Not very compelling!
I read this book and was very disappointed. I thought "oh, finally someone that had it harder than my family." Boy was I wrong. You don't even have a clue as to what abuse is in this book. Yeah, the father was a dark and mysterious often detached man, but until you walk in the shoes of someone that is truly abused, write something else.

Unreadable
I've read all of his books and this one is boring. I couldn't get past the first few chapters. There is little to no humor in it and it was ponderous and self pitying. His father didn't pay enough attention to him(whose father did?)and blah, blah, blah...

Fabulous follow-up
Running with Scissors by Augusten Burroughs is one of my favorite books and this was a good follow-up. He doesn't talk much about his father in the previous book so it was nice to get more insight. I thought it was a little dry at first but got really good as it went on. The first line in the book tied me in though!

Love the book cover
The book didn't make me want to read more. It didn't draw me into the charaters. It was very hard to follow for me.

Well Writen, But A Tad Misleading
I'm giving this book three stars primarily on the technical aspect of Burroughs writing. It's extremely well written, evocative, moody, and at times actually scary.For those who are familiar with his other books, this is also uncharacteristically very serious, lacking the many laughs or frankly even chuckles his other books have elicited. My problem with the book is that I kept waiting for the torrent of what I believed, and is actually foreshadowed, of violence at the hands of his father towards Augusten. Some of the incidents that he relays are awful there's no denying it, and there's no way to underestimate the feelings brought on by living with someone who was so clearly an angry alcoholic, but less so the menacing sociopath he would lead you to believe tormented him. The homicidal impulses he believes his father was capable of were merely that; feelings. And as the book progressed it seemed to become less about an abusive parent, whether physical or emotional, and more about a boy becoming a man and finding the way to put to rest the monster that had been created, and accept he might never get the love and validation he was seeking from this wolf he called "Dead".