My Three Dads

Starred review from May 9, 2022
Crispin (The Dead Ladies Club), founder of Bookslut, takes the ideals of the American Midwest to task in this scorching blend of memoir and social critique. In an attempt to exorcise the oppressive beliefs she internalized growing up in small-town Kansas, Crispin unpacks her hometown’s values of religion, family, and “this very Midwestern version of masculinity that is all emotional constipation,” while contending with the “atrocities” they’ve engendered throughout history. In a section titled “The Father,” Crispin recalls a murder-suicide committed by her art teacher on his family in the 1990s to underscore the prevalence of male violence in rural communities and muse on the cultural obsession with “tell stories about dead white women.” Another astute appraisal uses the martyrdom of John Brown—the abolitionist who combined religious fervor and guns—to examine the complications of culpability when violence is carried out in the name of a perceived greater good. Crispin also dives into her own evangelical youth in the 1980s to poke holes in the promise of the nuclear family structure while considering the pitfalls of subscribing to religion as a means to escape “the terror of freedom. The terror of ourselves.” It doesn’t strike a particularly hopeful note, but Crispin’s erudite analysis and biting wit make this multifaceted history unmissable. Searing and intelligent, this delivers on all counts.

July 1, 2022

Crispin (Why I Am Not a Feminist: A Feminist Manifesto) provides a much-needed counternarrative for the fictions of the Midwest that perpetuate and continue to engender an American cultural mythology that conceals harsh realities of colonialism, oppression, and patriarchalism, which together have led to undiscussed problems related to economic disadvantages, abuse, and stigma. The book opens with, ostensibly, a ghost story and unfolds as a series of near-exhumations of the haunted spaces of the Midwest, both as Crispin has lived with them and as she has studied them through socio-critical lenses. Crispin tells the stories of her "three fathers" with vulnerability and power, and she illuminates the secrets that families have, both personally and collectively, in ways that violate the norms of taciturn Midwestern values. VERDICT A powerful, provocative narrative, designed to remind readers that it is often silence that empowers oppression, allowing it the power to endure in unchallenged ways.--Emily Bowles

Copyright 2022 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from July 15, 2022
The author of Why I Am Not a Feminist and The Dead Ladies Project returns with a sharp examination of patriarchal cultural norms in the Midwest. Crispin, who lives in Philadelphia but grew up in Kansas, begins by describing a haunting she discovered in her home after moving back to her home state. The ghost in question, dubbed Charlie, came with a specific type of "dad energy...this disapproval, this long list of unspoken rules, this very Midwestern version of masculinity that is all emotional constipation yet still strangely captivating, that leaves those around it scrutinizing every glimmer of the eye, every change in tone or inflection, looking for some sign of approval or affection or respect. The kind of masculinity that makes you think love is a thing to be earned through sacrifice and improved performance." Mixing memoir and cultural criticism, the author explores her relationships with the three "dads" of the title: her elementary art teacher, who was involved in a horrific act of violence; abolitionist John Brown; and Reformation leader Martin Luther. Crispin shows how these different figures and their legacies have personally affected her and how their broader influences--in family, politics, and religion--have affected America as a whole, particularly related to the many myths embedded in ostensibly pure Midwestern values. Examining how each of these aspects of culture has been modified, redefined, and coopted, Crispin thoughtfully explores how "the idea of community is not enough. It's too floppy a concept, too nostalgic and indistinct. It doesn't just mean knitting circles and someone to bring you groceries when you're sick. It means clusters of like-minded people who shut out any dissent. Neo-Nazis have a great sense of community, as do anti-vaxxers and militias. What we need is society." By challenging a host of societal assumptions about family, identity, gender, religion, and politics, the author upends an array of notions about American exceptionalism. A fascinating and engaging cultural study.

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