Househusband

Rating:
Summary: Had potential but couldn't live up to it
Review: "In almost every culture on the planet, Mom is the building that harbors the family. And people just don't value architecture like they should."

In this novel (although perhaps somewhat autobiographical, as the author is a househusband himself) Ad Hudler examines the relations between men and women, between caregivers and care receivers, between work and home. He explains how a man who stays at home identifies with men, with women, and sometimes with no one at all. The narrator's journey toward identity resolution is funny, sweet, and poignant: "I thought of how we all fall into longstanding patterns of behavior, occasionally by choice, most often out of necessity, and we break free from those patterns only after a series of random phrases or acts that startle or frighten or anger us in some way. We then get diverted, pushed in a new direction, and we start walking and exploring all over again."

Men and women in traditional and nontraditional gender roles can identify with this book. I recommend it as an astute, yet non-blaming and non-guilt-producing, examination of family life.

Rating:
Summary: Witty and delightful!
Review: Absolutely one of the funniest and engaging books about child care and SAHM's. I laughed out loud so many times my co-workers thought I was nuts! I say bravo to Mr Hudler for a true glimpse of man in a woman's part of the world. I know there are men out there like this, because I have one!

Rating:
Summary: I need one of those! LOL
Review: Absolutely one of the funniest and engaging books about child care and SAHM's. I think this book makes a lot of true points, about gender and about the unrecognized value of a homemaker.

Rating:
Summary: This is for real!
Review: And I thought that the Nanny Diaries was an entertaining look at "parenting"? This book is for real and actually made me feel great about what I spend 16 hours a day doing. Hudler has a style and insight that made me want to agree out loud at what I was reading. This book was truly fun to read and I will absolutely pass it book along to friends. (After my husband is finished with it!)

Rating:
Summary: Exciting, Funny and a great way to view parenting
Review: Based on personal experience in which I am the stay-at-home dad and my wife is the "corporate executive" I find this book to depict many of the things that dads truly experience. We are viewed as different and even sometimes gay by some in the current culture. Others view us as failures in our own careers(which we are not) and even more so in a sort of discriminatory practice. But all things considered, after reading this book I realized how much more important it was for me to be the best parent I knew how to my two children. Kudos to Ad Hudler for taking on a new approach to parenting in our society and a great book.


Rating:
Summary: To someone debating whether to buy this
Review: Don't read this if you either think only women can be homemakers or think housework is a snap. I think this book makes a lot of true points, about gender and about the unrecognized value of a homemaker, and I think the readers giving reviews are influenced by whether they agree with these points. However a good message doesn't necessarily make a good book. The points could have been made in a 5,000 word position paper. Or this story could have made a tight novella. But, despite the well-written prose, the situation is unchanged for most of the book: Linc is unhappy as a househusband despite the rewards, yet he's trapped. The book failed to engage me in whether he has an affair with his neighbor, or with what happens to his mother on the run, or how he will deal with an inadequate nanny. I enjoyed the individual scenes but overall the trip to the end took too long.

Rating:
Summary: What an eye-opener!
Review: Having a 4-year-old child myself, it was fascinating to read about what I've been through the last few years, but from a male perspective. You can tell the author has lived this world of potty training, whipping together dinner fast and trying to keep up your self esteem in a world that measures people by job titles and career tracks. Add to that the gender issues and assumptions that we put on men and women, this novel has surprising depth while being very funny. I found myself examing my own knee-jerk reaction to househusbands, that they must be sponges who live off their high-earning wives. Yet I'd never think that of a housewife. Yikes, I'm a sexist and didn't know it!

On a lighter note, I just loved how he ended a number of chapters with a recipe for the dinner or lunch Linc had prepared in that chapter's scene. I have made the tortellini and the spring rolls and they are both easy and delicious.

Rating:
Summary: Not your typical Mr. Mom story, more sociological.
Review: I liked this book because it tells the stories of three different women, two southerners and one Yankee, and the reader gets to follow them as they grow into new lives. I enjoyed the book because the writing was fresh and cliche-free, and despite the humor there was a lot of depth to the characters. This is indeed a story about the "New South."

Rating:
Summary: Horrible depiction of parenting
Review: I thought this book may have potential to be witty and filled with great observations from the other half (dad being primary care giver). It was a disappointing, whining, boring, "soap box" that made not only working mothers look bad, but also stay-at-homers and everything in-between! I had a very hard time finishing it, and then considered it a complete waste of time. This guy does more whining and complaining then both of my children on an eight hour car trip! YUCK - - -
AND - It's easy to raise one child - I would love to see the character when number two and three come along!
Good Luck!

Rating:
Summary: five cheers for househusbands (and housewives)
Review: linc menner is a self-described househusband, a landscape architect to the stars who decides to stay at home with his three-year old, violet, while his wife takes a high profile job as the COO of a large rochester hospital. hudler's book outlines menner's foray into full-time parenting. cut off from all adult contact, he can chart the progress of time only by the growth of a passion flower plant. as he becomes more and more paranoid about his worth as a man and a husband, he also becomes more controlling about his "kingdom" - how violet is cared for, how the laundry is done, etc.

this book is certainly funny, but it also touches on deeper issues of gender roles, acceptance, and insecurity. there is also much mulling about food, and the book includes many of linc's recipes. i haven't tried any yet, but they tasted good in my mind.

i was pleasantly surprised by how cleanly this book is constructed, and how well hudler was able to expose linc's shortcomings while still keeping him likable. most impressive is the way that hudler develops linc, subtly but surely. this is light reading, but a more worthwhile book than most.