Real American : a memoir

"Courageous, achingly honest."
--Michelle Alexander, New York Times bestselling author of The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorb lindness

" A compelling, incisive and thoughtful examination of race, origin and what it means to be called an American. Engaging, heartfelt and beautifully written, Lythcott-Haims explores the American spectrum of identity with refreshing courage and compassion."
--Bryan Stevenson, New York Times bestselling author of Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption

A fearless memoir in which beloved and bestselling How to Raise an Adult author Julie Lythcott-Haims pulls no punches in her recollections of growing up a black woman in America.

Bringing a poetic sensibility to her prose to stunning effect, Lythcott-Haims briskly and stirringly evokes her personal battle with the low self-esteem that American racism routinely inflicts on people of color. The only child of a marriage between an African-American father and a white British mother, she shows indelibly how so-called "micro" aggressions in addition to blunt force insults can puncture a person's inner life with a thousand sharp cuts. Real American expresses also, through Lythcott-Haims's path to self-acceptance, the healing power of community in overcoming the hurtful isolation of being incessantly considered "the other."

The author of the New York Times bestselling anti-helicopter parenting manifesto How to Raise an Adult , Lythcott-Haims has written a different sort of book this time out, but one that will nevertheless resonate with the legions of students, educators and parents to whom she is now well known, by whom she is beloved, and to whom she has always provided wise and necessary counsel about how to embrace and nurture their best selves. Real American is an affecting memoir, an unforgettable cri de coeur, and a clarion call to all of us to live more wisely, generously and fully.

Author Notes

Julie Lythcott-Haims is the New York Times bestselling author of How to Raise an Adult . She holds a BA from Stanford, a JD from Harvard Law School, and an MFA in writing from California College of the Arts. She is a member of the San Francisco Writers' Grotto, and resides in the Bay Area with her husband, their two teenagers, and her mother.

Reviews (4)

Publisher's Weekly Review

Lythcott-Haims (How to Raise an Adult) has written a bold, impassioned memoir that explores the emotional and cultural divide imposed by American racism on people of mixed race. Born in 1967 to an African-American father and a white British mother, she was proud that her parents "broke the rules" despite the racial sneers and ridicule she experienced growing up in Palisades, N.Y., and Madison, Wis. However, the steadfast support of her loving mother and of her father, an accomplished physician appointed by President Carter as assistant surgeon general in 1977, couldn't prepare the insecure, mixed-race teen for navigating a white world ("I don't think of you as Black. I think of you as normal," says one high school friend while the two were watching Gone with the Wind). Upon graduating from Stanford University (she would serve as dean of freshmen there years later), Lythcott-Haims married a white Jewish man and gave birth to "quadroon children," which further complicated her quest for self-understanding. Later, she became empowered through her determination not to let hate define her or the lives of her children. Riveting and deeply felt, Lythcott-Haims's memoir sheds fresh light on race and discrimination in American society. (Oct.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

Kirkus Review

In a text that resembles a memoir, a prose poem, and an album of verbal snapshots, a writer from a mixed racial background chronicles her journeyand battleto understand her racial identity.Lythcott-Haims (How to Raise an Adult: Break Free of the Overparenting Trap and Prepare Your Kid for Success, 2015), who holds a variety of academic degrees (including Harvard Law), writes about her girlhood and youth as the daughter of a black father and a white mother. Her father was a very successful man, a doctor who served as an assistant surgeon general, and her mother would earn a doctorate, as well. The author grew up in mostly white neighborhoods, an experience that delayed her determination to define and identify herself as a black woman. In a series of numbered sections whose lengths vary from a few pages to a few words, Lythcott-Haims tells not only the story of her life and considerable accomplishments, but also about currentand relatively currentissues, from the elections of Presidents Obama and Trump to the spate of police shootings of young black men. Her son is now a teen, and she, like Ta-Nehisi Coates, to whom she refers several times, worries deeply about his safety. Occasionally, the author offers lines of poetry, especially at the conclusion of a section, and her verse is blunt and stark: "We continue to try to forgive. / To live." The author also poignantly describes the assorted indignities she has endured, from attending an event at a child's school where she saw characters in blackface to resisting a Stanford colleague, a woman who fondled her hair in a meeting. She also writes affectionately about her white husband of many yearsthough she wonders at times what it would have been like to be married to a black man. Many potent and painful reminders that we have a long, long way to go regarding race and identity. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

New York Review of Books Review

REAL AMERICAN, by Julie Lythcott-Haims. (St. Martin's Griffin, $17.99.) As the daughter of an African-American father and a white British mother, "I come from people who survived what America did to them," the author writes. "I'm so American it hurts." Her memoir charts the process of coming to terms with herself, and replacing the self-loathing and negative messages she had internalized about race with pride and love. TOUCH, by Courtney Maum. (Putnam, $16.) Sloane, the protagonist of this charming satire, is a trend forecaster out to sell the benefits of virtual relationships, but she's losing faith in tech, and envisions a return to intimacy and genuine relationships. "Good writing about creativity is rare," our reviewer, Annalisa Quinn, wrote, but "Maum captures that fragile, gratifying, urgent process." THE BETTENCOURT AFFAIR: The World's Richest Woman and the Scandal That Rocked Paris, by Tom Sancton. (Dutton, $17.) Liliane Bettencourt, the L'Oréal heiress worth billions, became infatuated with a man 25 years her junior (a former Dali protegé and an apparent social climber), giving him lavish gifts and even moving to adopt him. The story has all the trappings of a juicy affair, including graft and hidden Nazi sympathies. QUICKSAND, by Malin Persson Giolito. Translated by Rachel Willson-Broyles. (Other Press, $16.99.) Maja, a wealthy Swedish teenager, is on trial for her role in the mass shooting started by her boyfriend, which left him, her best friend and many classmates dead. This courtroom drama, the author's first novel to be translated into English, offers a window into Sweden's underlying racial and economic tensions; Maja is scorned for her privilege, and her story takes aim at the country's self-image as multicultural haven. THE ISLAMIC ENLIGHTENMENT: The Struggle Between Faith and Reason, 1798 to Modern Times, by Christopher de Bellaigue. (Liveright, $17.95.) De Bellaigue, a British journalist, tells the story of the individuals who helped bring about social and cultural changes across the Middle East, focusing on Cairo, Istanbul and Tehran. As our reviewer, Jason Goodwin, put it, "This brilliant and lively history deserves nothing but praise." HOW TO BEHAVE IN A CROWD, by Camille Bordas. (Tim Duggan, $16.) Isidore is the youngest in a remarkable French family, and he thinks of himself as the dullest: His siblings have skipped grades and are at work on dissertations, while his gifts - of observation and empathy - seem smaller. But in this novel his talents become the linchpin for the family after a crisis, showing the limits and loneliness of a life of the mind.

Library Journal Review

In this open and revealing memoir, -Lythcott-Haims (How To Raise an Adult) faces difficult truths head-on as she explores growing up biracial in the United States. Using powerfully effective prose, the author explains the impacts of racism on her daily life in both small and large ways, its chipping away at her feelings of self-worth. Despite earning multiple degrees from elite institutions, she spends much of her time not feeling good enough, black enough, and white enough. Instead, she feels as if she doesn't belong, wherever she tries to fit in. That is, until she finds a home at Stanford University, first as a student and later as dean of students. Encountering the term mixed for the first time while attending an undergraduate workshop on race, Lythcott-Haims begins to realize that the world is not black or white, as she had spent much of her life believing. As she finally learns self-acceptance, she also sees the importance of bringing others along on that important journey, too. VERDICT A compelling and important addition to any collection of personal narratives by women of color.-Venessa Hughes, Buffalo, NY © Copyright 2017. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

It Begins Like This	p. 1
An American Childhood	p. 9
Becoming the Other	p. 17
Desperate to Belong	p. 77
Self-Loathing	p. 125
Emerging	p. 173
Declaring	p. 193
Black Lives Matter	p. 223
Onward	p. 253
Acknowledgments	p. 271

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