Amateur Hour Audiobook Summary
An emotionally honest, arresting, and funny collection of essays about motherhood and adulthood…
“Being a mother is a gift.”
Where’s my receipt?
Welcome to essayist Kimberly Harrington’s poetic and funny world of motherhood, womanhood, and humanhood, not necessarily in that order. It’s a place of loud parenting, fierce loving, too much social media, and occasional inner monologues where timeless debates are resolved such as Pro/Con: Caving to PTO Bake Sale Pressure (“PRO: Skim the crappiest brownies for myself. CON: They’re really crappy.”) With accessibility and wit, she captures the emotions around parenthood in artful and earnest ways, highlighting this time in the middle–midlife, the middle years of childhood, how women are stuck in the middle of so much. It’s a place of elation, exhaustion, and time whipping past at warp speed. Finally, it’s a quiet space to consider the girl you were, the mother you are, and the woman you are always becoming.
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Amateur Hour Audiobook Narrator
Gabra Zackman is the narrator of Amateur Hour audiobook that was written by Kimberly Harrington
Kimberly Harrington is the author of Amateur Hour: Motherhood in Essays and Swear Words and But You Seemed So Happy: A Marriage, In Pieces and Bits. Her work is included in the collections Merciless & Unpredictable: A McSweeney’s Guide to Parenting and Keep Scrolling Till You Feel Something: Twenty-One Years of Humor From McSweeney’s Internet Tendency. She’s a columnist and regular contributor to McSweeney’s and her work has also appeared in The New Yorker, the New York Times, and The Cut. A long-time copywriter and creative director for design studios and brands, her clients have included Apple, Nike, and Netflix.
About the Author(s) of Amateur Hour
Kimberly Harrington is the author of Amateur Hour
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Amateur Hour Full Details
Narrator | Gabra Zackman |
Length | 7 hours 22 minutes |
Author | Kimberly Harrington |
Category | |
Publisher | HarperAudio |
Release date | May 01, 2018 |
ISBN | 9780062850751 |
Subjects
The publisher of the Amateur Hour is HarperAudio. includes the following subjects: The BISAC Subject Code is Biography & Autobiography, Women
Additional info
The publisher of the Amateur Hour is HarperAudio. The imprint is HarperAudio. It is supplied by HarperAudio. The ISBN-13 is 9780062850751.
Global Availability
This book is only available in the United States.
Goodreads Reviews
Kimberly
April 09, 2018
I wrote this book.I am def gonna give it 5 stars.What am I, an idiot?Not looking for an actual answer.
Kate
April 05, 2018
I love this book. I mean, I love, love, love it. I am a 45-year-old mother to two who writes books for a living while also writing other things that actually pay money and being a full-time mom. WHICH IS TO SAY I DO NOT READ BOOKS ANYMORE. At least not all the way through. Usually not more than a quarter of the way through. I'm lucky if I read one essay in a New Yorker. I can barely make it through NY mag's Approval Matrix anymore. I want to start a catalog club, because those I finish. My god, this Spring's Sundance Catalog in Guadalajara was a masterpiece. Discuss. BUT I DIGRESS. I read this book all the way through in a week. Hold your applause. Seriously, this book is deliciously, enjoyable, and lyrically human. It's raw and real and nostalgic and unapologetic and evocative in all the best, most believable ways. I write about motherhood and 90% of what I read I don't relate to. It's sappy pap. Or it's longwindedly sarcastic and desperately needs an editor. It's rare to find someone who can write about something as common as motherhood and make it as beautiful as poetry. And I related to almost every moment of this book. Not because my life resemble's the authors, but because she has a beautiful way of filtering the universal through her particular lens of funny, quirky, brave, low-key, middle-class, white Vermont mom life. This book is not trying to stand in for all the experiences of motherhood, it clearly represents an enviable (in the most human, natural, relaxed, i-wish-i could-go-camping-with-her kind of way) particular set of experiences. But the author brings forth from them the most universal understanding of how we are all fumbling through this thing called motherhood. Damn, without one moment of pollayannish crap she makes all the suck ass moments of motherhood so beautiful, noble even. I don't know how to say it, she just makes the hard work of mothering seem possible, and heroic and special. It's this really amazing, totally common (but completely rare) privilege of a burden. And reading this book just makes me feel lucky to experience it.
Amy
May 21, 2018
This book was a hilarious dose of birth control.
Rebecca
September 07, 2019
This book is pretty spectacular in its brutal honesty and hilarity. Harrington is the master at making her readers ponder in one essay, while laughing in the next. She is a woman (like many of us), stuck in the middle. The middle of tasing children, the middle of her marriage, and the dreaded middle age. She approaches love and loss with amazing clarity and strength. Let me just end with a few great quotes from a few of her essays. “If you have grandparents, visit them. Go because no one will ever love you in the bold and gentle, big and uncomplicated way they do. Go because you can.” “We can never know what’s coming. We can’t know what’s heading our way a year from now; we can’t know it just for tomorrow. I look around and think constantly, We are all fragile; we are all strong”.
Molly
August 10, 2018
I'm not a mother myself, but you don't have to be to enjoy this book. Kimberly's commentary on womanhood, motherhood, and adulthood (an especially the marriage of all three) will ring true to any woman who picks up this book. It's relatable, funny, and at times will push your emotional buttons, bringing up feelings of nostalgia for your own childhood (if you don't have kids) or your kids' childhood (if you do). Kimberly says the things we've all thought or felt but haven't said, either because we felt like we shouldn't or we couldn't find the words. Reading this book is like having a long, open-ended conversation with one of your best girlfriends - kind you can get totally real with and talk about "taboo" topics like money, not being happy when society tells you that you should be overjoyed, and above all, mistakes.I received a free copy of this book from a Goodreads giveaway. But you should buy it or get it from your local library because it is great!
Kayle
August 25, 2018
Would highly recommend it to future mothers, people who know or knew mothers, or anyone interested in an in-depth perspective about the potential realities of motherhood from an outspoken, flawed woman.
Shweta
March 03, 2020
It was everything I wanted it to be. Real, gritty, funny, emotional and thought-provoking.A couple of essays seemed like they might have done better elsewhere, but otherwise I’d highly recommend this to moms and dads alike.
Susanne
July 29, 2018
Absolutely hilarious, fantastic bunch of poems. I am not a poetry reader at all but this appealed to me. I have not laughed so much at a book for ages, it’s a completely honest and funny book. It details life from baby to teenagers, from family trips to marriage and death. Brilliant reading :)
Katy
November 05, 2019
Wow. What a book. It’s a love letter to her children. It’s an ode to her family members. It’s funny and thoughtful. I’ve ear marked my copy for my favorite essays and quotes to reflect on again. I really enjoyed this book.
Benita
August 12, 2018
Listen when I say there are portions of this book that I absolutely loved - I mean it. On the flip side, there are also segments/sections of this book that are forgettable. I'm still giving this book high marks because the good parts are THAT good! My favorite section of the book was the section titled "Vows" - What an emotional roller coaster! Having said that, you should be in the right mind set to read this book in order to enjoy it. The author is crass, honest and erratic in the the most wonderful way. The book lets you know you are not alone in this motherhood thing and let's talk about how its amazing and awful at the same time! Read it!
Monica
November 07, 2018
Kimberly Harrington is freaking hilarious. I laughed so hard at times, I almost forgot how massively sleep deprived I am from raising a newborn. Yay, motherhood.
Charissa
March 20, 2018
Amateur Hour was an unexpected treat--gripping from the first chapter, heartfelt, gritty, full of surprises. It is a book about motherhood, but also marriage, generations of family, and the ups and downs of life itself. I could have done without a few of the chapters, but I plan to pass my copy along because I know it will bring others the same laughter and tears it brought to me.
Gail
December 04, 2018
If you have mommy friends on the interwebs, chances are you’ve clicked on one of Kimberly Harrington’s viral parenting essays: “Job Description for the Dumbest Job Ever” (e.g., “This position manages to be of the utmost importance and yet somehow also the least visible and/or respected in the entire organization”), “I Am the One Woman Who Has It All” (e.g., “I have kids who have forced me to do everything in my life with greater efficiency and the professional assumption that I’m now less efficient after having kids”), “Just What I Wanted, a Whole Twenty-Four Hours of Recognition Once a Year,” “Are You Sure There Isn’t Something Else I Can Do Before the End of the School Year?” and “Please Don’t Get Murdered at School Today.” “Amateur Hour” contains these satirical social commentaries and more. “Anne-Marie Slaughter Is My Safe Word,” which appears to be original to the book, is one of the most brilliant compositions I’ve ever read. (“Now, I know that [that safe word is] a mouthful, ball-gag puns aside, but I feel like it reflects my beliefs ... when it comes to the intersection of work, parenting, and caregiving in general.”) Unlike most compilations that feature one style, Harrington mixes quirky conceptual pieces (the written equivalent of MOMA exhibits) with straight-laced ruminations on grief, aging, and marriage. Many passages spoke to my heart and/or sense of humor deeply; other bits seemed just okay. When the vast bulk of a writer’s material lands though, I tend to give the rest the treatment bestowed off-jokes by a favorite stand-up comedian: I assume someone, somewhere is doubled over.It doesn’t hurt that Harrington is my kind of girl, an introspective nerd who takes her neuroses less seriously than her punchlines:“Maybe normal people use lists as they’re meant to be used, as a daily reminder of things that should be taken care of somewhat soon. I don’t like to do things that make sense, so I use lists as a way of outlining how theoretically busy I am while also setting myself up for an infinity loop of self-loathing over my failure to get an impossible amount of things done.”“‘But you don’t ever like anything I post on Facebook! You don’t even look at my page!’ Those are not the words of a teenager, spitting ridiculous complaints across the room at her best friend or boyfriend. Those are the words of a forty-five-year-old woman, a mother of two, in the middle of a fight with her husband. A fight where the topic was divorce.”“And before I even know what’s happening, I’m suddenly sharing worries and revealing doubts in a school hallway or on the playground. Even though I know—I know—I should stop talking, I keep trying to bury my openness with more openness. It’s like my own mouth is swallowing me whole.”Nor the way she sprinkles her stories with legitimately helpful parenting advice:“I will not be calling administrators or program directors or HR on your behalf. I will not be smoothing the way for you, although it will be so hard to resist doing just that. I will have to be the elder grown-up here, to not hobble you with my help.”“When I die, hug each other with force, until no one wants to be the first to let go. I let go first a lot. I can tell you now, I regret it.”Even the Russian judges would be forced to give Harrington's writing high marks both technically and artistically:“There are the girls in their early teens, with the gangly limbs of children and the growing bodies of women. They romp in the waves not fully realizing the complicated power their bodies possess. They absentmindedly grab their budding breasts to adjust their tops, and I put my head in my hands. They don’t even know. Or maybe they do.”“I see the skin on my forearm, crinkling like birthday streamers in response to the slightest pressure. That’s the skin of my mother and my grandmother before her. That’s the skin I clearly never planned on having.”At the end of the day, Harrington’s work stands out because the humor she wields as both sword and shield produces more than a sardonic chuckle here and there; it protects and clears the way for the most poignant and penetrating of insights:“This is the year he’s noticing differences and other kids are noticing what’s different about him. And although I know he’s not the only one going through this, he does not.”“[Mothers] hold ourselves to intense and impossible standards. We, of course, don’t do this alone. Our culture has set the bar so high that it’s hidden in a place where we’ll never find it. And, conversely, the bar for fathers has been set so low they can easily step over it on the way to the bathroom.”
Maura
July 15, 2019
I absolutely loved this book and want to know why I couldn't have a neighbor like Kimberly Harrington? Especially when my son was little. I read this book during a week when I got the following 2 messages from my 19 year old son who is a camp counselor this summer at an "adventure camp".The first one laced with many swear words basically said, " Oh my God, now I know what you and Dad went through raising me. I'm SO sorry. I love you guys." Kiddo, you have NO idea! Kimberly Harrington has an idea. But you don't.The second message came a few days later and said, " Maaaaaaa! Medical emergency! I need you to come up here and pick me up right now." Even though I was sitting at my desk in NYC and he was many hours away in the Catskills.I finished "Amateur Hour" on the very long bus ride home to Upstate, NY and it helped me laugh out loud instead of worry. And that's a lot like what being a mother is...balancing the laughter with the worry. And if you're lucky enough, having a friend like the author to help keep you sane. Any Mom with a sense of humor will appreciate this book. It should be a required gift for all baby showers.
Emma
June 20, 2018
I loved the first third of this book, but somewhere towards the middle, Harrington’s humour started to grate on me. To be fair, I’m in the midst of reading many collections of non-fiction narrative on parenting, and I’m less than four-months into the infant hazing zone, myself. When I was frustrated with the tone of Harrington’s narration, it’s because I felt like she portrayed parenthood with an irreverent perspective, which is exactly the opposite of the frame I’ve adopted in order to get me through. But she has decades of experience on me. And as the book progressed, I realised that irreverence and humour are necessary tools for surviving it all. It also helped that she referred to her own book in the acknowledgements as: “this weird-ass mental breakdown of a book.” By the end, a few of her essays gave me chills. I picked out quotes I’d like to send to some of my friends approaching new motherhood. I’d like to copy some down for my son someday. In the end, Harrington’s humour won me over. I should have known to expect it in a McSweeney’s-backed publication anyway!
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