Thoughts on Memoirs

I love a well written memoir. I find them fascinating. The book I am reading now is a memoir. It was chosen by our book club to be our next conquest. When ordering the book for my Kindle 2, I saw the reviews were stellar. The average rating was five stars. However, there were a few rogues who gave it only a single star. I was intrigued. How can a book with well over 300 five star reviews, have a handful of one star reviews. I had to read them. I just could not help myself.

After reading a few, I realized what was happening with these reviews. The reviewers did not dislike the book as much as dislike one of the authors in particular. This is a phenomenon I have seen in past memoir reviews I have read. When researching Down Came the Rain, I found people reviewing Brooke Shield's life choices, not the book. I was annoyed by the public's inability to read a book and at least be polite. I wanted to comment on their reviews and tell each one (where the person was judging the life and not the book) to knock it off.


It is amazing how much we love to pass judgment on other people. I am no different. It is much more fun to gossip about others and judge their decisions. We are in the cheap seats and pulling punches is fun. How much better would it be for us to stop judging and start listening? How many of us ridicule out of insecurity? Isn't it easier to look at the speck in another person's eye without examining the log in our own? I know it for me. This has always been a weakness of mine. However, with two little pairs of ears listening to every word that comes out of my mouth (unless of course those words involve cleaning up toys, eating veggies, or bedtime, ahem), I am learning that I need to edit my comments. Something that is funny coming from a thirty something is not so amusing when repeated (several times) by a three year old. Hearing her innocent voice repeat my snarky remarks reinforces how tacky those snide comments sound. The next time I start to chastise someone else's choices, I hope I will take pause. I hope I will reassess the situation and shut the hell up.