# Magical Thinking: True Stories by Augusten Burroughs ## Metadata - **Author:** Augusten Burroughs - **Published:** October 2004, St. Martin's Press (about 288 pages) - **Form:** Collection of short personal essays (counts differ by source: 26 or 27 pieces) - **Audiobook:** Macmillan Audio, 2024, read by the author, about 8.5 hours - **Reading:** listening on audiobook (see [[Reading/Currently reading|Currently reading]]) - **Related:** [[Reading/Authors/Mary Karr/The Art of Memoir|The Art of Memoir]] (on the truth contract in memoir) ## How this note was made I wrote this from published reviews, a catalog record, and an encyclopedia entry, not from listening to the audiobook. The summary describes what reviewers report. The critique at the end is a synthesis of those reviews plus my own reading of what they imply, and it is marked as such. Check it against what you hear. ## Summary *Magical Thinking* is Burroughs's follow-up to his bestselling memoirs *Running with Scissors* and *Dry*. Instead of one continuous story, it is a run of short, self-contained true stories, mostly set in his adult life but opening with a childhood moment. Reviewers describe the arc as growing pains first, then adult pains. What the stories cover, according to the reviews: - **Childhood and its aftershocks.** The opening story, "Commercial Break," is about a childhood soft-drink commercial shoot that shaped his later ambitions and his habit of undermining himself. - **Work.** His years as an advertising copywriter, and the stretches before and after he was published. - **Relationships.** Boyfriends, including his partner Dennis and a date with an undertaker ("I Dated an Undertaker," set in a funeral home viewing room), and family, including a brother with Asperger's. - **Recovery.** Life after alcoholism, told as ordinary adult life rather than a recovery narrative. - **Petty obsessions and grudges.** "Telemarketing Revenge" (a crude response to persistent phone solicitors), "Debby's Requirements" (a demanding cleaning lady who eventually sues him), plus pieces with titles like "The Rat/Thing," "Vanderbilt Genes," and "Holy Blow Job." **The title.** Reviewers read "magical thinking" as the habit of overestimating your power to control events, the false sense that your thoughts or small rituals can steer what happens. The stories show Burroughs (and the people around him) trying to exert that control and failing, usually in a comic or squirm-inducing way. **Tone.** Darkly funny, irreverent, self-deprecating, unflinching about shame, sex, and bodily indignity. Serious material (childhood damage, even thoughts of murder, per one reviewer) sits right next to trivia like QVC infomercials, and the contrast is the engine of the humor. ## Reception - **Kirkus:** very positive. Calls the book "dementedly original" (their phrase), praises the honesty and the collision of tragic and trivial. Notes that some anecdotes may strain credibility. [Read](https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/augusten-burroughs/magical-thinking/) - **Encyclopedia.com (reference entry):** describes it as sharp, funny, sometimes brilliant, and compares him favorably to David Sedaris and David Rakoff while noting he's distinct. [Read](https://www.encyclopedia.com/arts/educational-magazines/burroughs-augusten-1965-0) - **San Diego Reader and a student newspaper (The Miami Hurricane):** positive; praise the wit, nerve, and willingness to go to taboo places. [Reader](https://www.sandiegoreader.com/news/2004/oct/07/augusten-burroughs-magical-thinking/) · [Hurricane](https://themiamihurricane.com/2005/11/15/burroughs-essays-charm-readers-with-humor-and-wit/) - **Metapsychology (audiobook review):** enjoyed it; finds Burroughs charming, "quirky, vulnerable," and the audio performance makes him feel like someone you're getting to know. Raises a cultural reservation about audiences consuming a stream of survivors-of-dysfunction stories. [Read](https://metapsychology.net/?p=2519) ## Critique *This section is my own synthesis from the reviews above, not a review from listening.* **What works (consistent across reviewers)** - **Voice is the product.** The reviews agree the book succeeds on the strength of a distinctive, acerbic, vulnerable narrator. That fits Karr's argument in [[Reading/Authors/Mary Karr/The Art of Memoir|The Art of Memoir]] that a memoir lives or dies on voice, and the audiobook, read by Burroughs himself, adds to that. - **Short form suits the material.** Self-contained pieces let him land a joke or a humiliation and move on, with no need to sustain a plot. - **Shame as comic fuel.** He doesn't flatter himself; the unflattering detail is usually the funniest, which is also what builds trust. **Reservations** - **Credibility of "true stories."** Kirkus already flags anecdotes that strain belief. The wider context matters: the Turcotte family sued Burroughs in 2005 over *Running with Scissors*, claiming many incidents were fictional, and in a later book (*Possible Side Effects*, 2006) he added a note admitting some events were "expanded and changed." That doesn't prove anything about these particular essays, but it changes how much weight "true" can carry in the subtitle. For a memoirist, this is a live example of Karr's truth-contract problem: a comic voice makes exaggeration tempting, and the reader can't tell where it happens. - **Shock as a habit.** Titles and premises lean on provocation. One of the reviews' own implied worries is whether shock and mortification can stay fresh across 26 or 27 pieces; I can't say from the reviews whether the book sags, so this is something to listen for. - **The survivor-story economy.** The Metapsychology reviewer's discomfort (an audience rewarding writers mainly for surviving dysfunction with jokes) is worth holding onto, though it's about the genre as much as this book. - **Episodic structure.** A collection of stand-alone pieces gives up the cumulative force of a book-length memoir. That's a trade-off, not necessarily a flaw. **Questions to check while listening** 1. Which pieces feel exaggerated, and does the voice invite you to forgive it? 2. Does the order of the stories build anything, or is it a grab bag? 3. Does "magical thinking" actually organize the book, or is it a title laid over unrelated stories? 4. How much of the effect comes from his performance rather than the prose? ## Sources [Wikipedia (publication facts)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magical_Thinking_(book)) · [Kirkus](https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/augusten-burroughs/magical-thinking/) · [Encyclopedia.com](https://www.encyclopedia.com/arts/educational-magazines/burroughs-augusten-1965-0) · [San Diego Reader](https://www.sandiegoreader.com/news/2004/oct/07/augusten-burroughs-magical-thinking/) · [The Miami Hurricane](https://themiamihurricane.com/2005/11/15/burroughs-essays-charm-readers-with-humor-and-wit/) · [Metapsychology](https://metapsychology.net/?p=2519) · [Audiobook catalog record](https://catalog.larchmontlibrary.org/Hoopla/17353390) ## My notes