My friend Annashay recommended this as an audiobook — Neko Case reads it herself — and I was pleasantly surprised by how different it was from what I expected. What I ultimately came to really appreciate (though it threw me at first) was how the book as only very loosely bound to an overarching narrative. It wasn’t like, My Life Story, or My Relationship to My Mother. It’s both of those things, yes, but there’s no single through-line or point. It’s more like a series of memories and meditations, in roughly chronological order, all related (literally, on the audiobook) in her distinctive voice.
There is surprisingly little about artistic development or inspiration, and what there is comes in bits and pieces — wanting to be like this other band, feeling self-conscious or insecure, men assuming you lack talent. One thing that really stuck with me was a bit about how her family singing along to the radio in the car taught her to sing without shame. I feel newly justified in continuing to torture my child on car rides!
A lot of the book deals with the experience of having parents who are struggling with their own traumas and whose parenting is in many ways actively detrimental to your well-being. This is hard, hard stuff, and it’s impressive how thoughtfully Neko Case engages it, trying to see her parents as entire people (not just parents) without diminishing or justifying the real harms they did. She writes with real compassion, though not without anger as well. But again, this isn’t the only, or even the main, story — it’s a piece among many.
I wouldn’t say it’s a book that everyone needs to read, but if you’ve had a lot of family trauma, it may be useful to you in working through it. And if you’re a Neko Case fan, it’s interesting to learn more about her — you come away feeling like you sat up all night talking, which is fun.
Kasia Reads 