# Running with Scissors: A Memoir by Augusten Burroughs ## Metadata - **Author:** Augusten Burroughs - **Published:** 2002, St. Martin's Press (Picador paperback, about 302 pages) - **Form:** Memoir of his adolescence, roughly ages 11 to 17, mostly in Northampton, Massachusetts - **Audiobook:** Macmillan Audio (2003), unabridged, read by the author, about 7 hours 38 minutes - **Adaptation:** 2006 film directed by Ryan Murphy, with Annette Bening, Alec Baldwin and Joseph Cross - **Related:** [[Reading/Authors/Augusten Burroughs/Dry|Dry]] (the sequel, covering his twenties), [[Reading/Authors/Augusten Burroughs/Magical Thinking|Magical Thinking]], [[Reading/Authors/Mary Karr/The Art of Memoir|The Art of Memoir]] ## How this note was made I wrote this from published summaries and reviews, not from reading or listening to the book. Sources differ on small details (the SuperSummary chapter summary and other summaries don't always agree on names and ages), so treat specifics as approximate. The critique is my own synthesis of the reviews and is marked as such. The book deals with child sexual abuse, which I describe only in general terms. ## Summary The book starts with a boy in an unstable home. Burroughs's father is emotionally distant, and his mother, Deirdre, is increasingly unstable. She is in treatment with an unorthodox psychiatrist, Dr. Finch, who is both her doctor and, increasingly, the authority in the family's life. When his parents divorce, around age twelve, Burroughs is handed over to Finch's care. Finch's home is a decaying, cluttered Victorian house that functions as a household without rules: patients live alongside the doctor's wife and children, adults set few limits, and Finch runs a style of "therapy" that treats chaos as honesty. Burroughs forms a close bond with Finch's daughter Natalie, and lives among a crowd of eccentric patients and family members. Three threads carry the book: 1. **The household.** The Finch house is both the comic engine and the setting of the harm. Finch's treatments include heavy medication, and the family's "anything goes" philosophy leaves a child to raise himself. 2. **Neil.** Finch's adopted son, an adult in his thirties, begins a sexual relationship with the thirteen-year-old Burroughs. The book presents it as a romance from the boy's perspective; reviews and summaries describe it as abuse, and the gap between the two is one of the main tensions of the book. 3. **His mother.** Deirdre deteriorates, with psychotic episodes and self-harm. She eventually accuses Finch of abuse and manipulation, and Burroughs is caught between her and the man who has become his guardian. **Spoiler:** The book ends without reconciliation. Burroughs, around seventeen, can't side with his mother or with Finch and chooses to leave for New York, hoping to become a writer. Details of how he gets away (including his attempts to get out earlier) vary by summary. **Disclaimer.** After the 2007 settlement (below), future printings changed the author's note and acknowledgments to say the Turcotte family's memories differ from his. ## Reception - **Kirkus (July 2002):** mixed. Found the premise vivid and the characters' "tangled, perverse bonds" strong, but the prose under-edited, rambling and too dependent on pop-culture references: "an unusual upbringing, reconstituted into a very usual memoir." [Read](https://kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/augusten-burroughs/running-with-scissors/print) - **Publishers Weekly:** positive; elegant prose and sharp wit, gripping and thought-provoking despite the disturbing subject. (via [Powell's](https://www.powells.com/book/-9780312422271)) - **Booklist:** positive; a survival story, edgier than but reminiscent of Dave Eggers's *A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius*. (via Powell's) - **Library Journal:** a warning as much as a review; graphic sexual and scatological scenes, not for sensitive readers. (via Powell's) - **The New York Times:** per one reading guide, called it a "bawdy, outrageous, often hilarious account" ([LitLovers](https://www.litlovers.com/reading-guides/non-fiction/running-with-scissors-burroughs?showall=1); I didn't read the Times review itself). - **Commercial:** it spent about eight weeks on the New York Times bestseller list ([SuperSummary](https://supersummary.com/running-with-scissors/summary)). One reading guide calls it a #1 bestseller; I didn't confirm the claim. ## The lawsuit In 2005 the family of Dr. Rodolph Turcotte, the real person behind "Dr. Finch," sued Burroughs and St. Martin's Press for defamation and invasion of privacy, saying they were identifiable and that the portrayal was invented or exaggerated, and seeking more than $2 million. Sony Pictures settled a separate suit over the film in late 2006. In August 2007 the book suit also settled: - the publisher dropped the word "memoirs" from the author's note; - a new acknowledgment said the Turcottes' recollections were "different than my own"; - Burroughs apologized for "any unintentional harm"; - the book itself kept its "memoir" subtitle and was not rewritten. Sources: [Poets & Writers](https://www.pw.org/node/478069), [Insurance Journal / AP](https://amp.insurancejournal.com/news/east/2007/08/31/83134.htm), [Advocate](https://advocate.com/arts-entertainment/entertainment-news/2007/08/31/family-settles-scissors-author). ## Critique *This section is my own synthesis from the reviews above, not a review from reading the book.* **What works (consistent across reviewers)** - **Comic voice against dark material.** The most repeated praise is the tone: deadpan, funny, and unsentimental about situations that would normally be told as tragedy. - **The characters.** Even the mixed Kirkus review credits the household cast and the "tangled, perverse bonds" as the book's strength. - **The mother-son story.** The film adaptation centered it, which suggests where the emotional core is. **Reservations** - **Prose and editing.** Kirkus's complaint of a rambling, pop-culture-heavy style is the one clear negative; it is worth checking against the voice on the audiobook, where his reading may smooth it. - **Comic framing of abuse.** The Neil thread is told from a teenager's viewpoint. A reader may find the humor and the romantic framing uncomfortable. That is a deliberate effect of a young narrator, but it is also the point where a memoir's craft and ethics meet. - **Accuracy.** The settlement leaves the central question unresolved: the family said the events were invented or exaggerated, Burroughs has maintained his account, and the publisher changed the label rather than the text. In Karr's terms (see [[Reading/Authors/Mary Karr/The Art of Memoir|The Art of Memoir]]), it is a test case of the truth contract. The same questions follow *Dry*, where he also admits compressed events. **Questions to check while listening** 1. Does the humor ever undercut the harm, or does it make it clearer? 2. How does the Neil relationship read in his own narration compared with what the reviews say? 3. Is the prose as rambling as Kirkus says, or does the reading fix it? 4. Compare with *Dry*: does the voice change between a teenager's account and an adult's? ## Sources [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Running_with_Scissors_(memoir)) · [SuperSummary](https://supersummary.com/running-with-scissors/summary) · [Kirkus](https://kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/augusten-burroughs/running-with-scissors/print) · [Powell's (PW, Booklist, Library Journal)](https://www.powells.com/book/-9780312422271) · [LitLovers](https://www.litlovers.com/reading-guides/non-fiction/running-with-scissors-burroughs?showall=1) · [Poets & Writers](https://www.pw.org/node/478069) · [Insurance Journal / AP](https://amp.insurancejournal.com/news/east/2007/08/31/83134.htm) · [Advocate](https://advocate.com/arts-entertainment/entertainment-news/2007/08/31/family-settles-scissors-author) · [Audiobook record (OverDrive)](https://dayton.overdrive.com/media/97554) ## My notes