What rhymes with bastard?
I’m not a self help book reader, and scoff at “The rules”, “He’s just not that into you” and whatever relationship guide is being touted on Doctor Phil or Oprah. A bit too much regurgitation for my liking. But a well written relationship memoir – that’s another story. They can be the most intoxicating intimate, amusing and revealing books of all. And of course, the most interesting ones detail relationships that are bad. Really bad.
I’ve just finished a corker called What rhymes with bastard by Linda Robertson. Check out this excerpt from the Times online to get a bit of its flavour. It is funny, but like Ricky Gervais’s comedy, tinged with a lot of pain.
Linda’s story begins in London, and then she and her boyfriend then husband Jack move to San Francisco. It’s not unfair to call him a bit of a freak, socially inept, drunk and occasionally drug-addled, prone to quoting Nietszche and stealing roommates cheese from the fridge. Most worryingly, he puts down his wife and is utterly lacking in any sensitivity. When he decides their relationship should be open, it’s excruciating how he documents his encounters to her. He really is an enthralling git.
Linda’s nutty encounters at work and in her later career in a cabaret act make for an engrossing read, and you are willing her along as she battles to be Ms Accordion San Francisco 2004.
Another memoir in a similar vein is Ill-equipped for a life of sex : a memoir by Jennifer Lehr. It’s described thus; “The wife of comic and writer John Lehr describes a series of painful relationships that marked her young adulthood, her disillusionment in the face of a lackluster married sex life, and the truths that she has discovered in her quest for passionate intimacy.” This doesn’t exactly capture the honesty and humour of the book. It’s captivating.
