Author: Adam Mansbach
Narrator: Samuel Jackson
Publisher: Audible, Inc
Length: 6 mins
Unabridged
My Review: I expected to really get a kick out of this audiobook. After all, I myself am a father of two boys (4 1/2 and 13 months). For the last 13 months of my life I have only on the rarest of occasions ever gotten more than 3 hours of consecutive sleep. My nights are inevitably interrupted when the baby monitor starts screaming in my ear and I get up and try to coax my son back to sleep. Usually this requires a bottle or two and about 30-45 minutes of patience.
So I can totally relate with the utter exhaustion many parents feel and I thought that this book would be a balm for my frayed nerves. I was wrong.
My expectations going into this book were that there would be two conversations going on. One conversation would be between the parent and the child. This conversation would be one where the father is gently trying to get the child back to sleep. Either reading a book, humming a song, or whatever. The second conversation I expected would be an internal dialogue of expletives that would parade through the father’s head but never actually be voiced and directed at the child.
Unfortunately there does not appear to be two conversations in Go the F–k to Sleep. Lines like “F__K your stuffed bear, I ain’t getting you shit” and “Hell no you can’t go to the bathroom! You know where you can go? The f__k to sleep!” are voiced directly at the child. Ultimately this is the problem I have with the book. I can’t imagine ever saying anything like this to my kids and it really bothers me to think about other kids out there in the world who are treated this way.
In Samuel Jackson’s introduction to the audiobook he talks about raising his daughter “I did say ‘Go the Fuck to sleep’ to her a lot.” How cute.
In my opinion, Go the F–k to Sleep trivializes emotional and verbal abuse and promotes an agressive and dysfunctional style of parenting. From watching the traffic on the #GotheFtoSleep I get the distinct impression that my thoughts are in the minority. That’s ok. Everyone is entitled to their opinion. Most seem to think this is harmless fun and I sincerely hope they are right.
I get it. I understand why people may think this is funny.. but I can’t find it humorous in this context.
For all of the fans of this book it appears you will have something to look forward to. With all the attention that this book is garnering I’m expecting we will probably see more “F–k” books from Mr. Mansbach. We can probably look forward to such titles as:
Eat Your F–king Breakfast
Put On Your F–king Shoes
What the F–k Do You Want
Clean Your F–king Room
Don’t Hit Your F–king Brother
Won’t that be nice?
Mixed feelings.
Part of me wants to say, “Hey, it’s just a joke get over it.”
The other part totally agrees with you.
I think Jackson’s reading made it sound even more brutal, but I have to admit, I laughed at some of it as well.
Yep, I am not so surprised at Mr. Badazz Jackson getting his ‘macho on’ by telling his little girl to ‘Go the F**K to sleep. As they say, the ‘Dog returns to its vomit’. I also see that he is really not an actor but just a mean-minded individual being type-casted in movies. Who knew?