Townie

A Memoir

By: Andre Dubus III

Narrated by: Andre Dubus III

Length: 14 hrs and 34 mins

Publisher's summary

Andre Dubus III, author of the National Book Award–nominated House of Sand and Fog and The Garden of Last Days, reflects on his violent past and a lifestyle that threatened to destroy him—until he was saved by writing.

After their parents divorced in the 1970s, Andre Dubus III and his three siblings grew up with their exhausted working mother in a depressed Massachusetts mill town saturated with drugs and crime. To protect himself and those he loved from street violence, Andre learned to use his fists so well that he was even scared of himself. He was on a fast track to getting killed—or killing someone else—or to beatings-for-pay as a boxer.

Nearby, his father, an eminent author, taught on a college campus and took the kids out on Sundays. The clash of worlds couldn’t have been more stark—or more difficult for a son to communicate to a father. Only by becoming a writer himself could Andre begin to bridge the abyss and save himself. His memoir is a riveting, visceral, profound meditation on physical violence and the failures and triumphs of love.

©2011 Andre Dubus (P)2011 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

Critic reviews

“The best first-person account of an author’s life I have ever read.” (James Lee Burke, New York Times best-selling author)

“In this gritty and gripping memoir, Dubus bares his soul in stunning and page-turning prose.” (Publishers Weekly, Starred Review)

“Powerful, haunting. . . . Beautifully written and bursting with life.” (Kirkus Reviews, Starred Review)

Moving and powerful

I am from the area that Andre is from and I worked with him at the Irish Pub when I was a teenager.

This book’s description of a life and times tangential to my own is so full, formed and truthful. This is a perfect book in capturing an imperfect time. I’m grateful that it was written.

“Townie” by André Dubus III: Exceptional Story and Storytelling

André Dubus III’s memoir “Townie” is extraordinary in its visceral ability to describe real characters and situations that are far removed from anything else I’ve known or read. I can feel the pain of his loving but absentee parents during his difficult teen years — and the gritty bars, unsupervised kids “roaming the street like dogs”, and younger brother’s unique challenges.

His transition from being an angry, frightened adolescent in a Haverhill, Massachusetts downtrodden mill town — to his reinvention as an adult learning to control his anger, build his physical and mental strength, and develop values and relationships that are positive would be fascinating as fiction — yet are even more transfixing because these stories are true. His beginnings to write was profoundly valuable to him and to readers: it’s easy to believe his claim of being a better man when he writes.

I can feel the impact and specificity of what happens — stealing lumber, testing himself on an eventful night train in Ireland, learning to love well, create independence and strength, and building his own home and also his own father’s pine casket with loving attention. We are there in every moment.

Grateful that André Dubus the Younger found a way to tell of so compelling a transformation — unforgettable. Reading his own words for Audible added further to authenticity and impact. Hope that story of his first fifty years will lead to essays or another memoir of his next decade, as a successful writer, teacher, and speaker — with an intact marriage and three grown children. I do not see how his words could be bettered — and hope he continues as one of America’s best and most versatile living writers.

As gripping as his fiction

Although this memoir has elements in common with other memoirs by adult children of neglectful or abusive parents, this is FAR BETTER than Jeannette Walls "The Glass Castle" or Mary Karr's "The Lairs' Club."

It is as good as "House of Sand and Fog" and few works are.
I am an unabashed fan of this author's father and am delighted by this author's own novellas, essays and short stories.
This autobiography touched me in a way that few autobiographies could.

Of course I had "known" the elder Andre Dubus only as he presented himself in his work. I was surprised by the depths of my outrage toward him as I realized how he had neglected the children of his first marriage and how that neglect nearly -- but did not -- destroy his children.

On the whole, this is an eye-opening, triumphant and inspiring autobiography and the son's acceptance and forgiveness of his father allows me to continue to love that writer's work.
I read the NYT review, which praised Townie but said "until it loses traction in clichés about redemption at its very end" and I disagree with this evaluation.

This book deepened my admiration and respect for the younger Andre Dubus and I found the ending cathartic.

Like his father, Dubus is a writer's writer as much as he is a reader's writer.

Despite the elder Dubus' well-known act of heroism and the loss of limbs it cost him, if one is going to compare the two, know this: the younger Dubus learned more from his father's mistakes than his father learned from them.

I look forward to reading more work from Andre Dubus III and I thank him for reading what must have evoked at times painful memories.

As an Austinite, among my favorite lines: "That’s what Texas did to me, took my hatred of bullies and bullying and institutionalized it."

And Andre Dubus III did something for me no other writer has: he eloquently explained to me how the same release found in engaging in acts of violence could be found in writing. Bravo, Mr. Dubus, Bravo!

beautiful, powerful, touching story

many times I had tears in my eyes and goosebumps on my skin as I read.
this is one of those books that will sit with me for years to come

WOW!

Would you consider the audio edition of Townie to be better than the print version?

Perhaps, only because the author himself is narrating and it's his story.

Who was your favorite character and why?

Andre (III), of course. I loved following him along in his journey. I would like to hear from his youngest sister some day. I wonder if she saw things differently?

Which character – as performed by Andre Dubus III – was your favorite?

His father.

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

Both. What a triumph over terrible circumstances. This story is fascinating. I thought that it was going to be about boxing and I wasn't thrilled about that. Thank goodness I was wrong.

Had a nice after taste

Parts of it irritated me and his writing got a little monotonous at times, but later on found myself thinking back to it. So maybe that's the sign of a good novel. I wished the story had a few more twists in places, but I guess you can't demand that from a memoir. He lapses into a bit too much navel-gazing at times, but the ending is touching.

Diamond in the rough

As a person who has had a rough beginning and grew to find the gem within, and still forever searching before the day I am done, this story gave me so much hope, sadness, despair, joy, laughter, and relief to feel alive, to feel love. Thank you.

not at all should narrate

Being a talented writer is not the same thing as being a talented narrator. Could not get into the story.

Just wanted it to be over most of the time....

I was bored and I didn't get the point. His life is interesting to a point, but not enough to write a book about. And his narration is very monotone and hard to listen to after a while. I wouldn't use a credit on this one.

Violence, violence, violence

Andre Dubus III is a violent man. I felt that after finishing his novel, HOUSE OF SAND AND FOG; having read his memoir, TOWNIE, I am certain of it as well as a bit more knowledgeable about the origin of the violence. Dubus III and his siblings were essentially abandoned by their father, short story writer Dubus II, when they were very young. Their mother then raised them (but mostly neglected them) in the slums, where they had to learn survival tactics. Dubus’ violent streak served to both protect him and impress his father.
TOWNIE is Dubus’ story of growing up poor with educated parents, using boxing and street fighting as survival strategies, and eventually learning to fight with his words rather than his fists. The book is filled with one exquisitely told brutal event after another. I listened to the book on Audible, narrated by the author, and the flat intonation with which he read his own writing is monotonous enough to counteract the ferocity of the prose . His dispassionate reading helped take some of the sting out of the brutality and probably fairly represented how inured to violence he became during his adolescence.
Violence was one theme of the book; the other major theme was Dubus’ striving to earn his father’s love. When his parents divorced, his father moved to the other side of town and lived a relatively elite college life while leaving his wife and children to live the deprived life his ex-wife could provide. Dubus and his siblings had dinner with their father occasionally, but otherwise saw little of him. It was only when Dubus began fighting that his father took notice. Dubus became a sort of alter-ego for his father, and he supported his father emotionally during his final years. As the book ends, Dubus seems proud of how far he’s come. However, he did not manage to make me like him or even feel that he was ultimately the “good” man he’d like to think he is.
It was hard for me to like TOWNIE given its heavy emphasis on violence and the fact that I really didn’t much like Andre Dubus III as he portrayed himself. The writing is very descriptive and evocative, however, so while he may not be a wonderful guy, he is a good writer.