gary Shteyngart's autobiography, Little Failure, but it can't hurt. Having some things in common with the author (religion, adopted city, Stuyvesant High School, working in the Financial District and browsing The Strand -
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now a Lot Less discount store) made me appreciate his personal story without ever having read his novels. Sharing traits (hopefully failure not being one of them) facilitates empathy and understanding, but Shteyngart's story is in some ways a universal one of becoming an adult and coming to understand oneself. His journey is more painful than most, and his skill, like David Sadaris's, is weaving that pain into golden, laugh out loud, humor. Show Less
LibraryThing member Clara53
Gary Shteyngart is not just a master of satire, he is genius at it. What a way with words. I loved this book from the start. It was funny and poignant (much more of the latter as I kept reading), totally explosive historically, full of sharp observations and merciless criticism of himself and his
And though I did allow myself to be judgmental over his inclusion of vulgar language as used by his parents (it just didn't ring true for me - I know many Soviet Jews, and none of them would resort to that kind of language, they are mostly too educated for that...My consolation was that English readers won't feel these words to such a degree of vulgarity, as a Russian reader would, simply due to literal translation...), I had to try not to let it bother me, because the rest of the book was superb. There are so many phrases that are pure gems that it's impossible to copy them all out.
After finishing his memoir, the author says he went back and re-read all his three novels. And I feel like doing the same. Because now, I will read them in a completely different light and will like the first 2 even more, and might even get to appreciate the third one (which eluded me before).
All in all, many an immigrant (especially Soviet ones) will be able to relate to this memoir and appreciate it for its honesty. No question about it. For all other readers, it will be a revelation of sorts.
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family. Apart from equally biting satire directed at both the author's birthplace - Soviet Union (his homeland till age 7) and his adopted country (America), he doesn't in the least spare his own person from the most bitter derision that, in its intensity, goes beyond anything I have encountered in memoirs.And though I did allow myself to be judgmental over his inclusion of vulgar language as used by his parents (it just didn't ring true for me - I know many Soviet Jews, and none of them would resort to that kind of language, they are mostly too educated for that...My consolation was that English readers won't feel these words to such a degree of vulgarity, as a Russian reader would, simply due to literal translation...), I had to try not to let it bother me, because the rest of the book was superb. There are so many phrases that are pure gems that it's impossible to copy them all out.
After finishing his memoir, the author says he went back and re-read all his three novels. And I feel like doing the same. Because now, I will read them in a completely different light and will like the first 2 even more, and might even get to appreciate the third one (which eluded me before).
All in all, many an immigrant (especially Soviet ones) will be able to relate to this memoir and appreciate it for its honesty. No question about it. For all other readers, it will be a revelation of sorts.
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LibraryThing member palmaceae
Reading Little Failure is quite the emotional roller coaster. Two chapters in and my heart was pounding as I sank into Gary's world of asthma, confusion, extended family, Russian history, immigration woes, and chaos. I always marvel at how good writers are able to take what seems to the average
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person like a mundane event and craft it into something worth showing off to the masses, and Gary excels at that. If you're not one for experiencing vicarious pain, then this isn't the book for you, but if you're looking for a great understanding of the various shades that life comes in, then give Little Failure a shot. Show Less
LibraryThing member banjo123
Shteyngart was born in Leningrad in 1972 and came to the US seven years later. His family was difficult and loving. Shteyngart grew up in Queens, went to Oberlin, and became a successful novelist ([Super Sad True Love Story]). Now he has written a memoir about his experiences as a Russian Jewish
I enjoyed this book and felt it gave me a window into the immigrant experience and Russian culture. The heart of the story is his relationship with his parents. Here is a story about his father, an outsized character in more ways than one:
“My father rushes up to my cousin and mock punches him in the stomach, shouting, “I am still the big one!” Being the big one is important to him. Several years ago, drunk off of turning seventy, he took my then girlfriend (now wife) to his vegetable garden, where he handed her his biggest cucumber. “Here is something to remember me by”—he winked, adding—“I am big. My son is small.”
Apparently Shteyngart’s parents have been leery about reading his work---that is understandable. One can see why Shteyngart turned to drugs and alcohol in his teens and later required years of therapy. Shteyngart is hard on his parents; but equally hard on himself. To be honest, for much of the book, he seems like a total jerk. However, he was an interesting jerk, and in the end, he seems to come through to have an appreciation of his parents and his background, while honestly aware of their many faults.
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immigrant. This book is funny, sad and insightful. I enjoyed this book and felt it gave me a window into the immigrant experience and Russian culture. The heart of the story is his relationship with his parents. Here is a story about his father, an outsized character in more ways than one:
“My father rushes up to my cousin and mock punches him in the stomach, shouting, “I am still the big one!” Being the big one is important to him. Several years ago, drunk off of turning seventy, he took my then girlfriend (now wife) to his vegetable garden, where he handed her his biggest cucumber. “Here is something to remember me by”—he winked, adding—“I am big. My son is small.”
Apparently Shteyngart’s parents have been leery about reading his work---that is understandable. One can see why Shteyngart turned to drugs and alcohol in his teens and later required years of therapy. Shteyngart is hard on his parents; but equally hard on himself. To be honest, for much of the book, he seems like a total jerk. However, he was an interesting jerk, and in the end, he seems to come through to have an appreciation of his parents and his background, while honestly aware of their many faults.
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LibraryThing member Alexander19
This memoir covers the acclaimed fiction writers immigration from Russia and upbringing in NYC. He told honest truths of being a young adult and all of the problems, responsibilities and "little failures" that come in trying to make your own place in the world. The writing was just as good as his
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fiction, if not more fine tuned with detail and description with it being an all out memoir. I usually read a few memoirs a year (3-8) and this one is the best I've read so far for this year. It will without a doubt be put on my bookshelf, never to leave because of it's humor, reality and great writing. Show Less
LibraryThing member TimBazzett
Gary Shteyngart's memoir, LITTLE FAILURE, is the first of his books I have read, although I have read numerous blurbs and reviews (mostly positive) of his second and third novels, ABSURDISTAN and SUPER SAD TRUE LOVE STORY. The guy's stock-in-trade is obviously humor, a biting satirical sort of
While it's probably of interest only to me, I did take note of the fact that Shteyngart's family chose to leave the USSR right at the time that the Soviet military invaded Afghanistan, just before Christmas of 1979. If you had a son, it was a damn good time to get outa Dodge.
Shteyngart was only thirty-eight when he was writing this (maybe a bit young to be writing your memoirs) and the first half of the book seemed a bit slow and redundant, the humor often cutesy and forced. The second part of the book, puberty and beyond, first in Queens and then at Oberlin College, was much more interesting, although - maybe that generational thing again - I had trouble relating to his drunken stoner ways. The humor here became much darker and perhaps even self-destructive, as the author moaned about his despair of ever finding someone to love him, although he seemed to end up doing okay with women. Indeed, one affair he documents here, with 'Pamela Sanders,' with its intimations of somewhat sleazy, slumming sexual obsession, reminded me of Glen Savan's novel of that ilk, WHITE PALACE.
The guy can be funny, no question. But it's not my kind of humor and there seems to be just a little too much self pity and whining involved in telling of a life in which the real sacrifices were made by a pair of parents who made many difficult choices and did everything they could to do right by their son. Yeah, their thrifty immigrant ways, broken English and old-country habits may have seemed strange and embarrassing to him. But did they deserve being so often the butt of his jokes? I don't think so. Shteyngart is a good writer, especially considering English is not his first language. He has obviously long since overcome that barrier; has, in fact, mastered the language thing. Now he just needs to grow up.
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humor, and, if this memoir is any indication, one that does not spare those closest to him. And I know he's been pretty successful and his books have sold well, so maybe it's a generational thing, but I had trouble even liking this guy who can so freely poke cruel fun at his parents, particularly given the tremendous sacrifices they have made on behalf of their only child, sickly and asthmatic. The 'humor' is, in some cases, just too caustic and critical. Yes, he does make fun of himself too, but even so ...While it's probably of interest only to me, I did take note of the fact that Shteyngart's family chose to leave the USSR right at the time that the Soviet military invaded Afghanistan, just before Christmas of 1979. If you had a son, it was a damn good time to get outa Dodge.
Shteyngart was only thirty-eight when he was writing this (maybe a bit young to be writing your memoirs) and the first half of the book seemed a bit slow and redundant, the humor often cutesy and forced. The second part of the book, puberty and beyond, first in Queens and then at Oberlin College, was much more interesting, although - maybe that generational thing again - I had trouble relating to his drunken stoner ways. The humor here became much darker and perhaps even self-destructive, as the author moaned about his despair of ever finding someone to love him, although he seemed to end up doing okay with women. Indeed, one affair he documents here, with 'Pamela Sanders,' with its intimations of somewhat sleazy, slumming sexual obsession, reminded me of Glen Savan's novel of that ilk, WHITE PALACE.
The guy can be funny, no question. But it's not my kind of humor and there seems to be just a little too much self pity and whining involved in telling of a life in which the real sacrifices were made by a pair of parents who made many difficult choices and did everything they could to do right by their son. Yeah, their thrifty immigrant ways, broken English and old-country habits may have seemed strange and embarrassing to him. But did they deserve being so often the butt of his jokes? I don't think so. Shteyngart is a good writer, especially considering English is not his first language. He has obviously long since overcome that barrier; has, in fact, mastered the language thing. Now he just needs to grow up.
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LibraryThing member Capybara_99
Gary Shteyngart's memoir is a nonfiction Bildungsroman, rather than some of the other things memoirs can be. I quite admire his accomplishment at depicting pretty full characters, primarily his parents and himself, who are often unpleasant people and yet I at least never turn against them. Too
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often a memoir with the theme of "How I Became a Better Person", one of the themes of Little Failure, over dramatize their negative parts in an act that is just as much an act of narcissism as is the act of demonstrating how great one is. Shteyngart avoids this trap -- I fully believe the depictions and the justifications of his characters. Along the way he offers sharp and convincing portraits of the Jewish Russian emigre, the Stuyvesant student, of Oberlin in the 90s. And he offers touching portrayals of the people who helped him along the way. I find his fiction often funny than most of this book, though there is certainly humor of a sort in this book too. Recommended to fans of Shteyngart, those interested in contemporary Russian Jews, and the many people who would take heart from the story of one writer's path through a lot of stuff before he could figure it out. Show Less
LibraryThing member eachurch
A brilliant book about immigration, becoming a writer, and the things that parents pass on to their children. It is extremely well-written, and Shteyngart's use of humor makes some of the more painful episodes bearable (even though they are still difficult to read). I think that I would have even
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more fully appreciated the book if I had already read his novels as then I could have had a greater understanding of how he used his life in fiction. Show Less
LibraryThing member jphamilton
This is one very funny bit of writing about Gary's first seven years living in the Soviet Union — Leningrad specifically — and the massive change with the move to the United States. His novel, Super Sad True Love, didn't move or amuse me much, but I found Little Failure quite engaging and
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hilarious. His relationship with his parents and his grandmother are just fascinating. The style in which he chooses to tell the reader about his early years is a hoot. Show Less
LibraryThing member kbuxton
I received this book as part of the Early Reviewers program. It tells the story of his family, their emigration from the Soviet Union to New York, and his attempts to assimilate. While I enjoyed it, the level of self-deprecating humor got to be a bit much after awhile. I like his novels better.
LibraryThing member lyzadanger
Shteyngart is no stranger to psycho-analysis—he tells us this—and you can see this ruminant method of his thumbing-over of his own personality, examining it in different kinds of light as he wiggles it around. As he whimpers through his wounded memories, you can sense that there is some
He’s right about something: the Soviet part sure was riveting. The rest of book, while nuanced and often eliciting rueful half-smiles, is overawed by the biographical recounting of the surreality of the day-to-day Soviet tragicomedy his little nuclear family plays out when he is very little. Unfortunate black-and-white unsmiling Soviet portraits of him in “Warsaw pact Speedo”, steamed-over French doors and defective, exploding televisions. “We were all connected by failure back then,” explains Shteyngart. To elude failure in that element was exceptional, but to transcend it in America, expected.
So we have a little simulacrum of seven-year-old Igor Shteyngart (the later “Gary” a grasp at middle-class American nomenclature), weakling and, already, a writer, infatuated with his hale, competent and, above all, unafraid father, all on the cusp of their emigration. The trajectory, already, defined. The volatility of a creative mind, the sensitivity of a foreign only child. Though he spends a large chunk of the book cobbling together, breaking apart, and re-piecing his identity, we already see it in its skeletal form here. Doomed is too strong a term, but predestination seems plausible.
"A writer or any suffering artist-to-be is just an instrument too finely set to the human condition, and this is the problem with sending an already disturbed child across not just national borders but, in the 1978, across interplanetary ones.”
Young Shteyngart and his catastrophically Russian parents are thus dispatched to Queens. This feels so well-worn—naive, starry-eyed immigrants end up in gritty, bombastic, self-centered 1980s Queens—that I’d roll my eyes were it not true and were I not being a bit unfair. His parents aren’t that starry-eyed. The naive part, however, is true.
Confused, unprotected, terrified, creative Igor-now-Gary is darkening classroom doorways at the Solomon Schechter School of Queens (here I am using Shteyngart’s breathless present tense, as if recounting anecdotes verbally). We see this setup, the slightly furrowed brow of the over-pummeled geek, and yet the youthful Gary we get is the actual failure.
“When the toxic and outre American right-wing pundit Glenn Beck declared himself a ‘rodeo clown’ a few years back, I understood his recipe well: part clown, part bully.” And, indeed, the latter half of the memoir is overshadowed by this Dark Gary, selfish, cruel and blase. He smirks his way through Oberlin. Here’s 20-something Gary, with his smarmy post-modernist reading list and slightly trendy drug habit. He hates himself and we kind of do, too.
And so it plays out somewhat predictably in this manner: My parents loved me once; they are now mostly turdy, listen to some of the horrible things they say and the provincial, small-minded political leanings they have; oh, they still love me but we’re all a “tribe of wounded narcissists.”
He gets better. He knows well enough to decry his youthful decadence. He suffers mightily—no, I really do mean that—from anxiety and the true fear that no one will ever love or admire him. He is a hell of a good writer. He apologizes. He recognizes his Russianness. He loves and understands his parents again. It is sewn up.
But what besides the clarion call of writing and writers and the life of writers sets Shteyngart’s memoir apart?
“I write because there is nothing as joyful as writing, even when the writing is twisted and full of hate, the self-hate that makes writing not only possible but necessary.”
He wrote it because, tortured and imperfect and somewhat of a genius, he had to.
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tramped-down grass on some of these reminisced pathways. It comes across as a bit of a ritualized, rote rehash. It’s like we’ve all been here before. “It takes me less than an hour after landing to find a metaphor for my entire visit,” says the Soviet-emigre writer after returning to Petersburg—excuse me, Leningrad—for the first time since his family’s egress in the late 1970s. It’s as if he’s been writing this memoir in his head since the sudden end of his delicate (asthma, senescing socialism), romanticized and brief childhood pre-America. He’s right about something: the Soviet part sure was riveting. The rest of book, while nuanced and often eliciting rueful half-smiles, is overawed by the biographical recounting of the surreality of the day-to-day Soviet tragicomedy his little nuclear family plays out when he is very little. Unfortunate black-and-white unsmiling Soviet portraits of him in “Warsaw pact Speedo”, steamed-over French doors and defective, exploding televisions. “We were all connected by failure back then,” explains Shteyngart. To elude failure in that element was exceptional, but to transcend it in America, expected.
So we have a little simulacrum of seven-year-old Igor Shteyngart (the later “Gary” a grasp at middle-class American nomenclature), weakling and, already, a writer, infatuated with his hale, competent and, above all, unafraid father, all on the cusp of their emigration. The trajectory, already, defined. The volatility of a creative mind, the sensitivity of a foreign only child. Though he spends a large chunk of the book cobbling together, breaking apart, and re-piecing his identity, we already see it in its skeletal form here. Doomed is too strong a term, but predestination seems plausible.
"A writer or any suffering artist-to-be is just an instrument too finely set to the human condition, and this is the problem with sending an already disturbed child across not just national borders but, in the 1978, across interplanetary ones.”
Young Shteyngart and his catastrophically Russian parents are thus dispatched to Queens. This feels so well-worn—naive, starry-eyed immigrants end up in gritty, bombastic, self-centered 1980s Queens—that I’d roll my eyes were it not true and were I not being a bit unfair. His parents aren’t that starry-eyed. The naive part, however, is true.
Confused, unprotected, terrified, creative Igor-now-Gary is darkening classroom doorways at the Solomon Schechter School of Queens (here I am using Shteyngart’s breathless present tense, as if recounting anecdotes verbally). We see this setup, the slightly furrowed brow of the over-pummeled geek, and yet the youthful Gary we get is the actual failure.
“When the toxic and outre American right-wing pundit Glenn Beck declared himself a ‘rodeo clown’ a few years back, I understood his recipe well: part clown, part bully.” And, indeed, the latter half of the memoir is overshadowed by this Dark Gary, selfish, cruel and blase. He smirks his way through Oberlin. Here’s 20-something Gary, with his smarmy post-modernist reading list and slightly trendy drug habit. He hates himself and we kind of do, too.
And so it plays out somewhat predictably in this manner: My parents loved me once; they are now mostly turdy, listen to some of the horrible things they say and the provincial, small-minded political leanings they have; oh, they still love me but we’re all a “tribe of wounded narcissists.”
He gets better. He knows well enough to decry his youthful decadence. He suffers mightily—no, I really do mean that—from anxiety and the true fear that no one will ever love or admire him. He is a hell of a good writer. He apologizes. He recognizes his Russianness. He loves and understands his parents again. It is sewn up.
But what besides the clarion call of writing and writers and the life of writers sets Shteyngart’s memoir apart?
“I write because there is nothing as joyful as writing, even when the writing is twisted and full of hate, the self-hate that makes writing not only possible but necessary.”
He wrote it because, tortured and imperfect and somewhat of a genius, he had to.
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LibraryThing member craskind
The memoir captivated me. It’s wonderfully evocative of a time and place that I remember well: New York City in the 1990’s. It also provides (for the curiosity seeker in me) a frank, not always flattering, but luridly fascinating look at the life of an author I’ve read in the pages of The New
The book takes us through Gary Shteyngart’s youth as a newly landed immigrant in brutish schools; a young adult straining against the iron grip of overbearing, abusive parents; and finally as an author who has succeeded against big odds to become the writer he has always dreamed he could be. One small quibble: For me, the recounting of his college years was a little “ho-hum.” I would have liked to read more about adult life in New York and less about dorm life at Oberlin. But perhaps this material is being saved for future volumes? Still, I read straight through. Overall I found it a fascinating memoir and a good read.
I received this book through the Random House Advance Reader’s program.
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Yorker and heard on NPR’s Fresh Air. Autobiographies this candid are usually written by politicians who have been indicted, found God, are running for re-election or all of the above. Mercifully Gary Shteyngart is doing neither, yet he is extremely frank about his shortcomings and indiscretions. The book takes us through Gary Shteyngart’s youth as a newly landed immigrant in brutish schools; a young adult straining against the iron grip of overbearing, abusive parents; and finally as an author who has succeeded against big odds to become the writer he has always dreamed he could be. One small quibble: For me, the recounting of his college years was a little “ho-hum.” I would have liked to read more about adult life in New York and less about dorm life at Oberlin. But perhaps this material is being saved for future volumes? Still, I read straight through. Overall I found it a fascinating memoir and a good read.
I received this book through the Random House Advance Reader’s program.
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LibraryThing member BettyTaylor56
I admit that I have not read any of Shteynart's books until this one which was generously provided to me by Random House Publishing Group. The book left me with mixed feelings toward it. I enjoy his wonderfully written descriptions of what it was like to grow up in NYC as a immigrant boy, never
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quite being accepted. (Gary came to the US when he was seven years old.) I also enjoyed reading of how life was in Russia and his return to it as an adult. There are many humorous passages regarding his relationship with his parents and interactions with people his age, some native-born Americans and others immigrants like himself. the book. I wasn't thrilled with some of the language he used. I'm not a prude and don't mind the language when it is appropriate. But there is so much of it used with no point. That was a turn-off to me. But overall, it was an enjoyable read. He really wasn't that different from native-born Americans of that time. He had his turn with alcohol, drugs, and always trying to find a woman. What I really came away with was how hard his family worked to gradually move up in economic-status. An interesting read. Show Less
LibraryThing member Grist
There's nothing really wrong with this book. It's humorous in spots and breezily written. But the author is what? - 40 years old? With a few books under his belt? Is it really time for a memoir? Sometimes the prose in Little Failure gets thin out of a lack of anything substantial to say. A favorite
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strategy is to turn his parents into comic foils. They continually tell him what a loser he is. Then he goes to college, has sex and grows a beard. It's hard not to put the book down and say, "So?" Show Less
LibraryThing member JGoto
I love reading memoirs. Gary Shteyngart's Little Failure was billed as hilarious and witty, so I went into it expecting something that would make me laugh out loud - like David Sedaris or Maarten Troost. That did not happen because I did not find Little Failure at all funny. I admit It did make me
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smile once or twice. Literally. Gary Shteyngart was born in the former Soviet Union, and any pull that the book had for me stemmed from that fact. The section of the book I enjoyed the most was a description of 4 year old asthmatic Gary with his father, playing hide and seek near a statue of Lenin in Moscow Square. "And I want to jump out and say, 'Here I am! You haven't lost me at all!' But this is against the rules of the game…You're supposed to feel scared when the papa who's looking for you gets closer, is about to find you, but instead I feel sadder when he seems to lose my scent. And when he approaches I feel scared again. Sad, scared. Sad, scared. Is that what I've been looking forward to for so long in my sickbed? No, it is this: suddenly Papa jumps out from behind an adjoining spruce, screams 'Found you!' and I scream with joy and try to escape. He scoops me up in one easy gesture, hoists me onto his shoulders, and we walk past the Lenin, who is also happy I've been found, toward our apartment one gigantic Stalinist block away where Mother is making cabbage soup, hot and tasteless." This passage made me smile not because of humor, but because it truly captured a moment that is both poignant and joyful. Most of the memoir is not about joy, however, but about guilt and angst. At times Shteyngart seems to ramble aimlessly and everything feels disjointed and confusing. The only parts I actually liked reading about were his early days in USSR and his first impressions upon leaving it. (The other passage in the book that made me smile was his description of the airport in East Germany, first stop on the way to the United States.) I found it interesting that Gary was a loyal Communist child, because his parents had feared to voice their displeasure with their country within hearing distance of a child while still in the country. Throughout the book Gary's parents belittle and insult him, helping forge his insecure and angry personality. I suppose he is candid and courageous in admitting his own self-centeredness and the cruelty he inflicted on others during his school days and beyond. And perhaps his self-deprecation does not allow him to show the reader his good deeds, his kinder self. We do read about his attempts to understand and love his parents, but unfortunately, what I felt left with is a memoir about a self-centered and often unkind man. It was hard to empathize and hard to enjoy. Show Less
LibraryThing member Georgia.Bets
The tone of this book reminded me of Jean Shepherd's "A Christmas Story" - you laugh along with the joy, you flinch at the pain. Even if you didn't share the same experience, you shared the feeling in your own coming-of-age story.
LibraryThing member hfineisen
Every book should have a trailer, only if they are as excellent as this one. And only if the book is as excellent as the trailer. And some parts are, some more so.Shteyngart can be funny and tragic and funny and all at once you are not sure who is laughing at who...sometimes we are the joke, and
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sometimes we deserve it. Immigration is certainly one of those ha ha you had to be there things, right? Enjoyable. Show Less
LibraryThing member c.archer
I really enjoyed reading Gary's book about himself and his family's life pre and post immigration from the Ukraine. I found it to read much like his novels, which are loosely based on his life anyway, I think. As evidenced by the title, this is not supposed to be a particularly uplifting memoir,
Being an only child can be challenging. In Gary's case, it is especially so. From childhood on, he is called small son and little failure among other deprecating "endearments". Although there is much love in his family, it is often expressed in confusing and inappropriate ways. This is where he comes from, and its affect on him creates his story. I found it to be witty, yet heart wrenching at times. Twists and turns can not keep his talent from coming forth, and this memoir is really a tribute to that. He pretty much dissects his life and that of his parents, laying open hidden parts and still perpetuating that only child's desire to please. I enjoyed Little Failure immensely and would recommend it to anyone who has enjoyed his other novels or is interested in the immigrant experience.
I thank the publisher, Gary, and NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this title.
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but it is written with candor and his trademark humor. Even the very serious issues are handled with some degree of sensitivity. Being an only child can be challenging. In Gary's case, it is especially so. From childhood on, he is called small son and little failure among other deprecating "endearments". Although there is much love in his family, it is often expressed in confusing and inappropriate ways. This is where he comes from, and its affect on him creates his story. I found it to be witty, yet heart wrenching at times. Twists and turns can not keep his talent from coming forth, and this memoir is really a tribute to that. He pretty much dissects his life and that of his parents, laying open hidden parts and still perpetuating that only child's desire to please. I enjoyed Little Failure immensely and would recommend it to anyone who has enjoyed his other novels or is interested in the immigrant experience.
I thank the publisher, Gary, and NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this title.
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LibraryThing member msf59
The Immigrant song…
Gary Shteyngart is the author of several acclaimed novels. I have not read him but I was immediately engaged by his memoir. He was born Igor Shteyngart in Leningrad, in the late 1960s and then immigrated to New York in the late 70s. Igor was an only child and was nicknamed the
This is his family’s story and it is filled with wonderful anecdotes, offbeat relatives, his stoner college years and his heavy drinking, all told with a sharp wit and uncanny insight. I will now have to dig out my copy of Super Sad True Love Story.
Gary Shteyngart is the author of several acclaimed novels. I have not read him but I was immediately engaged by his memoir. He was born Igor Shteyngart in Leningrad, in the late 1960s and then immigrated to New York in the late 70s. Igor was an only child and was nicknamed the
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“Little Failure” by his father. The boy was a lonely oddball, doted on by his Jewish mother, thrashed by his father and bullied by his classmates. The last kid to be picked for kickball. He finally finds refuge in books and writing.This is his family’s story and it is filled with wonderful anecdotes, offbeat relatives, his stoner college years and his heavy drinking, all told with a sharp wit and uncanny insight. I will now have to dig out my copy of Super Sad True Love Story.
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LibraryThing member LoisB
In [Little Failure: A Memoir], the author describes his emigration from the Soviet Union to the US as a child in 1979 and his life as an immigrant in Queens, NY. The story was interesting and leads to a lot of "What if?". What if his parents had spoken English at home? What if he had attended
The author is likeable as a child, evoking sympathy for the bullying he received during his struggle to be accepted, but develops a mean steak as he grows older, in turn bullying those weaker than him, and lying almost pathologically. The good news is that although he did not meet his parents expectations he achieved the success as a novelist that he had longed for. ***
I received this from the LT Member Giveaway program.
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public school rather than a private Jewish school? What if his parents had not been so frugal that they got furniture from the dump and clothed them in cheap, used "by the pound" clothes? What if he had not followed his girlfriend to college in Ohio?The author is likeable as a child, evoking sympathy for the bullying he received during his struggle to be accepted, but develops a mean steak as he grows older, in turn bullying those weaker than him, and lying almost pathologically. The good news is that although he did not meet his parents expectations he achieved the success as a novelist that he had longed for. ***
I received this from the LT Member Giveaway program.
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LibraryThing member everfresh1
I have read all other novels by Gary Shteyngart and so found his memoirs especially interesting. He is an excellent writer that possess great language skills - that was clear from his other works. This narrative covers his life from his childhood in Soviet Leningrad to his current days as a
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successful writer. This work is very honest - he really bares a lot, particularly stuff about his family. I did find the description of his child years in Leningrad a little too melodramatic for my taste (I lived at the same place at the same time) but overall it is a small price to pay Show Less
LibraryThing member bookchickdi
I hadn't read any of Shteyngart's novels, but have seen his howlingly funny book trailers online. This is such a rich, funny book, and anyone who enjoys reading about the immigrant experience should put this on their TBR list. His vivid writing brings his childhood in Russia to life and his stories
I think Americans take for granted how many people want to come here to live, the sacrifices they make and how hard they work to fit in and build a good life for their families. Reading Little Failure will remind you of that.
Shteyngart's book is brutally honest in quest for acceptance from his classmates, his search for love in college, and his many missteps on the road to writing success. He lays himself out there for all to see. At the end of the book, he takes his parents back to Russia, and this section of the book is very moving.
Shteyngart is a brilliant writer, each sentence perfectly constructed to convey his idea. Even if you haven't read his fiction (like me), if you like the memoir genre and you like to laugh, this book is for you.
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of his parents fighting (he always feared they would divorce), his grandmother's fierce devotion to him, his striving for acceptance from his new American classmates and how that led him to a life as a writer are fascinating.I think Americans take for granted how many people want to come here to live, the sacrifices they make and how hard they work to fit in and build a good life for their families. Reading Little Failure will remind you of that.
Shteyngart's book is brutally honest in quest for acceptance from his classmates, his search for love in college, and his many missteps on the road to writing success. He lays himself out there for all to see. At the end of the book, he takes his parents back to Russia, and this section of the book is very moving.
Shteyngart is a brilliant writer, each sentence perfectly constructed to convey his idea. Even if you haven't read his fiction (like me), if you like the memoir genre and you like to laugh, this book is for you.
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Language
Original language
English
ISBN
9780241971987
Physical description
368 p.; 7.8 inches
Pages
368