Neal Thompson's Blog: Blood & Whiskey, page 7

LitHub: HOW TO TELL YOUR FAMILY THAT YOU’RE WRITING A MEMOIR

"MY MISSHAPEN SKATEBOARDING BOOK HAD BECOME A BOOK ABOUT, WELL, US"

May 14, 2018  By Neal Thompson

[This story first appeared on LitHub]

I didn’t intend for it to be a memoir. I swear. It just kept tilting in that direction.

The only scenes that felt real and true were those with my wife and two sons. Still, it took a few years of writing my way in and out of corners and dead ends before I stopped referring to my book as a “history of skateboarding with bits of personal narrative,” before I under...

HOW TO TELL YOUR FAMILY THAT YOU’RE WRITING A MEMOIR

"MY MISSHAPEN SKATEBOARDING BOOK HAD BECOME A BOOK ABOUT, WELL, US"

May 14, 2018  By Neal Thompson

[This story first appeared on LitHub]

I didn’t intend for it to be a memoir. I swear. It just kept tilting in that direction.

The only scenes that felt real and true were those with my wife and two sons. Still, it took a few years of writing my way in and out of corners and dead ends before I stopped referring to my book as a “history of skateboarding with bits of personal narrative,” before I under...

Narrative Magazine: KICKFLIP BOYS Excerpt

Kickflip

BY NEAL THOMPSON

FIVE TEEN BOYS and two grown men, squished into a huge SUV, hemmed in by skateboards, video gear, sweat-skanked clothes. Doritos bags, soda cans, and water bottles at their feet. A record-breaking heat wave simmering outside, the air conditioner groaning. Seven of us, lost in Cleveland, and I’m wondering why I thought this was a good idea.

Sean, fourteen, the older of my two sons, sitting beside me in his cutoff jeans and Thrasher T-shirt, pokes our iPad screen, zooms i...

Reviews from Library Journal ("remarkably honest") and Booklist ("heartfelt")

[Thanks to Derek Sanderson for this fun review in Library Journal]:

Author Thompson (A Curious Man: The Strange and Brilliant Life of Robert “Believe It or Not!” Ripley; Driving with the Devil: Southern Moonshine, Detroit Wheels, and the Birth of NASCAR) pens an excellent memoir about the growing pains of fatherhood and adolescence. Encouraged from an early age to learn to skateboard and to find their own way through life, the author’s two sons enter their teenage years with a rebellious fury,...

Kirkus on Kickflip Boys: "A highly candid memoir of parenthood"

"The lacerating power of some of the chapters comes from the author’s recognition that he has perhaps 'become their enabler' ... Thompson recognizes promising material when he sees it (and lives it) and knows how to heighten the drama for narrative momentum ... A highly candid memoir of parenthood that often fascinates and occasionally frustrates"

KICKFLIP BOYS

A Memoir of Freedom, Rebellion, and the Chaos of Fatherhood

by Neal Thompson

AMAZON
BARNES & NOBLE
LOCAL BOOKSELLER

Permissive parenting cl...

Deep and Steep at Crystal Mountain

Though KICKFLIP BOYS is primarily about my skateboarding sons and our family adventures during the chaos of their teen years, I would like it to be known that dad still has a few moves of his own. Shot March 1, 2018 on Northway Peak at Crystal Mountain.

(Thanks to Joe Trimarco) 

Kickflip Boys reviewed in Publishers Weekly: "heartfelt and blunt"

In this heartfelt and blunt memoir, Thompson (A Curious Man: The Strange & Brilliant Life of Robert “Believe It or Not” Ripley) recalls the highs and lows of raising two boys who grow up obsessed with skateboarding. Thompson indulges his sons’ passion, chronicling their tricks on YouTube and at one point driving them on a cross-country skating adventure. As sons Sean and Leo snarl into their teen years, their rebellious attitudes fester into various forms of disobedience, including marijuana...

Kickflip Boys reviewed in Publishers Weekly

In this heartfelt and blunt memoir, Thompson (A Curious Man: The Strange & Brilliant Life of Robert “Believe It or Not” Ripley) recalls the highs and lows of raising two boys who grow up obsessed with skateboarding. Thompson indulges his sons’ passion, chronicling their tricks on YouTube and at one point driving them on a cross-country skating adventure. As sons Sean and Leo snarl into their teen years, their rebellious attitudes fester into various forms of disobedience, including marijuana...

My guest post for National Novel Writing Month

Writing on Amtrak between Seattle and Portland

[Sharing this post I wrote for my friends at National Novel Writing Month, on "How to Maintain Your Writing Momentum." Visit the NaNoWriMo blog: http://blog.nanowrimo.org/post/168263...]

In the cafeteria of a Seattle-to-Bremerton ferry, headphones on and laptop glowing, I'm surprised at how many others, like me, are drinking beer at 2 on a rainy Thursday afternoon. In Bremerton I find a coffee shop and wri...

How to Maintain Your Writing Momentum

Writing on Amtrak between Seattle and Portland

[Sharing this post I wrote for my friends at National Novel Writing Month, on "How to Maintain Your Writing Momentum." Visit the NaNoWriMo blog: http://blog.nanowrimo.org/post/168263...]

In the cafeteria of a Seattle-to-Bremerton ferry, headphones on and laptop glowing, I'm surprised at how many others, like me, are drinking beer at 2 on a rainy Thursday afternoon. In Bremerton I find a coffee shop and wri...