There Are No Grown-ups: A Midlife Coming-of-Age Story by Pamela Druckerman

There Are No Grown-ups: A Midlife Coming-of-Age Story Reviews

• 
  Sonja Arlow

  As I am 42 I am at the beginning of this decade that the author wanted to make sense of. To be honest I have no idea why I picked this up. I don’t feel as if I am going through a mid-life crisis, I don’t break out in a sweat when someone asks me my age and I don’t have this uncontrollable urge to go bungee jumping or sky diving (I did all that in my 30s)
  
  Each chapter ends with “You know you are in your 40s when….” Followed by little gems in bullet point format. These sections really made me laugh and made the book worth the read.
  
  The author is very relatable and has a style of writing that feels as if you are having a chat with a friend.
  
  I found the sections dealing with her everyday life much more enjoyable than the sections where she investigates the phenomena of the “Mind life Crisis”.
  
  More loosely related stories than memoir this was a nice read. Not exceptional, not boring just nice.
  
  This could perhaps make a thoughtful gift for a woman of a certain age that is a bit panicked at the prospect of turning 40.
• 
  Cristy Jimenez-Shawcroft

  I couldn't put this book down. Entertaining, quick read. I like how the author writes; she is completely honest and very reflective, telling about everything from ménage à trois she planned for her husband's 40th birthday to her bout with cancer to how she became a journalist to figure out what is going on (she had felt clueless about aspects of the world around her previously, in part due to her parents sugar-coating everything when she was growing up). It reads like various short stories to create a memoir that has a lot of insights and universal truths for everyone. I definitely recommend it.
• 
  Rebecca

  Druckerman’s
  French Children Don’t Throw Food (U.S. title: Bringing Up Bébé) was a surprise hit with me in 2012, the sort of wide-ranging, witty book anyone can enjoy, parent or no. Earlier this year I read her first book,
  Lust in Translation, and was disappointed that it lacked a personal component; it read like pure journalistic investigation, and was weaker for that. Here she’s back with what she does best: slightly neurotic reflections on her expatriate life in Paris and the search for the right way to do things, whether that’s choosing a flattering outfit, making lasting friendships, or coming across as an expert when actually you feel like a fraud.
  
  In particular, the focus is on one’s forties and all the physical and emotional changes that come in that decade of “middle-age shock.” Each chapter is given a “How to” title, from “How to Find Your Calling” to “How to Be a Femme Libre,” and ends with a brief “You know you’re in your 40s when…” section of witty-but-true quips. Druckerman first knew she was getting older when she walked into cafés and heard “Bonjour, madame” instead of “Bonjour, mademoiselle.”
  
  Now, I’ve not yet hit my forties, but I’m staring down the barrel of 35, and a lot of this still hit home for me, especially the feeling of being a kid in disguise and wondering when I’m ever going to have the wisdom that would make me feel like a grown-up; I have no children, have never owned a home or a car, and despite the advantages of my freelance lifestyle still have the suspicion that I’ve never had a ‘proper career’ and never will.
  
  I had no idea that Druckerman had been diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma just as she handed in the manuscript for her parenting book. So while her publishers were most concerned about the fallout of her essay about arranging a ménage à trois for her husband’s fortieth birthday, she was just worried about staying alive for her three kids.
  
  Druckerman blends her own experience with some unthreatening popular science and statistics. She quotes researchers on the midlife crisis and on what constitutes wisdom; she also draws on Jung’s theory about the two halves of life: the first is ruled by the ego and the second is guided by our true self (a framework applied to spiritual development in Richard Rohr’s Falling Upward).
  
  The book is somewhat lacking in focus – it’s really more of a set of loosely related essays than it is a memoir – but if you think of the whole thing as a self-investigation it basically hangs together. “I’ve accepted that whatever my true story is, it’s enough,” Druckerman writes, and these pieces of true story add up to a witty and reassuring work for frustrated would-be ‘grown-ups’ of any age.
• 
  Stephanie

  Two and a half stars. I probably should have rated it higher because I couldn’t stop reading it, but there was so much about it that bothered me. Part memoir, part self-help, part essay collection...this book has an identity crisis, much like the author. While I loved Bringing Up Bebe, this time around, Druckerman seems out of her depth. I found my own conclusions about mid life to be vastly different from hers. She often comes across as an insecure twenty something who is shockingly (and admittedly) self-absorbed. Self-absorption and insecurity are the running themes here. The chapter about giving her husband a special gift for his fortieth birthday is a particular low. His schoolboy glee in the face of her ambivalence is awkward and sad. Later when she chooses to write an essay about the incident for a magazine, her editor’s comment is particularly telling: “everyone will want to be your friend.” Hardly.
  
  Still, I have this strange feeling that the real issue is a problem with tone. In an attempt to be self-deprecatingly funny and disarmingly relatable, Druckerman may have overshot the mark. Maybe her sense of self is a bit better than she lets on. Maybe she doesn’t really tune out completely every time someone else is talking. Maybe her husband isn’t quite so dismissive of her or seem so chronically dissatisfied as he comes across in the book. At least I hope not for Druckerman’s sake.
• 
  Lily

  Три факти, які хочу сказати про цю книгу:
  •Я малюю смайлики, коли мені смішно і тут сторінки густо помережані ними. Почуття гумору в авторки чудесне.
  
  •Памела Дракермен прекрасно володіє методом індукції - бере свій особистий досвід і узагальнює його так, що ти впізнаєш себе. Навіть якщо тобі 30, а не 40.
  
  •І, як наслідок - книга дуже вчасна. Я знайшла тут стільки думок, які резонують з власним станом роздоріжжя. "Мене завжди заспокоювала думка, що у світі є дорослі... Тепер, коли я думаю, що "хтось таки має щось з цим зробити", то з тривогою розумію, що цей "хтось" - я сама", - пише Памела. Важко насправді прийняти той факт, що ти вже давно в касті дорослих - всіх тих, хто обертає світ.
  
  Слів, які хочеться цитувати й пам'ятати, тут багато. Але лишу дві цитати - як промо. Сподіваюся, вони спонукають прочитати цілу книгу, яка цього вартує.
  
  "Зрештою, прокинутись у сорок нагадує сцену з фільмів жахів, коли героїня усвідомлює, що монстр перебуває всередині будинку... Я справляюся зі старінням так само, як з фільмами жахів - відводжу очі."
  
  "Зазвичай я так занепокоєна думкою інших людей про мене, що моя товаришка на ланчі могла б стікати кров'ю, а я не помітила би." (Тут був вееееликий смайлик, хоча насправді є над чим подумати)
• 
  Johnette

  I tried to slog through this book but I couldn't. I just couldn't. It seemed like a lot of random thoughts that didn't go anywhere, except for the part about the threesome. That was interesting. I hate to give a bad review because I'm sure there's a piece of the author's heart in every book but this book bored me to tears. I'm still trying to figure out the premise exactly. It's not a how to manual for aging women. I just didn't get it. There are plenty of good reviews so it must be gettable. Maybe I'm too grownup for it or not grownup enough.
• 
  Jen

  What I was expecting: a fun, campy take on middle age à la This is 40 or Parenthood. What I got: a memoir with banal stories that had nothing to do with age or season of life. I drew the line when she started going into detail about how she found a woman for her husbands threesome birthday present. DNF at 40%.
• 
  Lindsay Nixon

  It’s possible that I’m the wrong demographic... I loved her book on French parenting, not only because it was insightful, fascinating, and smart, but because it was funny, and captivating. I loved her personal memoir bits mixed into the info but this book is dreadful and p-a-i-n-f-u-l-l-y boring. I’m not in my 40s, so perhaps that’s the problem, though I’ve read and loved novels and memoirs about / by women in their 40/50/60s and connected to it... I’m seeking a refund, it’s that lousy. The only reason I'm giving this 2-stars instead of 1 is because it is well organized (a rarity in memoirs these days) and for the carefully included factual evidence/content.
• 
  Mehrsa

  This was exactly the book I needed right now. Though I don't share all of Druckerman's concerns about aging, she's very likable and insightful. The book is part memoir, part self-help, and part just chatting with a friend. It's a fun and quick read
• 
  Lucy

  
  Pamela Druckerman has lots of anecdotes to share about her quest to understand life in her 40s. I found her stories interesting and at times insightful, but generally not relatable. Her writing style is casual, humorous, and honest. I do enjoy that.
  
  I didn't like this book as much as
  Bringing Up Bébé: One American Mother Discovers the Wisdom of French Parenting. I found this one a bit disjointed and repetitive at times.
• 
  reader

  Could not finish. The author says there are no grown ups but actually she means she herself is not a mature person. This is a memoir by a person who really did not come of age until her forties.
  
  A lot of her concerns seemed bizarre to me. For example, why do you need waiters to think you're young? We have words like madame and mademoiselle in Korean - and we have it for BOTH men and women. It's not worth getting worked up over, you know? She also seems very concerned about the sexual invisibility and contempt foisted on women in their 50s and 60s but not because of the inherent misogyny, but because she wants to make sure she wins at having the right amount of sex.
  I think the story of her 40 year old birthday where she over prepared and invited people who were not her friends because she wanted to suddenly have a glamorous "French salon" life was supposed to be amusing but it only made me feel irritated at a person who has lived THAT LONG and can't own her actual life. There is no wisdom or insight to be had for a person entering her forties equipped with a better sense of self than Druckerman.
  
  What a tiresome person.
• 
  Reese

  The book started out okay, though incredibly shallow, that earned it one full star. Then it turned into something that seemed like the author had researched dozens of articles and dumped them all into a book and tried to tie them together by claiming they had something to do with age. There's also way too many grammatical errors to ignore. Oh, and if someone is constantly telling you they are not a narcissist, they're a narcissist.
• 
  Donna

  I'm old. I liked this because I could identify with a lot of this. She spoke my language. Even at my age, I often wonder if I'm an adult because I don't always feel like one.
  
  I had no expectations going into this. This felt more like an autobiography than a humorous book. I liked the way she kind of figured things out. I also like her efforts in doing her genealogy. I would have liked this to be more personal. It seemed at times she was catering this to a specific audience....and it was not all inclusive. But still enjoyable. So 4 stars.
• 
  Amy

  Oddly enough, as a 43 year old woman, I didn't feel like I was the target audience for this one. You see, the target audience for this is really specific. 40-something year old women, who have children and who have been married for a long time, who also have lots of "first world problems" like shopping in boutiques and cocktail party anxiety. I have no children and got married last year, so most of this angst was lost on me. Also, Im not angsting over my age. Sure, I don't like getting older, but hey, I'm alive and kicking. Honestly, I expected more humor and less angst.
• 
  Carrie

  Do you like to read about self involved and self obsessed average looking 40year old women ? This is you book. Ugh -why did I waste precious time of my own 40 year old life to read this drivel? Gah! Go for it if you have a long flight and an empty brain. Self centered author who-oh how awful-lives in Paris, with a seemingly selfish husband. Rants annoyingly about her first world 40 year old probs.
• 
  Merry Miller moon

  Thank you to Goodreads for the free ARC of this book. The author is giving advice/life lessons on how to deal with life when you reach your forties, which is so appropriate for me, since I am a forty something. In one chapter, she describes how she made her husband's fantasy come true for this birthday-having a threesome, with another woman. Kudos to you, Pamela Druckerman! for not only doing this, but writing about it so bluntly. Pretty amazing since her previous book was a 'how to parenting' book about the differences between raising children in the United States and France, where the author lives with her British born husband and their children. The very next chapter is more somber, she describes getting diagnosed with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. WOW! I cannot even imagine! You are one strong woman, Pamela! I'm so glad that you have pulled through and continue to thrive. Each chapter is wrapped up with a 'You know you are in your forties when....'-and they are so relateable that they are funny! I learned the following by reading this book, 'Nunchi', which means eye measure in Korean, is the ability to pick up on things well. She says that we have no similar word for this in English. Apparently all other nationalities of people pick up on things far better than we do as Americans. Very interesting. Good book.
• 
  Janssen

  It wasn’t as good or as fun as Bringing Up Bebe (review here:
  https://everyday-reading.com/bringing...) but still interesting and entertaining with some very insightful parts. It felt somewhat uneven to me, though.
• 
  Christine (Queen of Books)

  Thank you to Penguin for providing an advance reading copy, won via a GoodReads giveaway. (Thanks also to GoodReads!)
  
  Druckerman has a great voice, which makes for an easy read - conversational, though she mixes in facts and quotations. I was predisposed to like this book, as the premise hit a note with me. (I've come to believe no one knows what they're doing.) It was enjoyable, and I particularly liked some parts, but it felt sort of surface-level... I wanted the author to delve a bit deeper throughout. (Incidentally, the focus on the 40s felt sort of contrived to me - seemed like so many of the themes related to being a well-adjusted, mature adult more so than being 40something.)
  
  I'd recommend this as a beach read or perhaps a good plane book. Not going to change your life, but entertaining enough to be worth a couple hours of your time.
• 
  Chris Devine

  So, I'm definitely not the intended audience for this book, but it sounded interesting so I gave it a shot. This book seems to be geared towards rich older women, who have problems with shopping and packed schedules full of lunches with other rich women. I don't know this woman, but I just hate her for some reason. She thinks of herself as an expert in both french and american ways of life, but she doesn't seem to know that the vast majority of people in both those countries live a vastly different life then she does. End rant.
  
  I won this from a goodreads giveaway.
• 
  Cherniakhivska

  Цю книжку мені було приємно читати. Причому раніше я про неї чула і завжди ігнорувала, і коли гортала в книгарні, то не зацікавлювалась, і від викладеного в ЗМІ уривку не зацікавилась. Але потім десь через рік натрапила на цей же фрагмент - і цього разу було втрапляння в настрій, і вся вона мені була в настрій цього разу, починаючи від подиву через звертання "мадам" в кафе. Багато знайомих відчуттів. Я теж звикла завжди здаватися (чи відчувати себе) молодшою, а тут зненацька відчуваю себе як є, і тут теж ок.
• 
  Summer

  Too much priviledged white woman for me.
• 
  Ryan

  I came to There Are No Grown-Ups after reading Druckerman's book about adultery, Lust in Translation. Here, she seems to have ditched the more anthropological approach and has doubled down on her humour, which better suits these essays about turning 40. The writing style is lite, breezy, and would work really well for beach reading. There Are No Grown-Ups most strongly recalls, for me at least, Joel Stein's slightly obnoxious Stupid Quest for Masculinity. (I think of Stein as a sort of "bro" writer who might write for Esquire.) Of the two, Druckerman retains just enough scholarship from her early book to give these essays something more than a throw away quality. If, however, you're coming to this for another American in France memoir, something akin to David Sedaris's Me Talk Pretty One Day, I suggest re-reading the Sedaris. My favorite thing about this book is Druckerman's ability to write about her family. She is generous in her descriptions of her husband, Simon, and in her thankfully brief stories about her children. When she ruminates on her own life, I think she'd agree that she comes across as a bit neurotic. The most sensational essay here is about organizing a threesome to celebrate her husband's birthday, but my favourite essay was probably about fashion--invest in blazers. There is an essay about being diagnosed with cancer, but it does not dominate the book, something I would not have thought possible. I mentioned to a co-worker this morning that I'll use "I just read Lust in Translation" as a conversation starter for some time to come, whereas I'm not sure I'll ever use this book to start a conversation. But it would be unfair not to acknowledge that Druckerman seems happier and more confident writing this book.
• 
  Maryna

  Я не знайшла відповідей на всі свої запитання на порозі 40-річчя, але книжка дуже варта уваги. Хоча би для того, щоби стати приємною підставою для рефлексії і роздумів, яким я хочу бачити своє життя) ну і важливо знати, що ще хтось теж замислюєтся про те, як це так, мені вже 40 і як так сталося, що дорослі - це ми...
  Не знаю, як цю книжку сприймають 20-річні, але тим, кому більше 35 читати дуже раджу. Бодай для того, щоби звірити температуру)
• 
  Ira Therebel

  This isn't the first book about being 40 that I read and sure it won't be the last one. I am one of the many people who isn't totally cool with it. This book on the topic was really good. It isn't some sort of self help book but the author talking about her own life at that decade of her life, her insecurities and changes and it was pretty interesting.
  
  Some negative reviews seem to come from people not being able to see themselves in this book. When reading the introduction I knew that I will get her. The issues she described were familiar to me. One which is also in the title of the book is how at this point of life when you are supposed to be one of those grown ups who run the world you don't feel like one. Of course you are aware that you are a grown up and live a grown up life and yet this doesn't seem to be what you imagined it should be like. There is the issue that the future seems so uneventful because all the major milestones are behind you. You can still get married or change carriers but it just isn't the same. It is like the life you were getting ready for is happening now. And I liked her point on why the change of how one looks may feel uncomfortable. It is the beginning of the time when what you look like to the outside world doesn't seem to fit with what you feel yourself to be. I could connect to all of it which is why the introduction got me interested.
  
  Other than that we have very different lives. A lot of the essays in this book have absolutely nothing to do with me or what my 40s will be like. I have no kids, I am not a writer, I don't live in Paris etc. but reading it was both interesting and entertaining. I loved the story of her organizing a threesome which her husband for as his 40th birthday gift. And I found it especially interesting when she compared the attitude towards getting older in France and America.
  
  As I said, not a self help book but it does give one a feeling of positivity at the end.
• 
  Micah

  The first half or so was fine. I mean, it wasn't particularly insightful or entertaining, but it was easy enough to read. Around the halfway to two-thirds mark, though, Druckerman loses all charm. The chapters on style (where "style" now means "the clothes that flatter your body type"), her talk for Brazilian mothers (in which she completely half-asses a speech and appears to think that her learning a lesson from the experience is charming rather than par from the course), and learning how to read people (which reads like a seventh grader's patronizing presentation to classmates of her father's ideas) are exhausting. I really wanted to like – and finish – this book. I couldn't do either. My takeaway is that the title isn't true. There are grown-ups. There are also women who think they're ingénues well into their forties even though their performance of naïveté has become beyond tiresome.
• 
  Shelly

  I just finished this memoir about aging. I liked it a lot. Highly recommend the audio edition as the author has a good voice for it and it’s helpful with the French words sprinkled throughout the book. The only part I could have done without is the end of chapter bits of “you know you’re in your 40s when...”
• 
  Marilee

  Nope. This book is touted as a hilarious read about the truth about life in your forties. The first couple of chapters were ok, I even chuckled a few times, but nothing great. Then the author got long winded about planning a menage a trois for her husband's birthday, and she totally lost me. I knew I would struggle to relate to her after that and gave up. DNF.
• 
  Kitty

  Pamela Druckermanilt olen ma õppinud kõik, mida ma tean lastekasvatuse ja prantslaste kohta (seda pole vbla ülemäära palju, aga mul ei olegi oma elu kontekstis rohkem vaja) - tema kirjutas kuulsa teose sellest, kuidas prantsuse lapsed ei loobi toitu (e.k. "Prantsuse lastetuba"). nii et selle raamatu rabasin Kindle'i sooduspakkumisest küll puhtalt autori nime järgi.
  
  kuna ma juhtumisi saan sel aastal 40 ja olin just jõudnud muutuda veidi murelikuks selle osas, kas olen piisavalt ette valmistunud, siis oli see raamat küll suurepärane leid, sest just seda mul vist oligi vaja teada - kõik on okei. kui vast välja arvata algus, kus autor lihtsalt oma lapsepõlve kirjeldab (see kulub küll hiljem kontekstina kenasti ära) ja üks veider igav peatükk keskel, mis räägib keskeakriisi kui mõiste ajaloost ja arengust, siis üldiselt võetakse meeleolukal moel ja kiires tempos läbi kõik vanemakssaamisega seonduvad teemad - seks ja suhted, sõbrad ja perekond, riided ja kehakaal, haigused ja surelikkus. iga teema puhul tuleb lõpuks välja, et neljakümnendatel on kahekümnendate ees omad eelised (tihti on põhiliseks eeliseks see, et sul on lihtsalt rohkem ükskõik:P).
  
  ameeriklanna Druckerman elab endiselt oma briti mehega Pariisis, nii et nagu ka prantsuse laste raamatus, võrdleb ta tihti kolme eri kultuuri lähenemist samadele teemadele. ja nagu ma kunagi otsustasin, et kui ma üldse lapsi tahaks, siis prantsuse omi, on mul tunne, et kui minust peab just saama vanainimene, siis prantsuse oma. (kahjuks keeldun selle kõige nimel Prantsusmaale kolimast, mulle ei meeldi seal eriti).
  
  ega ma vist otseselt midagi uut ei õppinud (ja mis saaks minu eas nii väga uut ollagi:P), aga väga palju oli äratundmist: jah, just selline tunne on. ja see kõik väga positiivses võtmes, nii et kui keegi keskiga kardab, siis soovitan lugeda küll, saab kergem.