Total Page : 288
Publisher : Gotham
Publication Date : 2010 04 01
>> A triumph of humor and compassion over privilege and bitterness
The trick to money is to have a lot but not too much
What s too much
I could tell you I was once married to the daughter of the second or third richest woman in America but you probably wouldn t believe me Better that you find out for yourself Just start accumulating wealth When you have enough you ll feel great When you have too much some new friends gloom anxiety and a nasty sense of meaninglessness will show up and never leave Guaranteed
Speaking of misery let s consider the heritage of Cornelius Vanderbilt in his day the richest man in America Here s just one of his estates Wendy Burden is his great great great granddaughter It is astonishing given her bloodline that she could pull herself together enough to write Dead End Gene Pool It s even more astonishing that she s alive
When Wendy was six her father killed himself After that she writes I only spent time with my mother when she was getting ready to leave My brother and I had recently come to view her as a glamorous lodger who rented the master bedroom suite
It would be easy to write this memoir from the Valley of Bitterness but then you d have to live there Wendy Burden chooses to reside on the Mountain of Absurdity Smart move Why waste energy on hating your mother when you can rip off lines like this about Leslie Lepington Hamilton Burden dropping her young daughter at the airport and fleeing the jurisdiction She could make it downtown to Trader Vic s in less time than it takes to put on a pair of sheer black stockings and get the seams straight
So Wendy and her brothers fell by default into the care of their grandparents Mr and Mrs William A M Burden II He had been a successful investor Ambassador to Belgium oh how he craved the post in Paris and President of the Museum of Modern Art But Popsie and Gaga were not exactly homey their Fifth Avenue apartment had 14 bathrooms and 21 rooms The Burdens were ghosts only their servants seemed real
Bill Burden had a breakthrough art collection His wife was a modern woman only when it came to self medication By the time Wendy showed up their marriage consisted of gallons of wine rich meals afternoon naps cocktails and dinner parties William Burden s favorite word Mah velous Really You ll decide for yourself
Nature abhors a vacuum Wendy and her brother filled the absence of adult supervision with an unending series of pranks They were by turns destructive cruel stupid and funny I lump them all into another category life saving
When you pass unseen through rooms it s hard not to work at what Erik Erikson called negative identity the sum of all those identifications and identity fragments which the individual had to submerge in himself as undesirable or irreconcilable Mooning boaters who have slowed their engines to gawk at the Burdens house in Maine stealing every bit of food from the kitchen stretching Saran Wrap under the toilet seat the young Burdens did it all Do I have to add that Wendy also got terrible grades in school
Even if you re not of her world you ll guffaw at the descriptions of meals in Maine and vacations in Florida Her mother s marital history is a kind of hoot Wendy s first crush and her efforts to lose her virginity are damn funny To say nothing of Jacques Cousteau putting the moves on teenage Wendy on the Concorde And the descriptions of a great meal It was sublime like eating orgasms
Take the laughs where you can get them because you knew where this book is going adult diapers for William Burden rehab for Wendy s brothers more inappropriate marriages for her mother By the end if you re like me you ll find Wendy s survival nothing short of remarkable And you ll be glad she heads out into her adult life only kinda sorta rich
>> Mildly entertaining
In spite of the beautiful manner in which this book is written I found myself getting bored because NOTHING HAPPENS The anecdotes are amusing but no depth story or Insight into any of the characters I enjoy reading about rich people as much as the next person but when I was 7 when I was 8 when I was 9 can get tiresome
No way should this book be compared to Frank McCourt s Angela s Ashes
>> Highly Entertaining not for the socially conservative
I noticed another reviewer commented on the book not being well written which is false It s well written extremely entertaining and provides a lovely portrait of some fascinating people Yes true if you think people who drink or take drugs or are shallow are horrible and you despise them clearly this is the wrong book for you If you re a little more open minded or at least don t take yourself that seriously you will really enjoy this It s a fascinating rollicking story of the end of family wealth from the perspective of a child who comes to understand her world just as you come to understand it as the reader I personally love stories of interesting people doing entertaining things and by interesting and entertaining I mean different It s positively rejuvenating to read about people who have structured days with cooks and maids and have cars delivered and just live in a delightfully interesting world
I will say that I would have liked a longer book It s a very easy read very compelling and I just would have liked to read more It skips around at parts so you miss a lot of time and correlated information Obviously it s difficult with a memoir that involves family to strike that balance between telling your story and offending your family my guess is that s why there isn t more
