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Contents May Have Shifted

by Pam Houston (Goodreads Author)

3.54 of 5 stars 3.54 · rating details · 637 ratings · 179 reviews

Stuck in a dead-end relationship, this fearless narrator leaves her metaphorical baggage behind and finds a comfort zone in the air, “feeling safest with one plane ticket in her hand and another in her underwear drawer.” She flies around the world, finding reasons to love life in dozens of far-flung places from Alaska to Bhutan. Along the way she weathers unplanned losses...more

Hardcover, 320 pages

Published February 6th 2012 by W. W. Norton & Company

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Community Reviews

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Mar 23, 2013 Patricia rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: literary-fiction

I quickly learned that I needed to take sips of “Contents May Have Shifted” with my morning coffee when my mind was alert and better able to catch the nuances in Houston's writing. It didn't work to read it at bedtime. A friend who also read the book said, “Houston asks a lot of the reader.” Yes, this is true, and I think that readers who are willing to give the book the kind of attention it requires will be rewarded. Perhaps it was the power of suggestion in the title, but as I read further int...more

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Feb 08, 2012 Amanda rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: arc, short-stories

Hokay so. At one point near the end of the book, Houston says that she considered calling this "Suicide Notes: 144 Reasons Not to Kill Yourself." The book consists of 144 short pieces, each in a different location (or on an airplane)- some of which are about something awesome like DOG SLEDDING or AIR FUNERALS IN BHUTAN or RIDING CAMELS and some of which are about something like arguing with your spouse or going to a spa with a girlfriend. Some of the pieces are actively depressing, but full of f...more

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Jan 17, 2013 Craig rated it 5 of 5 stars

Whenever I am asked what my favorite novel is, Written on the Body immediately springs to mind. Seconds later, I start arguing with myself - throwing The Virgin Suicides into the mix. And so I reply with both.

I believe that there is now a third book that will join that fight. I may have to rattle off three titles whenever I am asked what my favorite novel is.

I have long been a fan of Pam Houston, loved her syncopation and her straightforward stabs at the real meanings behind our gender differenc...more Whenever I am asked what my favorite novel is, Written on the Body immediately springs to mind. Seconds later, I start arguing with myself - throwing The Virgin Suicides into the mix. And so I reply with both.

I believe that there is now a third book that will join that fight. I may have to rattle off three titles whenever I am asked what my favorite novel is.

I have long been a fan of Pam Houston, loved her syncopation and her straightforward stabs at the real meanings behind our gender differences and differences in general. This book, though, takes her to a whole new level in my opinion. It is a thing of beauty, pure and heartwrenchingly real. A treatise on suicide and the reasons not to take that path, it never strays into the realm of the cliche, staying always honest to itself.

One small complaint: I think she is clinging a little too hard to the "romantic gender war" that made her such a popular writer. The men in this book, particularly in the early chapters, often seem like caricatures rather than actual men. It does change, though, as you get into the book further, but it is off-putting. What would normally be a large complaint for me, really pales next to the accomplishment that the book truly is.

A favorite quote:

"I'm beginning to understand that when we want to kill ourselves, it is not because we are lonely, but because we are trying to break up with the world before the world breaks up with us."

Like the rest of the novel, it is simple. But it gets to the heart of the matter succinctly. This book hit me pretty hard, got to me. It impressed me with how well it was written, but beyond that - it hit home.

Another quote said to the author that gets to the heart of the book and what it most likely is about (in my opinion) to the author herself:

"I don't think it is so much about the story anymore. I think it's about what kinds of possibilities are out there when you can finally stop telling the story."

I selfishly hope that Pam never stops telling the story. I want to listen to her rhythms and reasons for a long time to come.(less)

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Jun 05, 2012 Alan rated it 5 of 5 stars Recommends it for: Students of tight, tautly-written prose

Recommended to Alan by: A random pickup

Maybe I'm just not as familiar as I should be with the type of mimetic fiction presented here—I'm perfectly prepared to believe that—but... I picked this book up on a whim (my wife had checked it out of the library for herself, and it was close to hand when nothing else was), and was immediately captivated by the page I'd opened to at random. That doesn't happen to me very often these days. I read another few pages, then realized that yes, I was going to start over at the beginning and read the...more Maybe I'm just not as familiar as I should be with the type of mimetic fiction presented here—I'm perfectly prepared to believe that—but... I picked this book up on a whim (my wife had checked it out of the library for herself, and it was close to hand when nothing else was), and was immediately captivated by the page I'd opened to at random. That doesn't happen to me very often these days. I read another few pages, then realized that yes, I was going to start over at the beginning and read the whole thing... and that happens to me even less often. Houston has an amazing gift for capturing essentials in tiny slices of prose, and that's a good thing for a reader to encounter, whatever the genre.

I am given to understand that this book is a work of fiction; if so, though, it still has the immediacy of an autobiography, or a journal, written dramatically and unfolding in the moment. Less a novel than a series of intense vignettes, Contents May Have Shifted changes locales with dizzying rapidity, eventually building up a coherent portrait of its narrator through a kind of literary pointillism. Each two- or three-page chapter could stand on its own, but each contributes to a growing understanding of its (fictional—some parts obviously more fictional than others) Pam Houston's being.

I think it's the eerie, jewellike specificity of Houston's writing that brings on the feeling—illusory though it may be—that we are coming to know this person so deeply. Each snapshot Houston shows us is sharply focused on the details of her protagonist's surroundings, companions, foods tasted and monuments visited, but each gives us a glimpse into "Houston" and her inner life as well. Travel is redemptive, even when (especially when?) it's life-threatening—that is the theme that binds them together. Indeed, sometimes the book feels like a scattered travelogue, like Eat Pray Love (but more acerbic, cerebral and self-aware)—or so I believe, anyway. I haven't actually read that one, but when I described this book to a cow orker, Elizabeth Gilbert's book is what she immediately thought of too.

It's not a perfect narrative, of course—what is, in this imperfect world? From small flaws (such as the use of "flare" instead of "flair" on p.33; a reference to "Orleans Parrish" on p.44; a funny-in-context mention of "unexploded ordinances" on p.71) to larger issues (it's hard to shake off all the vestiges of First World privilege—see Houston's cure for depression, for example, from p.52: "Remember this and get on an airplane, a small one if possible, because it always works"), this book can occasionally seem smug, the chronicles of the woman who does everything more perfectly than you.

But those quibbles are so minor I hesitate even to introduce them. Let me give you an example of the kind of mini-story Houston writes, the sort of thing that grabbed me, the sort of thing I envy. This is the second in a "short list, in chronological order, of suicides I have known" (from pp.46-47):

The girl in the first writing class I ever taught whose boyfriend left her in a campground in the desert. She walked for fifteen miles to the nearest highway, hitched to Grand Junction, borrowed the cash for a bus ticket to Denver, walked ten blocks from the bus station to their apartment, turned the key in the lock, and hung herself from the rafters. Following her death, I heard that the boy who really loved her, who had been watching her canaries for her while she went to the desert with the other boy, wrapped the small birds in cellophane and shot them with a BB gun so he would not have to hear the flapping of their wings.

If that's the kind of flashbulb moment for which you read fiction... rest assured that Houston packs a lot of such moments into 306 pages.

"Love is supposed to feel good," Nora always tells me, "at least fifty-one percent of the time" (p.171). This novel feels good to read, substantially more than 50% of the time. And while it may be true that, however tightly packed, its Contents May Have Shifted, you can also rest assured that everything Houston intended to deliver should still arrive intact.(less)

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Mar 19, 2012 Vicki rated it 3 of 5 stars

The word that you probably cannot read in the little heart-shaped cloud on the book cover is "novel." I point this out because this book reads like the most funky and creative memoir ever. Adding to this misinterpretation is that the narrator of the book is also named Pam, also is a Creative Writing teacher in California, and also owns a ranch in Colorado. But the cloud on the back of the book says "fiction," so there ya go. Apparently not every word included here is true, but it would be an ama...more The word that you probably cannot read in the little heart-shaped cloud on the book cover is "novel." I point this out because this book reads like the most funky and creative memoir ever. Adding to this misinterpretation is that the narrator of the book is also named Pam, also is a Creative Writing teacher in California, and also owns a ranch in Colorado. But the cloud on the back of the book says "fiction," so there ya go. Apparently not every word included here is true, but it would be an amazing memoir if it were!

The structure of the book took some getting used to for me. There are well over 100 short vignettes that are used to tell Pam's story, but the reader has to do some work to figure out what makes Pam the unique person she is. We find out early on that she loves to travel, as many of the vignettes carry as a chapter title the flight number of a particular plane. What they have in common is that something goes awry either mechanically or meterologically on seemingly every plane trip she takes, but her desire to travel trumps the fear factor every time.

There does not appear to be a lot to connect one vignette to the next as the time and place and people included are likely to be totally different in succeeding chapters (which look for all the world like journal entries, i.e., short, and with the assumption that the reader is already connected to whatever came before). After awhile though, the reader begins to pick up a theme or two and start to recognize that some of the players are repeats; therefore worth paying more attention to. Pam is a woman searching for love, for adventure, for validation, for a spiritual dimension to her life.

She connects with some very interesting and exotic people along the way and picks up bits of wisdom in some very out of the way places. She finally sheds the guy that she thinks might be the one, except that he keeps a photo of his own great love (not Pam) in his glove box. After several hilariously described blind dates, she meets a Texan that she really clicks with. The only thing is that he still is the emotional property of his ex and his 6 year old daughter. Pam and Rick, the Texan, invest an enormous amount of time and travel miles in building a relationship with ample depth and trust. This also includes a surprisingly deep love and affection that Pam feels for Rick's daughter Madison.

Author Pam Houston has a great ear for dialog and a sense of humor to match. The working title of this book was "144 Reasons Not to Commit Suicide," but the title, Contents May Have Shifted embraces both the travel aspect and the emotional journey that Pam makes very effectively, I think.(less)

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Feb 19, 2012 Sharon rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: pacific-u-mfa

Reading Pam Houston gives me courage. I studied with her the second semester of my MFA and count her as a big influence. I will never be adventurous in the outdoors sense, the way she is. But I do aspire to her fearlessness in writing.

It’s not just the structure (144 short chapters, conceived as 144 reasons not to commit suicide). It’s not just the sleight of hand that makes the intimate-funny-smart voice of the narrator Pam sound just like but even better than the author’s own voice. It’s not j...more

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May 24, 2012 Sarah rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: adult, travel, relationships, adventure

Oh, Pam, how you've let me down. I've loved Pam Houston for years, after discovering her "Cowboys are My Weakness" story collection. Her newest "novel" is really anything but. It's a hodge-podge of travel/love/adventure vignettes, loosely tied together and blurry in their direction. Pam is a thrill seeker, traveling the globe with assorted misfits and spiritual soul searchers. Her bohemian charisma is attractive, and I admire her stamina dealing with difficult people, and stubborn men. Certain '...more

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Feb 23, 2012 Erin rated it 4 of 5 stars

I went to hear Pam Houston read in Berkeley on February 20. It was delightful, and I appreciated when she said that we are a culture so interested in categorizing--novel, prose poetry, fiction, non-fiction.

I liked this book a lot, perhaps more than any book besides "Cowboys." But "Cowboys" maybe only because of where I was in my life when I read it. However, I think this is a book that might require multiple readings, and could in fact become my favorite book. However, I probably should not hav...more

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Mar 01, 2012 Larry Hoffer rated it 5 of 5 stars

Pam, the narrator of this absolutely fantastic book, can't seem to stay in one place. An author and writing instructor with little luck on the romantic front, the one thing she seems to have inherited from her dysfunctional parents is a sincere love of travel and a restlessness to explore.

Contents May Have Shifted follows Pam all over the world, from ranches and spas, to monasteries, religious shrines, hotels, and landmarks, in locations as diverse as the American Southwest, Alaska, Bhutan, Tibe...more

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Dec 29, 2012 Nicole rated it 4 of 5 stars

Years ago, the first writing workshop I ever attended was in Taos, NM, and the teacher I worked with for that week was Pam Houston. One of the first things I remember her talking about was "glimmers"--the moments that captured her or stuck with her for some reason or other and that she knew she would write about someday even if she didn't yet know exactly how they would fit with anything else. About forty pages into this book, it struck me that she'd found a way to create a storyline entirely ou...more Years ago, the first writing workshop I ever attended was in Taos, NM, and the teacher I worked with for that week was Pam Houston. One of the first things I remember her talking about was "glimmers"--the moments that captured her or stuck with her for some reason or other and that she knew she would write about someday even if she didn't yet know exactly how they would fit with anything else. About forty pages into this book, it struck me that she'd found a way to create a storyline entirely out of glimmers. And, for the most part, this worked beautifully.

This "novel" is only a novel in the sense that it has a more or less single primary storyline. More than anything, it reads as a series of linked short-shorts. The primary character is a woman named Pam, and we follow her through a series of snapshots: therapies, lovers, friendships, sideways versions of family (I believe her words, but now I can't find them), introspection, and travel, travel, travel. The travel bits show up in two ways: moments on the ground in various places both terrifyingly wild and surprisingly tame; and moments in the air between destinations, most often in (or about to be in) the crash position.

A series of themes emerges from these chaotic glimpses. Among them: the sense that this character has lived much of her life braced to assume the crash position at any given moment (either figuratively or literally); the need for control versus the desire to embrace something too big to control (usually love, although of varying types); the way parts of life overlap and throw shadows or light into other parts of life without clear connections and without permission; the frustrating dance of creating boundaries in relationships and sticking to them when they're different for every relationship.

The effect is lush and dizzying at times, with locales and characters and disconnected conversations flashing past so quickly I found myself clinging to the familiar names like lifelines. Surprisingly, though, all these fragments/glimmers came together into something that felt complete and grounded and true.

I'm used to loving Houston's writing, but I marked an obscene number of passages in this book. Maybe it's the distilled quality of the short scenes that let so many of them shine so brightly for me, or maybe it fit just right with what I wanted to read last week. Maybe her writing's always this good and I've just gotten braver about marking up books since the last time I read one of hers for the first time. Regardless, there are many, many beautiful and joyous and sad and funny things in here and I can only give you a few of the ones that caught my attention:

If I die tonight it will be with every single thing unfinished (like, I suppose, any other night), and yet, what a gift to die on the verge of tears. I have spent my life trying to understand the way this rock and this ache go together, why a granite peak is more dramatic half dressed in clouds (like a woman), why sunlight under fog is better than the sum of its parts, why my best days and my worst days are always the same days, why (often) leaving seems like the only solution to loving (each other) the world.

Here's the thing about jealousy: it eats your heart from the inside out and makes you so unlikable even the dogs get skeptical.
"Love is supposed to feel good," Nora always tells me, "at least fifty-one percent of the time."

Watching her use her knives on vegetables is like watching an aficionado play a complicated string instrument, a harp or a hammer dulcimer. Even the way she lays the chopped pepper into the bowl is less like cooking and more like dance.

That night in Minneapolis, delirious with fever, I ate every bite of what was served to me, the kind of hot that hurts so much you can't actually stop eating but have to keep shoveling in bite after bite just to stay a few seconds ahead of the pain.

My bottom line: gorgeous writing, smart story (if a little disorienting at times), and bonus points for mentioning my favorite hotel on the Oregon Coast. Brace yourself for the whirlwind, but do read it.

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Oct 10, 2011 A. rated it 4 of 5 stars

Pam Houston is a magnificent writer. Her prose is beautiful and her ability to surprise the reader with a turn of phrase or a pithy comment is extraordinary. Those gifts are on full display in her new book.

Contents May Have Shifted is composed of 144 short pieces. All but 12 of the pieces are labelled with places. Many are exotic or at least intriguing like Tibet, Istanbul, Mallorca. Others are the territory that Pam Houston, the fictional narrator, and Pam Houston the writer inhabit like Crede,...more Pam Houston is a magnificent writer. Her prose is beautiful and her ability to surprise the reader with a turn of phrase or a pithy comment is extraordinary. Those gifts are on full display in her new book.

Contents May Have Shifted is composed of 144 short pieces. All but 12 of the pieces are labelled with places. Many are exotic or at least intriguing like Tibet, Istanbul, Mallorca. Others are the territory that Pam Houston, the fictional narrator, and Pam Houston the writer inhabit like Crede, Denver and Boulder Colorado along with Davis, California. The other 12 pieces are named for flights UA#368 opens the book. To call this a novel is a bit out on a limb. These pieces largely work as short shorts. Many don't quite connect, especially in the beginning of the book, with the pieces that come before or after.

As Pam jumps from place to place in a never ending tour that would rival Bob Dylan's odyessey of the last 20 years, we are left trying to figure out an underlying plot and a purpose. It's clear that Houston is trying to find connections in all these places and it is also clear that she must be running away. The relationships come into better focus in the second half of the book and we see Pam trying to come to terms with a committed relationship.

What makes this book special are the individual pieces. They are beautiful. They glimmer, as Houston would say. She writes about place concisely and infuses her tales with great humor. I think to call this book a novel is a bit of a misnomer and forces the reader to think of it in a way that isn't in line with the book's strengths. I was reaching too hard for cohesion when it was better to just let the pieces wash over me. When I finally gave in and enjoyed meandering from place to place for the sake of it, the plot kicks in in a much more overt way and almost seems to get in the way of the travelling.

Pam Houston has always inhabited that world between fiction and nonfiction. Her stories are autobiographical and her essays sometimes read like tall tales. I think I would have liked a little more ambiguity in this book. I don't quite believe it's a novel even if I know that it isn't quite the truth.

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Feb 29, 2012 Ally Armistead rated it 4 of 5 stars

I have been a fan of Pam Houston's ever since I read "Waltzing the Cat"--one of the most perfect short stories I've ever read. Houston's precision of language, and her wry, ironic bent make her delectable and hard to put down; once her voice is inside your head, it's impossible to get her out.

"Contents May Have Shifted" is instantly recognizable as the Pam Houston we all know and love. In this um, novel (though I'm still not entirely sure about its classification just yet), Houston stars as "Pam...more I have been a fan of Pam Houston's ever since I read "Waltzing the Cat"--one of the most perfect short stories I've ever read. Houston's precision of language, and her wry, ironic bent make her delectable and hard to put down; once her voice is inside your head, it's impossible to get her out.

"Contents May Have Shifted" is instantly recognizable as the Pam Houston we all know and love. In this um, novel (though I'm still not entirely sure about its classification just yet), Houston stars as "Pam," and takes us through a series of vignettes about her travels all over the world, her relationships with men and women, and her difficulty with Rick, a boyfriend who is still emotionally tied to his ex-wife and the mother of his child.

The book is organized by flight numbers; within each is a series of mini chapters headlined with a city, state, or country. In every vignette Pam's language is beautiful and haunting, and after ingesting about 30 of these mini stories an emotional theme begins to emerge: amid all of her whitewater rafting and mountain climbing and outdoor bear adventures, we begin to sense a desperation in Pam, a need to keep running from place to place, to heal from a dark past with her father, to simultaneously cling to and abandon Rick, and a deep desire to "fix" herself but not knowing how. In these pages, we sense a vulnerable woman--hurt by her past and present--who seeks out New Age healing, massage, acupuncture: anything to relieve the pain.

Threaded throughout these vignettes is a subtle exploration, too, of what it is to be a woman: the anxiety-ridden intersection between motherhood and singledom, commitment and freedom. At almost fifty-years-old, Pam analyzes her life choices, often meditating on the act of suicide--the removal of any more choice. She points to the disturbing video camera placed on the Golden Gate bridge where jumpers test their fate, the death of David Foster Wallace, and her near-death experiences on airplanes. Throughout it all, though, Pam returns to the idea that it is only the simplest most beautiful gestures on this earth--a boy cupping water, a dog smiling, a man's hair basked in sunlight--that comprises life itself.

Overall, the book is a beautiful meditation on co-dependence, pain, and realization. However, at the same time, the lack of cohesion between all of these vignettes (at times) made for a slow-going frustrating read. Part of the issue may be the faulty labeling of the book as a "novel," which sets a reader up (this reader, anyways) to expect a kind of narrative. True, while Houston gives us a narrative, it is only arrived at after patient reading, and a willingness to let her vulnerability surface over time. In this way, "Contents" is wonderfully authentic, and must be read as a collection of prose poems. Still, I think it might pose a challenge to the every day reader anticipating a more conventional read. However, I--for one--found it incredibly moving.(less)

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Feb 01, 2012 Lisa rated it 4 of 5 stars

I read this in a day. I am a fan of Pam Houston's writing. In this novel, the character, Pam, narrates her story in mini chapters. It's an interesting way of telling the story because at first you think - this is jumping around from place to place and time to time, but when you think about it, that's sort of the way many of us tell a story. The story flows and we learn about characters in Pam's life, (much like we did in Sight Hound.) She deals with many of the same pitfalls and joys we all do -...more

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Mar 30, 2012 Paula rated it 2 of 5 stars

I wanted to like this book, but I couldn't. Normally I love things written in short, sweet snippets like this, and I was and am intrigued by the style. But in this book I felt as if there was no "there" there. I wanted to either be shown more about the interior underbelly of the narrator, and discover what this was all about for her and how the travels were affecting her, and/or I wanted more about the fabulous out-of-the-way places she has traveled. Instead I got neither. I felt like this was a...more

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May 31, 2012 Heidi Willis rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: mfa

Houston's "novel" reads more as a collection of vaguely connected flash fiction, or what Pam herself calls, "glimmers." These bits and pieces of her life are like embroidery floss in a tapestry - beautiful in color and texture on their own, but when woven together create a more expansive and complex picture.

There is no easy storyline here, no simplistic plot or conflict besides the one the main character - named Pam, and so like the author herself - fights inside herself. Although there are a h...more

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Mar 08, 2013 Anita Edwards rated it 3 of 5 stars

Ah, yes, another Port Townsend community read.

I read the first 5 pages and decided this really wasn't my sort of book. But then I read the next 30 pages and decided, nope, this really wasn't my sort of book. And then I read 100 pages and decided, still not my sort of book. And then I found myself finishing it and feeling really good and unexplainably uplifted and still thinking,"This is not my sort of book."

I'm not tempted to read anything else by this author. Her style goes so far beyond stream...more

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Feb 22, 2012 Susy rated it 5 of 5 stars

I'm not sure there are enough superlatives for me to do justice to this book! I love Pam Houston, the author and director of UCD's creative writing program, for her fearless sense of adventure; her love of the people & animals in her life and the way she weaves them into her stories. In this novel- she calls it a novel because the narrator Pam who bears a remarkable resemblance to the author Pam - manages to find her way through dicey flights to obscure parts of the world combined with inten...more

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Jan 02, 2012 Lynn rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: read-in-2012, novel

I finished this book just this morning. I liked it a lot though I would say the style/format is schizophrenic. It is made up of short sections, each one named for a place. Even within those short sections the topic/idea/thread jumps around from paragraph to paragraph. But, that said, I liked it. The short sections do accumulate, there is a thread, and things do come together, but not in a way that is reductive.
It might be a bit too much given to insight. In almost every section, there is some bi...more

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Jan 04, 2013 MN rated it 4 of 5 stars

This is a complicated book - not complicated to read, but for me, complicated to think about. It requires a complicated category, its review requires a complicated perspective; and although it can be considered merely as divisible into 144 parts there's a more complicated structure to its internal logic. There are 132 parts divided into 11 sections by 12 flights. Some of the parts are very short; some are almost long; none is straightforward; and all are provocative.

This is a book I need to rere...more

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Feb 28, 2012 Michaela rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: kindle

I'm predisposed to like Pam Houston - I took a writing class with her back in the late 90s and found her to be warm, funny and really insightful. Totally the kind of person you want to hang out with over beers (though her stories will ALWAYS be better than yours). Her new novel is lovely, though it took me a little while to fall into its rhythm -- 144 short chapters, which take place in various locations and with a variety of characters. Take the time to sort it all out, though, and you get an e...more

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Feb 08, 2012 christine cooper added it

I enjoyed reading this myself and would recommend it because Pam Houston is just such an engaging writer. I must admit that I liked the first half a lot more than the second half, but by the time I got to the parts I didn't like as much, I didn't care what was going on -- I just liked the way the words sounded.

I can't help but wish that the book remained a simple collection of vignettes that evoked a feeling rather than adding the sort-of plot half way through. I actually may have even accepted...more

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May 03, 2013 Sonja rated it 2 of 5 stars

After reading 108 pages, I realized I wasn't learning anything new from this book, unless it was that the author either had a very interesting job that enabled her to travel a lot or she had a trust fund and was just going where the wind blew her. I did enjoy the descriptions of places that I have not been but, other than that, there just isn't much that makes me want to read more. Part of it may be her jumping around from place to year to whatever and back again. I think this is a book that may...more

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May 04, 2012 Denise marked it as to-read

Shelves: short-stories-as-novel, memoir, stopped-reading, memory, had-to-return-before-done, travel, western

Cowboys are my Weakness was my all-time favorite book for several years -- a rare ode to strong, self-reliant, independent and brave-as-hell women in the modern West. Women who, despite their amazing survivalist skills, find themselves undone by independent, strong, sexy-as-hell guys of the West. Ah, cowboys. Be still, my beating heart. But, Houston's latest work failed to hook me after the first few pages (tough to not be grabbed by a 747 with fuel pump failure) and I did not finish before it...more

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Aug 01, 2012 Suzanne rated it 3 of 5 stars

This is very readable, but it isn't really a novel, more a series of reminiscences that don't add up to a plot. But I guess she had to call it a novel...

I went to one of her author signings where she basically said that if she was writing nonfiction, say a travel article, she made stuff up, and when she wrote fiction, say Waltzing the Cat (which was the book just out when I went to the signing) it was pretty much all true.

That's an interesting way to look at it. Doesn't fit my concept of fiction...more

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Mar 28, 2012 Deena rated it 3 of 5 stars

I may be getting sensitive in my old age, but I felt like this latest book from Pam Houston was almost too disturbing. It made a lot of sense to me why she is who she is, and she certainly has a great sense of who that is as well. . . but I never put it together before that she is a survivor of physical abuse and incest. Sometimes I just had to put the book down and catch my breath, after she would offhandly mention some horrible childhood injury at the hands of her parents.
I loved the way the...more

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Mar 15, 2012 Leota rated it 3 of 5 stars

This novel (though it reads more like a memoir) is divided into short chapters that bounce around from the mountains of Tibet to a town in Texas to the wilds of Alaska... and beyond. The big consistency throughout is Pam: her shitty relationships with men (and one awful new age woman who changed her name from Sofie to So Free, gag), her amazing relationships with her friends, and an old physical wound that just can't seem to heal.

I've always liked Houston's writing, and this book is no exceptio...more

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Nov 09, 2011 camilla rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: rad-ladies, read-2011, travel

Pam Houston won me over with her wonderful short story collection Cowboys Are My Weakness. Here she delves further into relationships, romantic and friendly, while skipping around the world from Newfoundland to Laos. More like a book of beautiful vignettes than a novel, Houston showcases the travels of a similarly named narrator who searches the globe for reasons to love life. And find them she does, in monasteries in Tibet, Roman ruins in Tunisia, and possibly with a new family in Colorado. Hou...more

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Feb 13, 2013 Janene Tamborello rated it 3 of 5 stars

This is a book of 144 teeny little boasts the author makes about various places traveled to and/or weird things that happened to her. There is no cohesion though, no evolution of character to be cheered, no heady insights to highlight. It is interesting kind of...the writing is neither bad nor breathtaking. The book is already getting old half way through. I could have exactly this (or better) conversation with a half-dozen funky people at any given international youth hostel. I think it is an e...more

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Dec 01, 2012 Sherry rated it 2 of 5 stars

Another story of a middle aged woman looking for the next perfect mate.

I feel that I have read this story a few times ( and lived it).

However she was an interesting gal, and I am a bit jealous that she could travel so far and wide. I liked her adventures, too.

Not sure I cared for the format. Jumping from one scene to another, one time to another, never an explanation of anything, anywhere. But one could figure it out eventually so ........

Of note. I once lived in Aspen, Co., and was aware of th...more

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Oct 29, 2012 Alyson Hagy rated it 4 of 5 stars

Pam Houston has one of the best voices around. On the page, she can be tender, hilarious, plaintive, shrewd, and incisive by turns. I really enjoyed the structure of this book (144 short "glimmers" or microfictions of a sort). The narrator, "Pam" takes us around the world on a series of internal and external journeys that explore love, loss, heritage, friendship and more. Each section is wonderfully balanced and flavored. And I relished the dozens of locales...from Alaska to Tunisia to Laos. A l...more

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About Pam Houston

Houston is the Director of Creative Writing at U.C. Davis. Her stories have been selected for the Best American Short Stories, the O. Henry Awards, the Pushcart Prize, and the Best American Short Stories of the Century. She lives in Colorado at 9,000 feet above sea level near the headwaters of the Rio Grande.

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Quotes from Contents May Have Shifted

“I still don't see how it would make me feel any better to think of the pain in my hip and spine as anything other than my most loyal and valuable companion, the continuous nonvoice in my ear that says, You got out alive and you still get to go.” — 1 person liked it

“...the purser has something resembling joy in her voice when she welcomes us to San Francisco. 'I probably don't need to tell you all to open the overhead bins with caution,' she says. 'If your contents haven't shifted, you must be carrying lead weights.” — 1 person liked it

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