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A review by jdglasgow
The New One: Painfully True Stories from a Reluctant Dad by Mike Birbiglia
3.0
The concept of THE NEW ONE appealed to me as a fairly new parent myself; like Mike, I fretted over the decision to have a child and even after the decision was made felt some ambivalence about the prospect. My father friends assured me that once the baby was born a light would come on in my heart and everything would change but on the day of my son’s birth there was no glorious revelation: he just seemed like any other baby at first. Now, nearing a year old, I’ve come to know him and feel much closer to him than I did in those very first moments, but I must admit that Birbiglia’s reluctance to be in the dad role seemed relatable.
Having now read the book, I’d still say that, yes, it is relatable, though perhaps unsurprisingly his journey doesn’t exactly match mine. For instance, it sounds like he struggled with connecting with his daughter long after she was born whereas I don’t think it took all that long for me to feel a bond with my son. But more generalized feelings like not wanting his life to change, assuming he will be a lousy parent, and worrying about what neuroses or, heck, even medical issues he is passing along through his genes are all things that I could appreciate. It is nice to see those feelings detailed, not to mention the stress it *did* put on his marriage. I did read a handful of other reviews on GoodReads suggesting that Birbiglia’s wife Jen comes across as selfish or bitchy here and that may be true but I think it’s not so much that she’s a bad person as that this is how Birbiglia perceived her in the moment; he doesn’t come across as an exemplar of virtue either. It’s about people who struggle and snipe at each other but who ultimately want to work together. I think it’s nice.
Though Birbiglia’s wife Jen (who goes by the pen name “J. Hope Stein”) isn’t a bad *person* despite some of the ways she is characterized in this book, she is a bad *poet*. In an egregious example of nepotism, the book is interrupted every few pages by Stein’s formless poetry which is no better than the work of any random teenager. It put me in mind of the sketch from ‘I Think You Should Leave’ in which a deep-voiced singer/songwriter tries to impress record execs with a plaintive song about dying in a duel over the love of a woman and Tim Robinson, trying to “follow his lead”, inserts tuneless ramblings about skeletons that pull your hair up but not out and use worms for money. Similarly, Birbiglia’s funny observational humor is shot through with shitty little bits of nonsense with no rhyme scheme or structure, lines cut up at random to at least look like poetry. The sheer badness of this writing fairly enrages me, though to be fair it did seem to get a little stronger after their daughter Oona was born. Mostly it really brings down the book, though.
That aside, Birbiglia’s writing is funny. It made me laugh aloud to myself on several occasions and there were a few passages I found so funny I had to read them to my wife. The vignette about Mike and Jen meeting President Obama and deciding to make him the first to know Jen was pregnant is a particular highlight. I also found the part where Mike has to have his sperm tested for motility issues and worries that the doctor’s instruction to masturbate into a cup is an elaborate practical joke to be very funny. (This is unrelated but my phone’s swipe keyboard will now write “Birbiglia” without issue but absolutely *refused* to suggest the word “masturbate”—such a prude.)
I guess one other concern I have is that the book as a whole feels a little loosely structured. There’s an overall chronological sequence of events, but I didn’t really feel Birbiglia‘a changing attitude toward his daughter or fatherhood; the “Oonadad” chapter near the end lacked emotional resonance to me because it didn’t feel earned. I don’t get the impression the book had a real strong central thesis undergirding it (swipe had no problem with “undergirding”; it got it on the first try), so it didn’t come across as building to anything, really. Nevertheless, it is funny and unquestionably raw, and as noted there are elements which seem… if not universal then at least common enough that I could see myself in some of Birbiglia’s anecdotes. I enjoyed it.
Having now read the book, I’d still say that, yes, it is relatable, though perhaps unsurprisingly his journey doesn’t exactly match mine. For instance, it sounds like he struggled with connecting with his daughter long after she was born whereas I don’t think it took all that long for me to feel a bond with my son. But more generalized feelings like not wanting his life to change, assuming he will be a lousy parent, and worrying about what neuroses or, heck, even medical issues he is passing along through his genes are all things that I could appreciate. It is nice to see those feelings detailed, not to mention the stress it *did* put on his marriage. I did read a handful of other reviews on GoodReads suggesting that Birbiglia’s wife Jen comes across as selfish or bitchy here and that may be true but I think it’s not so much that she’s a bad person as that this is how Birbiglia perceived her in the moment; he doesn’t come across as an exemplar of virtue either. It’s about people who struggle and snipe at each other but who ultimately want to work together. I think it’s nice.
Though Birbiglia’s wife Jen (who goes by the pen name “J. Hope Stein”) isn’t a bad *person* despite some of the ways she is characterized in this book, she is a bad *poet*. In an egregious example of nepotism, the book is interrupted every few pages by Stein’s formless poetry which is no better than the work of any random teenager. It put me in mind of the sketch from ‘I Think You Should Leave’ in which a deep-voiced singer/songwriter tries to impress record execs with a plaintive song about dying in a duel over the love of a woman and Tim Robinson, trying to “follow his lead”, inserts tuneless ramblings about skeletons that pull your hair up but not out and use worms for money. Similarly, Birbiglia’s funny observational humor is shot through with shitty little bits of nonsense with no rhyme scheme or structure, lines cut up at random to at least look like poetry. The sheer badness of this writing fairly enrages me, though to be fair it did seem to get a little stronger after their daughter Oona was born. Mostly it really brings down the book, though.
That aside, Birbiglia’s writing is funny. It made me laugh aloud to myself on several occasions and there were a few passages I found so funny I had to read them to my wife. The vignette about Mike and Jen meeting President Obama and deciding to make him the first to know Jen was pregnant is a particular highlight. I also found the part where Mike has to have his sperm tested for motility issues and worries that the doctor’s instruction to masturbate into a cup is an elaborate practical joke to be very funny. (This is unrelated but my phone’s swipe keyboard will now write “Birbiglia” without issue but absolutely *refused* to suggest the word “masturbate”—such a prude.)
I guess one other concern I have is that the book as a whole feels a little loosely structured. There’s an overall chronological sequence of events, but I didn’t really feel Birbiglia‘a changing attitude toward his daughter or fatherhood; the “Oonadad” chapter near the end lacked emotional resonance to me because it didn’t feel earned. I don’t get the impression the book had a real strong central thesis undergirding it (swipe had no problem with “undergirding”; it got it on the first try), so it didn’t come across as building to anything, really. Nevertheless, it is funny and unquestionably raw, and as noted there are elements which seem… if not universal then at least common enough that I could see myself in some of Birbiglia’s anecdotes. I enjoyed it.