Customer Reviews

This Boy's Life: A Memoir

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For those who like the Tolstoy addage about "unhappy families," you'll want to read this stellar Tobias Wolff novel. Jack Wolff is a boy who has one unusual life. He smokes, drinks, vandalizes, and steals. That is, however, until he is forced to move from Seattle to Chinook, with his new step-father, Dwight. Dwight turns out to be an abusive drunk, who will change Jack's life forever. Full of twists and turns, this is one fascinating read and should not be overlooked. Would also recommend another great book I've come across: "The Bark of the Dogwood." Equally as entertaining

This Boy's Life is a memoir of a vulnerable childhood in the mid 1950's. Toby, the main character has had a life full of trouble and grief. His mother and father are divorced, leaving him with his mother, Rosemary, while his brother and father live in Connecticut. Toby and his mother are always on the go and through this Toby and his mother become very close. They are trying to become new people and escape Troy, Toby's abusive stepfather. "It was 1955 and we were driving from Florida to Utah, to get away from a man my mother was afraid of..."(Wolff 4). The book carries you through various troubles that Toby and his mother get involved with; Toby commits a few schemes of his own along with it. The book is a very good read for teenagers and adults can also take something away from this memoir too.
The majority of the book takes place in West Seattle in a low key community. "We lived in a boarding house...At Night if my mother wasn't to tired, we took walks around the neighborhood, stopping in front of different houses to consider them as candidates...the boarding house was full of old men and men who probably seemed old" (Wolff 37). Toby finds himself with a bad crowd of friends which gets him into trouble. He breaks cafeteria windows, nails some rich people's cars with eggs, and is just a thug when he is not around his mother. He is lost between his mother and the rest of the world.
I would definitely recommend this book to teenagers especially runs that have experienced some things like Toby such as abuse and always being on the go. The book draws you into many different situations that bring you to the heart of the moment. Although this book review may not be very convincing that this is a "must read", if you ever get to pick up the book you will be drawn to it in a snap of a finger.

This book does not have a lot to offer. There are so many memoirs out these days and Tobias should have stuck to fiction. His life just wasn't interesting enough and his writing is not compelling enough to make the reader care. . .about him or the outcome of his life. Even the writing was not particularly great. So, I would choose a different book for English classes, one that would resonate a bit more. I would choose one that would offer a bit more moral courage in the face of hardships, something that would show development in spite of a harsh environment. Mr. Wolff just played his cards the way they were dealt and cheated when he felt it would help him. I don't think that's commendable or anything to 'write home about'.

In this memoir, author Tobias Wolff tells his story of growing up in the 1950s. He begins at age 10, five years after the breakup of his parents' marriage, when he and his mother are heading West to escape from one of her boyfriends and to start a new life. From this point on, the book details their struggles, which revolve around two main (and clearly related) themes: their financial difficulties and the conflicts which arise with the various men who appear in their lives.

The majority of the book centers around a period when Tobias (or Jack, as he was known then) and his mother live with Dwight, a man his mother married in an attempt to keep Jack out of trouble. To some extent, Wolff attempts to portray Dwight as all-bad, but like all people, Dwight is simply flawed. His positive efforts to help Jack are often wiped out by his subsequent negative behavior--e.g., he helps Jack get a paper route but then spends Jack's money without his knowledge, he encourages Jack to become a Boy Scout but won't complete the paperwork to allow him to become an Eagle Scout, etc. Jack's family life was dysfunctional well before the term ever existed.

I read this book after seeing a reference to it in another memoir, Alice Sebold's Lucky. Like Sebold, Wolff tells his own story with a largely dispassionate voice and very simple language, both of which dilute the impact of his words somewhat. His emotions more clearly shine through when he mentions what his past brought to his current life, but unfortunately, he does not do this very often. Furthermore, Wolff gives the reader only a small glimpse of what the future holds in store for Jack, which I found to be frustrating. Overall, this was a compelling memoir, but it left me wanting more than what Wolff offered.

(...)
This is an accurately told book regarding the hard life that some children must go through. The lack of actually having a normal childhood. This is a great book, very emotional

Also recommending: Nightmares Echo,Bastard Out Of Carolina,Running With Scissors

This was an excellent book. I could relate to it in many ways. I too had a childhood like Tobias and I am finally getting over it.

This is not your All American idyll. No, young Wolff is not the barefoot boy with cheek. It seems his life would be everything he could desire if only he weren't drawn to the wrong sort of peers and if only his mother avoided abusive men. After a few pranks such as drawing a bead with a 22 rifle on passers by, and pelting with eggs a well-to-do man in his new Thunderbird Convertible it almost seems like just desserts for Wolff and his mother to be swept away to an isolated company town in the Cascade Range of Washington State with the nefarious Dwight the dim-wit.
But whoa, the new man in their life is a monster who eventually is banished from their lives by court order. Halleleuh! But for two or more indelible years, this is the sort of stepfather who makes young Wolff deliver newspapers for the brief years of their association, claiming to be saving the funds for the boy but instead spends the money on fancy hunting rifles for great horseback hunts which never happen. A drunkard and a master of brow beatings, the one redeeming factor dull Dwight brings into Wolfe's life is an association with the Boy Scouts and indeed Wolff credits his scouting days with his later decision to join the army.
As presumably a real life memoir, the writing is excellent. It does however beg the question; what is craft without purpose? The strength of This Boy's Life is the candor and comfort with Wolff recounts his struggles. Hurray then for candor, hurray for the anti-hero but please Turn on the Lights! Must this hero live in darkness? Give him purpose, direction, and discipline. Most of all, give him fresh thunder!!!

This boy's life is memoir of a professor named Tobias Wolff at the Syracuse University. The story takes place in Salf lake city, Seattle, and Concrete, Washington. The story takes place in the 1950's. The story starts with a big truck and a trailer running off a cliff and blowing up. Reading the first paragraph one would think that it is one of those action - adventure novels where things blow up. But one was not idea how wrong he or she is. The novel starts out with a teenager (Toby) who is traveling with his mother (Rosemary who is a victim of black Friday) to Utah. Trying to escape an abusive relationship. Also traveling with them are their high hopes of starting a new life but all of that is smashed into to pieces when her abusive lover shows up in Salt Lake City. They flee again, this time to Seattle. Somehow Jack's mother always manages to find and love men who are abusive to her and who make Jack's life miserable. Toby, who changes his name to Jack after Jack London, and for the rest of the novel he is known as Jack. Separated from his father and older brother who is attending Princeton and living the money life Jack can only dream about. Jack never finds out what is a real family life like. He is also gripped with guns just like a normal young child is fascinated with guns would be. When Jack and his mother arrive in Seattle, where his mother meets Dwight. To her Dwight seems to be the perfect man for a husband for herself and a father for Jack. His character can be best described as cruel, antagonist or the villain of the story, the one who steals Jack's childhood, his only motivation is to humiliate and insult everyone and anyone he can. For every move Jack makes Dwight is there to criticize him. Dwight uses physical power to show everyone that he is the king of the castle. Throughout this book Jack raises the question to himself of who he is and struggles with his own identity as a man, and with less than good role models and even more he is looking in the wrong places at the wrong time. Jack is overcome by the power of his fantasies and is convinced that they are even more real than reality; his fantasies help him to overcome his pains and trouble in life which are mainly caused by Dwight. He finds himself becoming a master of deception, pretending to be whatever other people want from him, instead of who he himself is. For example his plans of running to Alaska, forges letters of recommendation from his teachers, and He tries to make his mother happy by becoming what he thinks she wants him to be, and by doing that he ruins a big part of his life. This story somehow seems similar to The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz by Mordecai Richler. As both novels deal with self identity issues and family relations. This boy's life as a book is lacking something, like for all the abuse Jack apparently suffered from Dwight especially, one does not feel any rage or anger at the situation, when reading the novel it felt like reading a newspaper, one does feel towards the character, events and situation in the novel but the feeling is strong enough. The reader is just not encouraged enough to feel strongly about the characters, events and situation in the novel.

America is said to be the land of the free. This freedom provides a wide variety in the ways that people choose to live their lives. Everyone has a different and unique family situation. Dysfunctional families exist all over the nation. "This Boy's Life: A Memoir", by Tobias Wolff, puts you in the shoes of a young kid growing up in a dysfunctional family. The main character in the story is the author Tobias Wolff in his childhood. In an effort to escape his abusive father, Toby and his mother move from Florida to Utah to try to get rich from uranium. In Utah, Toby makes friends with the trouble makers at school and becomes a master of deception. As the story progresses, Toby struggles with his identity. He wants to be the son his mother expects him to be, but he can't stop lying and stealing. Later in the story they move to Washington where Toby's mother remarries a man named Dwight, who also turns out to be abusive. And the cycle continues.
This story is told very true to life. Wolff tells his story very well so that even if you do not live in a dysfunctional family, you can still understand the harsh situation that people are in across the country. Some families only have a mother, others only a father. Whatever the situation may be, unless someone has lived in a situation like this it is hard to imagine what life might be like in a single parent dysfunctional family. In the book, Wolff gives a child of a unique family situation a voice, and brings his story to life. Wolff tells the story well enough that you understand emotionally, what Toby is going through. Throughout the story, Toby is met with some common conflicts a lot of people encounter during adolescence. How many people can say they have never in some way lied, stolen, or questioned their identity? Not very many. The book is a journey through Wolff's life, but at the same time it's a journey through a lot of people's lives.
This book reminded me of some very valuable life lessons. It reminded me that difficult situations like Toby encountered are not punishments or barriers, but rather character builders. In the story, Toby learned to cope with the absence of his father, and he also learned to search for positives in a world full of negatives. I think most people would agree that situations like Toby's only make you a stronger person. Living and experiencing pain and bad luck, you learn to deal with the things that life throws at you. Your experiences and make you who you are. I think Toby learned a lot from what was happening around him. For him, growing up in a dysfunctional family, I think showed him what he didn't want to turn out to be.
The story ends with Toby and his friend Chuck driving in the car singing along to the radio. Toby had been through a lot, and was still in a tough situation, but for the first time he seemed happy. He had let go of all of the things that were happening to him, and he learned to overcome his situation. This ending sent a very powerful message to me. It reminded me that no matter what life throws at you, you always have hope, and you can always move on.
I think this is a great story because it deals with real life issues. This book is about life, the good and the bad. Though this is a very depressing story, I found this book to be very inspiring.

It seems presumptuous to write a review of this book. It's capable of standing alone, selling forever, and being widely and deeply admired without anyone ever writing another review of it. Published in 1989, This Boy's Life is a memoir of Tobias Wolff's grim teenage years in which he is pitted in a battle of wills against his abusive stepfather. The intelligence and deception employed by the child prove a nearly equal match against the cruelty of the adult in this equation. In exquisite prose, Wolff leavens the grisly reality with dark humor, and readers are surprised, considering the subject matter, to find themselves not depressed overall, but uplifted.