(U-WIRE) – Recently transformed into a motion picture, Augusten Burroughs’ memoir “Running With Scissors” certainly has the effect of a twisted, disturbing movie without the comfort of censorship.
Burroughs’ writes of his unstable parents, adopted family and extremely unhealthy relationship with a man twice his age. All of these elements combine to form his childhood, which can best be described as interesting with a large dose of disturbing.
His mother is a devoted and deranged writer who spends her time obsessing over her poetry, eating toothpaste sandwiches or bits of the ceiling, and creating makeshift shoulder pads out of maxi pads.
Meanwhile, his father is an alcoholic with a short temper who loses all interest in Burroughs when he finally divorces his mother.
The book largely revolves around the relationship Burroughs and his mother have with her psychiatrist, Dr. Finch, whose own mental health is quite questionable. Diedre, his mother, goes from seeing her doctor once or twice a week to every day to practically living at his house.
No ordinary family, the Finches are a random assortment of people including several “adopted children” and a hunchback mother who eats dog food like popcorn. The Christmas tree stays up year round, the grandson Poo Bear runs around naked, and roaches run rampant.
This is where the majority of the events take place, as Burroughs’ mother decides to let the doctor adopt her son. Burroughs spends years with the Finches and through his experiences there, the reader is forced to question what the defining line is between sane and insane.
Burroughs’ one saving grace among all the filth, his mother’s psychotic episodes and overall confusion, is the best friend that he finds in one of the adopted daughters, Natalie. The two have a common bond in that they haven’t completely succumbed to the insanity that surrounds them and they both desire to move on to something greater.
While the memoir is very interesting and hard to put down, it is also quite graphic in parts and isn’t for the faint of heart. Burroughs takes a no-holds-barred way of writing and his story is all the more effective as a result.
He goes into great detail about the intense and twisted relationship that he, a 14-year-old boy, has with a 34-year-old man, Neil Bookman.
The characters in this book are some of the most twisted and complex to ever have made their way on to a page and the truly disturbing part is that they are not fictional.
The book progresses at a nice pace until it jumps from Burroughs’ sixteenth year to his post-college years and abruptly finishes. There is resolution, though, and that is more than many books offer. There is even a “Where are they now?” update after the final chapter. Overall, this very interesting yet disturbing read is good to have under your belt, but definitely not one to read to the kiddies at bedtime.