Three Women 
Lisa Taddeo, 2019
Simon & Schuster
320 pp.
ISBN-13: 9781451642292


Summary
A riveting true story about the sex lives of three real American women, based on nearly a decade of reporting.

In suburban Indiana we meet Lina, a homemaker and mother of two whose marriage, after a decade, has lost its passion. Starved for affection, Lina battles daily panic attacks and, after reconnecting with an old flame through social media, embarks on an affair that quickly becomes all-consuming.

In North Dakota we meet Maggie, a seventeen-year-old high school student who allegedly has a clandestine physical relationship with her handsome, married English teacher; the ensuing criminal trial will turn their quiet community upside down.

Finally, in an exclusive enclave of the Northeast, we meet Sloane—a gorgeous, successful, and refined restaurant owner—who is happily married to a man who likes to watch her have sex with other men and women.

Based on years of immersive reporting and told with astonishing frankness and immediacy, Three Women is both a feat of journalism and a triumph of storytelling, brimming with nuance and empathy.

"A work of deep observation, long conversations, and a kind of journalistic alchemy" (Kate Tuttle, NPR), Three Women introduces us to three unforgettable women—and one remarkable writer—whose experiences remind us that we are not alone. (From the publisher.)

Author Bio
• Birth—ca. 1979-80
• Where—Short Hills, New Jersey, USA
• Education—B.A., Rutgers University; M.F.A., Boston University
• Awards—Pushcart Prize (2)
• Currently—lives in Litchfield County, Connecticut


Lisa Taddeo is the author of Three Women, published in 2019. Additionally, she has contributed to New York magazine, Esquire, Elle, Glamour, and many other publications. Her nonfiction has been included in the Best American Sports Writing and Best American Political Writing anthologies, and her short stories have won two Pushcart Prizes. She lives with her husband and daughter in New England. (From the publisher and Wikipedia. Retrieved 3/21/20.)

Book Reviews
[A]n immersive look at a particular story of female sexuality, albeit refracted three ways. It's florid…but also bracing, bleak and full of nagging questions about why it remains so difficult for some women to access their secret lives, to name—let alone pursue—their desires.… The boldness in Three Women—and its missteps—are both born of the risks Taddeo takes; she is a writer who knows "there's nothing safer than wanting nothing.
Parul Sehgal - New York Times


Searing.… The stories of Taddeo’s subjects, Sloane, Lina and Maggie, all feature the illicit—threesomes, dominance and submission, underage sex—and each includes a hefty dose of good old-fashioned adultery.… The result is effective and affecting..… Taddeo reveals an avalanche of evidence, as if we needed more, that the cozy comforts of marriage and its defining, confining attribute, monogamy, provide the perfect petri dish for combustible sex—with someone other than your spouse.
Toni Bentley - New York Times Book Review


Taddeo is stellar at embodying the women, taking on the voice of each in turn. It produces a feeling that the reader is sitting down over coffee to listen to the deeply personal and frequently painful stories of Maggie, Lina, and Sloane.…. With the disparate threads of these stories, Taddeo weaves complex connections between her subjects' desires.
Bryn Greenwood - Washington Post


An extraordinary study of female desire.… To write this kind of nonfiction—it’s true, but reads like a novel—Taddeo smartly employs not only interviews but also diary entries, legal documents, letters, emails and text messages. The result is a book as exhaustively reported and as elegantly written.… Taddeo’s language is at its best—sublime, even—when she describes the pain of desire left unfulfilled.
Elizabeth Flock - Washington Post


A dazzling achievement.…. Three Women burns a flare-bright path through the dark woods of women’s sexuality. In sentences that are as sharp—and bludgeoning, at times—as an ax, she retains the accuracy and integrity of nonfiction but risks the lyrical depths of prose and poetry.
Los Angeles Times


[The three women] are not unusual in their complicated sexual histories; what makes their stories revolutionary is the exquisite candor with which Taddeo gives them voice.…. Taddeo narrates [the storoes] with a magically light touch, inhabiting each so fully we feel as if we’re living alongside them. The book is sexually explicit… but it never feels gratuitous or clinical. Its prose is gorgeous, nearly lyrical as it describes the longings and frustrations that propel these ordinary women.
NPR


An astonishing work of literary reportage..… As Lisa Taddeo writes about her subjects, the women she uses to map out an anthropological, humane, passionate study of female desire, she seems almost to inhabit them..… A fascinating appraisal of a subject few writers have approached so intently.
Atlantic


Taddeo takes readers inside the lives of three women whose lives were profoundly influenced by choices they made regarding sexuality. Written in beautiful prose, Taddeo’s take makes the nonfiction stories come alive in a collection you won’t be able to put down.
Newsweek


The hottest book of the summer.… Taddeo spent eight years reporting this groundbreaking book, moving across the country and back again in her staggeringly intimate foray into the sexual lives and desires of three "ordinary" women. Tragedy and despair lurk in each of their stories, but Taddeo’s dynamic writing brings them all to breathtaking life.
Entertainment Weekly


Taddeo spent a decade immersed in the sex lives of three ordinary American woman.… The result is the most in-depth look at the female sex drive and all its accompanying social, emotional, reproductive, and anthropological implications that’s been published in decades. But it’s also fully immersive.
New York Magazine


A revolutionary look at women’s desire, this feat of journalism reveals three women who are carnal, brave, and beautifully flawed.
People


[A]mbitious, if flawed, debut…. Unfortunately, all three [women] feel underdeveloped, with no real insight into them or their lives outside of their sexual histories…. Taddeo’s immersive narrative is intense, but more voyeuristic than thoughtful.
Publishers Weekly


(Starred review) Taddeo braids together the women’s narratives, which adds both suspense and heft as their desire-biographies echo and diverge…. She allows them to be defined not by… the men in their lives, but by a deep and essential part of themselves.
Booklist


Dramatic, immersive…. Instead of sensationalizing, the author illuminates Maggie’s, Lina’s, and Sloane’s erotic experiences in the context of their human complexities and personal histories, revealing deeper wounds and emotional yearnings.
Kirkus Reviews

Discussion Questions
1. In the author’s note, Taddeo explains the mechanics of her reporting and writing process for Three Women. How did knowing this information affect the way you read the book? Did it help to know how the book was researched before you started reading?

2. Why do you think we have such a difficult—or uncomfortable—time talking about women’s desire and women’s bodies, even in today’s otherwise open cultural discussions?

3. In the prologue, the author writes, "One inheritance of living under the male gaze for centuries is that heterosexual women often look at other women the way a man would" (page 2). Discuss this statement. In your experience, have you found this to be true or false? Assuming you believe this statement to be true or at least partially true, how does the notion of the inherited male gaze affect Lina, Sloane, and Maggie’s desire and the actions they take to seize their desire?

4. The author spent a considerable amount of time speaking with men about desire before becoming so intrigued by the "complexity and beauty and violence" of female desire that she turned her focus exclusively to women. How would the book be different if men’s voices were included? Did you find yourself wondering what Lina or Sloane’s husbands were thinking, or what Maggie’s teacher taught? Discuss with your group whether men and women will read and respond to Three Women differently and, if so, how?

5. After years of research, interviews, and embedding, the author made the decision to narrate much of Three Women in the third person and uses only the first person in the prologue and epilogue. At times during Maggie’s sections, she even switches to the second person ("you"), directly addressing the readers as if they are involved. How did the author’s decisions about point of view enhance or alter your understanding of these women and their stories? How would the book have been different if the author had chosen to insert herself into the women’s stories?

6. One thing that Lina, Sloane, and Maggie have in common is the way they modify their behavior to fit the needs and desires of the partners they desire. How did it make you feel that these women had to change parts of themselves to try to gain love and acceptance from the ones they are with or the ones they desire? What does this say about power in relationships and the dynamics between men and women that we inherit and invent for ourselves? Have you ever experienced this in a relationship?

7. While Lina and Sloane are adults when they realize and act on their desires, Maggie is a high school student involved in an alleged relationship with a married teacher. Did you view Maggie’s story differently from those of her counterparts? What struck you most about her experience?

8. Maggie’s experiences not only upend her own life but also that of her entire community. Were you surprised by the outcome of the trial and the varying ways in which Maggie and her teacher each have to deal with the fallout from it? How did you feel about how strongly the community supported Maggie’s teacher?

9. At one point in her narrative, Lina explains that she fears being alone more than she fears death, which seems to inform a lot of her decisions. Do you agree with her? Why do you think that loneliness and not experiencing love frighten us so much?

10. Something that seems to follow Sloane are the expectations that others put upon her when it comes to her job, life partner, appearance, status, and so on, which create a line she has to straddle. How does accommodating other people interfere with Sloane’s own needs and desires? Is there an overlap between her accommodation and her desires?

11. To some extent, the author’s goal in Three Women is to restore agency and power to women as they tell their stories. Do you think she succeeds? Why is it important that women feel empowered to tell their truths?

12. In your opinion, what shapes our views of sex and relationships most? Is it environment, past experience, the media, our families, our friends, or something else? How does each of the three women’s lives influence her mind-set? How have experiences from your past informed your adult life?

13. In the beginning and at the end of the book, the author recounts a story about her Italian mother and the man who used to follow her inappropriately. How does that anecdote set the tone for the book and carry throughout? What is the legacy of mothers and daughters when it comes to relationships, sex, and desire, both in this book and in your own experiences?

14. In the prologue of Three Women, the author explains, "It’s relatability that moves us to empathize" (page 7). After reading the book, do you agree? How did you relate, or not, to Lina, Sloane, and Maggie’s stories? Discuss as a group whether you empathize more or less with people you can relate to. Was your reading of the book affected by an ability to connect with Lina, Sloane, or Maggie?
(Questions issued by the publisher.)

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I Should Have Honor:  A Memoir of Hope and Pride in Pakistan
Khalida Brohi, 2018
Random House
224 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780399588013


Summary
A fearless memoir about tribal life in Pakistan—and the act of violence that inspired one ambitious young woman to pursue a life of activism and female empowerment

From a young age, Khalida Brohi was raised to believe in the sanctity of arranged marriage.

Her mother was forced to marry a thirteen-year-old boy when she was only nine; Khalida herself was promised as a bride before she was even born.

But her father refused to let her become a child bride. He was a man who believed in education, not just for himself but for his daughters, and Khalida grew up thinking she would become the first female doctor in her small village. Khalida thought her life was proceeding on an unusual track for a woman of her circumstances, but one whose path was orderly and straightforward.

Everything shifted for Khalida when she found out that her beloved cousin had been murdered by her uncle in a tradition known as “honor killing.”

Her cousin’s crime? She had fallen in love with a man who was not her betrothed.

This moment ignited the spark in Khalida Brohi that inspired a globe-spanning career as an activist, beginning at the age of sixteen. From a tiny cement-roofed room in Karachi where she was allowed ten minutes of computer use per day, Brohi started a Facebook campaign that went viral.

From there, she created a foundation focused on empowering the lives of women in rural communities through education and employment opportunities, while crucially working to change the minds of their male partners, fathers, and brothers.

This book is the story of how Brohi, while only a girl herself, shone her light on the women and girls of Pakistan, despite the hurdles and threats she faced along the way. And ultimately, she learned that the only way to eradicate the parts of a culture she despised was to fully embrace the parts of it that she loved. (From the publisher.)

Author Bio
• Birth—October 10, 1988
• Raised—Balochistan Province, Pakistan
• Education—Karachi University
• Currently—lives in Pakistan and Sedona, Arizona, USA


Khalida Brohi is a Pakistani activist for women's rights and a social entrepreneur. She is also the author of I Should Have Honor: A Memoir of Hope and Pride in Pakistan, published in 2018.

The first girl in her village to go to school, Brohi was educated in Karachi. When she was 16, and still in Karachi, her 14-year-old cousin became a victim of an honor killing: her cousin's only crime was to fall in love with a young man other than the one her parents had betrothed her to.

Brohi began to publicly protest the cultural tradition of honor killings—a protest that went viral, attracting international attention and angering tribal leaders. In 2008, Khalida left Karachi.

In the process, Brohi founded the Sughar Empowerment Society to help women in Pakistan learn skills related to economic and personal growth. (Sughar is Urdu for a skilled, confident woman.) The Society challenges perceptions of women from within the culture it seeks to change.

By 2013, there were 23 Sughar centers, serving hundreds of women in small Pakistani villages. The women make their own money by selling hand-made embroidery work to the fashion industry. At the same time, they learn about preventing domestic violence, the importance of educating girls, and expanding women's rights.

The year 2014 proved a banner year for Brohi. Forbes included her in its "30 under 30" list, she was invited to join a cohort of fellows with the Media Lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She was also the subject of a documentary, Seeds of Change, and in October of that same year Brohi gave a TED talk at TED Global discussing her activism.

Although she has received worldwide praise for her work, Brohi has been the subject of violent threats on her life, including shooting and bombing.

Brohi is married to David Barron, and the two spend their time between Pakistan and Sedona, Arizona, in the U.S., where the couple runs The Chai Spot. Fifty percent of their profits go toward micro grants and scholarships for children. (Adapted from Wikipedia. Retrieved 2/14/2018.)

Listen to the author's interview by Terry Gross.

Book Reviews
Khalida Brohi’s powerful storytelling exposes the little-known world of tribal Pakistan and the injustices facing women there. With insight and determination, she explores the most entrenched social customs facing women today and shares her secrets for innovation, impact, and success. This story is timely not just for those who care about women’s rights but for anyone involved in activism, community mobilization, and social entrepreneurship.
Ariana Huffington - Founder, HuffPost


Khalida Brohi is a force of nature. Her story, in many ways, is beyond belief. It’s incredible that someone so young could achieve this much through passion and ingenuity.
Chris Anderson - TED


Writing in compelling, page-turning prose, Brohi shares a deeply felt, intimate portrait of what it means to be a global activist. There’s even a love story—one with a happy ending. Don’t miss I Should Have Honor, which deserves a legion of caring, activist readers.
BookPage


One woman's efforts to save women in Pakistan from outdated tribal traditions.… The author illuminates the importance of education for both women and men and the global need for women to be recognized as equals to men. The heartfelt story of a woman's ardent dedication to stopping the senseless "honor" killings in Pakistan.
Kirkus Reviews

Discussion Questions
We'll add publisher questions if and when they're available; in the meantime, use our LitLovers Book Club Resources. They can help with discussions for any book:

• How to Discuss a Book (helpful discussion tips)
• Generic Discussion Questions—Fiction and Nonfiction
• Read-Think-Talk (a guided reading chart)

(Resources by LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, online and off, with attribution. Thanks.)

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Late Migations:  A Natural History of Love and Loss
Margaret Renkl, 2019
Milkweed Books
248 pp.
ISBN-13: 9781571313782


Summary
An unusual, captivating portrait of a family—and of the cycles of joy and grief that inscribe human lives within the natural world.

Growing up in Alabama, Renkl was a devoted reader, an explorer of riverbeds and red-dirt roads, and a fiercely loved daughter.

Here, in brief essays, she traces a tender and honest portrait of her complicated parents—her exuberant, creative mother; her steady, supportive father—and of the bittersweet moments that accompany a child’s transition to caregiver.

And here, braided into the overall narrative, Renkl offers observations on the world surrounding her suburban Nashville home. Ringing with rapture and heartache, these essays convey the dignity of bluebirds and rat snakes, monarch butterflies and native bees.

As these two threads haunt and harmonize with each other, Renkl suggests that there is astonishment to be found in common things: in what seems ordinary, in what we all share. For in both worlds—the natural one and our own—"the shadow side of love is always loss, and grief is only love’s own twin."

Gorgeously illustrated by the author’s brother, Billy Renkl, Late Migrations is an assured and memorable debut.  (From the publisher.)

Author Bio
Margaret Renkl is a contributing opinion writer for The New York Times, where her essays appear weekly. Her work has also appeared in Guernica, Literary Hub, Proximity, and River Teeth, among others.

Renkl was the founding editor of Chapter 16, the daily literary publication of Humanities Tennessee, and is a graduate of Auburn University and the University of South Carolina. She lives in Nashville. (From the publisher.)

Book Reviews
Ms. Renkl crafts graceful sentences that E.B. White would surely have enjoyed.…. We’re left to wonder what drives Ms. Renkl’s fears… [and we] wish… that Ms. Renkl would more fully explore the implications of such disclosures, but Late Migrations treats them only glancingly. Her narrative… patchwork sensibility seems meant to convey the crazy-quilt texture of personal memory, recollection rarely moving in clear sequence…. A liberating lyricism informs [the illustrations]…. [Renkl's] prose often sings…. [It's the] border between lightness and dark is where Ms. Renkl seems most inspired.
Wall Street Journal


This warm, rich memoir might be the sleeper of the summer. [Renkl] grew up in the South, nursed her aging parents, and never once lost her love for life, light, and the natural world. Beautiful is the word, beautiful all the way through.
Philadelphia Inquirer


[A] perfect book to read in the summer.… This is the kind of writing that makes me just want to stay put, reread and savor everything about that moment… a vivid and original essay collection.
Maureen Corrigan - Fresh Air


Magnificent…. Conjure your favorite place in the natural world: beach, mountain, lake, forest, porch, windowsill rooftop? Precisely there is the best place in which to savor this book.
NPR.org


Late Migrations has echoes of Annie Dillard's The Writing Life—with grandparents, sons, dogs and birds sharing the spotlight, it's a witty, warm and unaccountably soothing all-American story.
People


[Renkl] guides us through a South lush with bluebirds, pecan orchards, and glasses of whiskey shared at dusk in this collection of prose in poetry-size bits; as it celebrates bounty, it also mourns the profound losses we face every day.
Oprah Magazine


A lovely collection of essays about life, nature, and family. It will make you laugh, cry—and breathe more deeply.
Parade Magazine


(Starred review) [A] magnificent debut… poetic…. Renkl instructs that even amid life’s most devastating moments, there are reasons for hope and celebration…. Readers will savor each page and the many gems of wisdom they contain.
Publishers Weekly


A captivating, beautifully written story of growing up, love, loss, living, and a close extended family by a talented nature writer and memoirist that will appeal to those who enjoy introspective memoirs and the natural world close to home. —Sue O'Brien, Downers Grove, IL
Library Journal


[Late Migrations] is shot through with deep wonder and a profound sense of loss. It is a fine feat, this book. Renkl intimately knows that "this life thrives on death" and chooses to sing the glory of being alive all the same.
Booklist


Lyrical…. [T]he strength of [Renkl's] narrative is in the descriptions of nature in all its glory and cruelty; she vividly captures "the splendor of decay." Interspersed with the chapters are appealing nature illustrations…. A series of redolent snapshots and memories that seem to halt time.
Kirkus Reviews

Discussion Questions
We'll add publisher questions if and when they're available; in the meantime, use our LitLovers talking points to help start a conversation for LATE MIGRATIONS … then take off on your own:

1. Margaret Renkl writes "[A]ll my life I've turned to woodland paths when the world is too much with me." Does the natural world have a similar affect on you? Do you find solace in nature? In other places? Where do you find comfort when you need it?

2. Although she is a nature writer, Renkl says that she is not a scientist. In fact, she posits that scientific ignorance can be a good thing in that it leads to astonishment. What does she mean? Do you agree that astonishment is a beneficial outcome of scientific ignorance? If you yourself are scientifically knowledgeable, do you lack the ability for awe?

3. The narrative in Late Migrations is studded with stories of Renkl's life. Did you enjoy those episodes, feeling they enhanced the book? Or did you find them interruptive and distracting?

4. Talk about Renkl's childhood family, especially her parents and grandmother. What did you most appreciate about her descriptions each? Do her relationships remind you of your familial connections?

5. Renkl, who nursed both her parents until their deaths, and who also lost her husband, is intimately familiar with personal loss. She says of grief that "this talk of making peace with it," all the talk of "finding a way through, [of] closure. It's all nonsense." What do you think? How have you handled deep, aching grief in your own life? Have you found "a way through"?

6. The author juxtaposes observations of the natural world with family history—as if to remind us that we, too, are biological creatures and that we are shaped by forces beyond our control. What other life lessons does Renkl draw from nature? Do you relate to Renkl's understanding of humanity's position and our role in the natural world? What are the implications of that understanding?

7. Renkl sees in nature "the splendor of decay" and observes that "this life thrives on death." What does she mean? Why, say, is decay filled with "splendor"?

8. Is this a religious or spiritual work? One or the other? Both?

9. Which depictions of the nature world particularly intrigued you: say, the lily pads, dive-bombing blue jays, pecan orchards, thunderstorms? What analogies does she draw between the natural world and we humans. What parallels do you draw? How, for instance does she view creatures' "aggressive territorialism"?

(Questions by LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, online and off, with attribution. Thanks.)

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Small Fry:  A Memoir
Lisa Brennan-Jobs, 2018
Grove/Atlantic
400 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780802128232 


Summary
 A frank, smart and captivating memoir by the daughter of Apple founder Steve Jobs.

Born on a farm and named in a field by her parents—artist Chrisann Brennan and Steve Jobs—Lisa Brennan-Jobs’s childhood unfolded in a rapidly changing Silicon Valley.

When she was young, Lisa’s father was a mythical figure who was rarely present in her life. As she grew older, her father took an interest in her, ushering her into a new world of mansions, vacations, and private schools.

His attention was thrilling, but he could also be cold, critical and unpredictable. When her relationship with her mother grew strained in high school, Lisa decided to move in with her father, hoping he’d become the parent she’d always wanted him to be.

Small Fry is Lisa Brennan-Jobs’s poignant story of childhood and growing up.

Scrappy, wise, and funny, young Lisa is an unforgettable guide, marveling at the particular magic of growing up in this family, in this place and time, while grappling with her feelings of illegitimacy and shame.

Part portrait of a complex family, part love letter to California in the seventies and eighties, Small Fry is an enthralling story by an insightful new literary voice. (From the publisher.)

Author Bio
• Birth— May 17, 1978
• Where—Portland, Oregon, USA
• Education—B.A., Harvard University
• Currently—lives in Brooklyn, New York City, New York


Lisa Nicole Brennan-Jobs is the daughter of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs and artist Chrisann Brennan. She has worked as a journalist and magazine writer and, in 2018, published her memoir, Small Fry, the story of her childhood and coming-of-age in Silicon Valley in the 1970s and 80s.

Brennan-Jobs has been depicted in a number of films and biographies of Steve Jobs, including three biopics—Pirates of Silicon Valley (1999, made for TV), Jobs (2013, with Ashton Kutcher as Steve Jobs ), and Steve Jobs (2015, based on Walter Isaacson's bestselling biography). A major character in her aunt Mona Simpson's novel A Regular Guy (1998) is based on her.

Birth and the Apple Lisa
Brennan-Jobs was born in 1978 on Robert Friedland's All One Farm commune outside of Portland, Oregon. Her mother, Chrisann Brennan, and her father, Steve Jobs, first met in high school in 1972 and had an on-off relationship for the next five years.

In 1977, after Jobs had co-founded Apple Inc., he and Brennan moved into a house with a friend near the company's office in Cupertino, California, where they all worked. It was during this period that Brennan became pregnant with Lisa.

Jobs, however, denied responsibility for the pregnancy, and Brennan ended the relationship, walking out of their shared home. She supported herself by cleaning houses and later moved to the Portland commune where Lisa was born: Jobs was not present at the birth.

Robert Friedland, the farm's owner and a friend of Jobs' from Reed College, called Jobs, persuading him to drive up to see the baby, and three days later Jobs appeared. Brennan and Jobs chose the name Lisa.

Jobs also named the computer project he was working on—the Apple Lisa—for his new daughter. Shortly after, however, he denied paternity, claiming the name "Apple Lisa" was devised by his team—as an acronym for "Local Integrated Systems Architecture." (It wasn't until decades later that Jobs admitted the computer was "obviously" named for his daughter.")

Paternity
Jobs continued to deny he was Lisa's father—even after a DNA test established his paternity within a 94% probability. Nonetheless, the resolution of a legal case required him to provide Brennan with $385 per month and to reimburse the state for the money she had received from welfare.

After Apple went public and Jobs became a multimillionaire, he increased the payment to $500 a month.

When Lisa was nine, Jobs acknowledged his fatherhood and worked at reconciliation, legally altering Lisa's birth certificate—at her request—from Brennan to Brennan-Jobs. Crissan Brennan credits the change in Jobs to author Mona Simpson, Jobs' newly found biological sister, who worked to repair the relationship between father and daughter.

According to Fortune magazine, Jobs left Lisa a multimillion-dollar inheritance.

Education and career
Brennan-Jobs lived with her mother until sometime in high school; then she moved in with her father, attending Palo Alto High. She received her B.A. from Harvard University, where she wrote for the Harvard Crimson. After graduation in 2000, Brennan-Jobs worked in finance in the UK (she had spent a year abroad studying at King's College-London) and Italy; she later shifted to design.

Eventually, Brennan-Jobs turned to writing and moved to New York, where she freelanced for magazines and literary journals. She has written for Southwest Review, Massachusetts Review, Harvard Advocate, Spiked, Vogue, and Oprah Magazine.

In 2018, Brennan-Jobs published her memoir, Small Fry, to positive reviews, including the New York Times Book Review, which called her a "deeply gifted writer." The book details her childhood and complex, often difficult, relationship with her father.

Personal life
Brennan-Jobs resides in Brooklyn, New York City, with her husband, their son, and her two stepdaughters. (Adapted from Wikipedia. Retrieved 9/18/2018.)

Book Reviews
Entrancing.… Brennan-Jobs is a deeply gifted writer.… Her inner landscape is depicted in such exquisitely granular detail that it feels as if no one else could have possibly written it. Indeed, it has that defining aspect of a literary work: the stamp of a singular sensibility.… Beautiful, literary, and devastating.
Melanie Thernstro - New York Times Book Review


It’s gratifying to see [Ms. Brennan-Jobs] assert her authority as the owner of her narrative. Writing with enlightened panache and dry humor, she’s as keen a witness to the ambience of the Bay Area in the 1980’s and 1990’s …as she is to the behavior of the adults around her.… Never having felt safe in any of her father’s houses, [she] has built her own house in memoir form, a repository of her love and anger and mourning.… It’s alive in all the rough edges of its feelings, and it’s home.
Wall Street Journal


[The] story of a girl growing up in 1980s and ’90s California trying to fit into two very different families and not belonging in either. It’s the story of her single mother trying to keep it together and often not succeeding. It’s the story of a family that is as imperfect as every family, things complicated by wealth, fame and, in the end, illness and death.
Associated Press


An intimate, richly drawn portrait.… Small Fry is a memoir of uncommon grace, maturity, and spare elegance.… The reader of this exquisite memoir is left with a loving, forgiving remembrance and the lasting impression of a resilient, kindhearted and wise woman who is at peace with her past.
San Francisco Chronicle


Mesmerizing, discomfiting reading.… [Small Fry is] a book of no small literary skill.
New Yorker


Extraordinary.… An aching, exquisitely told story of a young woman’s quest for belonging and love.
People


Revelatory.… Her exquisitely written prose allows Brennan-Jobs to—painfully, complexly, heroically—reclaim her own story.
Entertainment Weekly


A masterly Silicon Valley gothic.… The bohemian landscape she captures will be virtually unrecognizable to anyone who equates this slice of Northern California with Teslas and tiger moms.… Of the book’s myriad achievements, the greatest might be making [this] story her own.
Vogue


(Starred review) Bringing the reader into the heart of the child who admired Jobs’s genius, craved his love, and feared his unpredictability, Brennan-Jobs writes lucidly of happy times… [and] loneliness.… [A] sincere and disquieting portrait.
Publishers Weekly


[Lisa's father,] Steve Jobs, [was] barely there until he decided to swoop in to show her the wealthy world of private schools and big vacations. But it wasn't easy. A singular life and California in the Seventies and Eighties.
Library Journal


(Starred review) Bennan-Jobs skillfully relays her past without judgement… [and] never turns maudlin or gossipy.… [An ]authentic story of growing up in two very different environments, neither of which felt quite like home.
Booklist


(Starred review) An epic, sharp coming-of-age story…. In a lesser writer's hands, the narrative could have devolved into literary revenge. Instead, Brennan-Jobs offers [an] exquisitely rendered story of family, love, and identity.
Kirkus Reviews

Discussion Questions
We'll add publisher questions if and when they're available; in the meantime, use our LitLovers talking points to start a discussion for SMALL FRY … then take off on your own:

1. How does Steve Jobs come across in his daughter's memoir? What were your expectations of him before you read Small Fry? Were they altered or confirmed after having finished the book?

2. When she was only a little girl, Jobs told his daughter that he hadn't named the Apple Lisa computer after her. As an adult, she writes that he wasn't being cruel but teaching her a lesson—"not to ride on his coattails." What is your take on that episode? Was it a good lesson? How do you think young Lisa might have felt that at the time it took place, as opposed to looking back 30-some years later with the cushion of hindsight? What other incidents does the author point to as examples of Steve Jobs' life lessons?

3. Follow-up to Question 2: The author wants readers to forgive her father—as she herself has. Is it easy for you to do so, to put aside his seeming cruelty? She herself wonders whether she has conveyed his true nature: "Have I failed in fully representing the dearness and the pleasure …of being with him when he was in good form?" What do you think?

4. Follow-up to Question 3: What are the moments in the memoir that capture Jobs when he was in "good form"? Consider the time he showed up unexpectedly in Japan, pulled her out of school, and talked with her about the nature of God and consciousness. "I was afraid of him and, at the same time, I felt a quaking, electric love," she writes. Does that description of Jobs capture his charisma, his "true nature," or warmth?

5. How does Brennan-Jobs portray her mother, Chrisann Brennan? Why did Lisa leave her mother's home to live with her father? How would you have fared as a child or teen under either parent?

6. Once Lisa moved in with him, her father forbade her to see her mother for six months. He objected to her school extracurricular activities, and accused her of not "succeeding as a member of this family." She needed to be around more, he told her, "to put in the time." What do you think of Jobs' criticism?

7. How does Brennan-Jobs herself come across in her memoir? How would you describe her? Do you see her as traumatized? As resilient? As both?

8. What do you think of the neighbors who moved Lisa out of her father's house into their house—and even paid for her to finish her college degree? Were they right to interfere?

9. All of the people Brennan-Jobs writes about in this book are still alive except Steve Jobs, of course. Do some research to find out their various reactions to Small Fry. What do you think, overall, of the author's presentation of her family? What was her motive to write this book? Do you see it as a standard celebrity "tell-all" story? Is it vengeful? Is it putting the record straight? Is it a working out of the author's own identity? How do you see Lisa Brennan-Job's memoir?

(Questions by LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, online and off, with attribution. Thanks.)

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