Someone Could Get Hurt

Someone Could Get Hurt: A Memoir of Twenty-First-Century Parenthood by Drew Magary
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Sum it up in a sentence (or two): Drew Magary's memoir of "21st Century Parenthood" is filled with personal stories of the triumphs and tribulations that go with having children. The essays range from sweet and sensitive to rowdy and irreverent, and the whole way through I was both grateful for and shocked by his honesty.

First thoughts: See above. Also, I liked Magary's laid back writing and parenting style for the most part. A few times I was like, uhhh, should he be saying these things? He himself admits to self-editing certain parts so as to not scare people with his parenting, but I'm sure many things were exaggerated for humor.

Favorite quotes:

"No one makes it through life unscathed, but you usually get a grace period at the start." -p3

"People tell you that you should never take life for granted but that's wrong, because taking life for granted is an encouraging sign that your life is going well." -p8

"All the bullshit you sign up for when you start out doesn't just go away. It goes on and on and on until you stop running away from it and start embracing it." -p239

"Love means you never stop trying to be better." p 239

Parenting thoughts: This book could be an effective form of birth control; it's funny, but sad and scary too. More than once I asked myself if I was ready to be in the situations the book presented.

Final thoughts: I love the way the book was end-capped with one story (about the birth of his third child) split so that we got the set up early on, then read through stories of kids one and two before getting back to baby three. It gave a serious weight to the rest of the book and served as a balance to some of the crazy stories in the middle.


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