Tiny Beautiful Things by Cheryl Strayed
by Jenners • 07/10/2012 • 4 Stars, Non-Fiction, S Authors, Spirituality, T Titles • 24 Comments
Tiny Beautiful Things by Cheryl Strayed
Publisher: Vintage, 2012
Pages: 368
Genre: Non-Fiction
Where I Got It: From Amazon Vine
Why I Read It: I LOVE reading advice columns and I wanted to check out the author’s book Wild but got to this first
My Rating: 4 stars
I’ve always been a sucker for advice columns—from gobbling up Ann Landers and Dear Abby columns in the newspaper to reading Dan Savage’s Savage Love columns. Reading people’s letters scratches my voyeuristc itch, and I enjoy trying to think of what advice I would give for particular situations. Tiny Beautiful Things is a collection of letters and answers from the Dear Sugar advice column from the online magazine The Rumpus. This is simply the best advice column I’ve ever read. It transcends the short pithy advice of Ann and Abby and digs deeper than Savage Love (as well as being a bit less bawdy).
What makes Sugar’s advice so meaningful, fascinating and readable is that she shares herself and her life experiences (of which there have been many) in her answers. This makes her advice feel authentic and thoughtful. When she’s writing about the difficulty of cutting off ties with a toxic parent, her advice rings true because she’s had to do it herself. When advising a woman to leave a relationship despite feelings of guilt, she shares the details of the demise of one of her own romantic relationships. By sharing her experiences and life lessons so candidly and openly, Sugar’s advice feels like it is coming from a place of love and experience—from a friend versus an advice columnist.
Her loving-kindess is apparent throughout her responses (she routinely calls her letter writers “sweet pea”), and her advice always felt well-considered and spot-on. She rarely provides short answers, but takes the time to address each issue and to share the reasons why she is giving particular advice. As with the best advice, Sugar’s responses are often simply reflecting a mirror back at the letter writer. Often, those who are writing for advice already KNOW what they need to do … they just don’t want to make the difficult choices they know they need to make. By acting as an understanding and sympathetic friend—yet a friend who will tell you the unvarnished truth and not let you take the easy way out—Sugar provides both the advice and the encouragement to seek the path that will lead to real growth and peace. There wasn’t a single instance in the book where I disagreed with Sugar’s advice, and I often found myself feeling uplifted and encouraged even when the situation at hand did not relate to my own life at all.
Reading this book is like getting advice from a sympathetic and wise friend. If you happen to be experiencing an issue covered in one of the letters (and chances are you have or you will as the letters focus on the very fundamental issues we all face as humans), I suspect that Sugar’s advice will speak volumes and provide a helpful perspective to get you on the right track. And even if your life is going swimmingly, I still think we can all find some inspiration and guidance from this book. It is, at its heart, about how we all struggle to get through this life with dignity, love, grace and respect but often fall flat on our faces despite our best efforts. That we can always pick ourselves up and try again is what Sugar reminds us over and over and, really, who doesn’t need to remember that lesson?
Note: Although the online Dear Sugar column was written anonymously, Sugar’s identity has been revealed to be Cheryl Strayed, whose memoir Wild was released earlier this year. Based on this book, I will definitely be reading Wild to learn more about this most interesting person who gives such wonderful and caring advice.
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I would love to read this and I want to read Wild too!
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I loved Wild and am now eagerly awaiting my turn for this one at the library. Hope Wild doesn’t disappoint you!
I’m finished Wild now and I liked it. I’ve seen some poeple who just hated it because of how idiotic she was (and I’ll admit … she was really dumb at times) but that is so that age!!! Glad to hear from another fan.
Those were my thoughts too: I made spectacularly bad decisions in my twenties despite not losing my mother or having a failed marriage. I just loved her raw honesty.
I love advice columns, particularly Dear Sugar (which Amy, from My Friend Amy, introduced me to). Glad to hear you enjoyed this book. I can’t wait to read Wild (despite what Ti and softdrink thought)!
Reading the Dear Sugar stuff first helped me to like her more than Ti and Fizzy Jill — I was prepared to like her going in.
Ditto what Ti said. I just keep picturing her shooting up heroin and losing her boots and I can’t take her seriously.
Sounds interesting. I MIT check it out. Trying to read five whole books on my summer break.lol
Advice that comes from the heart, and is delivered in a gentle yet firm way is the best advice to have. I bet I would love to read this book, and that it would help me. I remember many years ago when I read Ann Lander’s column everyday, and I always closed the paper feeling less baffled about the world. This sounds even better. Fantastic review today, Jenners. I need to read this one!
I’ll be happy to send you my review copy. Shoot me your address again and I’ll get it in the mail to you.
I wanted to read Wild as well until I read several negative reviews. The negatives I’ve heard are bad enough that it makes me wonder if Strayed is the appropriate person to give out advice :/ I guess now I’m gonna have to read Wild so I won’t be forming my own opinion just from someone else’s opinion.
I read Wild and I liked it … but I see where the negative reviews are coming from. She did a lot of dumb stuff at a dumb stage in her life (early 20s) but I think she learned from it and came out the other side.
Glad to have you back. Alas probably not a book I’d enjoy though the fact that it reads like getting advice from a sympathetic and wise friend does appeal.
I haven’t heard of this one, but I was hoping to read her new book – until I read several unfavorable reviews and decided it probably isn’t the best book for me.
She sounds like a compassionate person. I recently downloaded Wild, so I’m glad to hear you liked her other writing.
Sounds very good.
Typically I shy away from things like this as I find the “advice” to be more about the writer than the asker. It sounds like she does this too but in an authentic rather than a self-interested way.
Advice columns really are fun, aren’t they? I miss reading Ann Landers and Dear Abbey!
This is one of those books I think I’d like at first but then would grow tired of. I’m glad you liked it to so much.
I loved read Ann Landers as a child. This books sounds really good and I think now that Oprah has chosen her other book for a summer read some of her other works are going to get much more play in the media.
I really, really didn’t care for Wild but I know she’s got a following for Dear Sugar. I tried to read some of her column but after Wild, I just couldn’t.
I clicked on The Rumpus link and Love the site, so added it to my bookmarks. I’m a big fan of advice columns too! I’m adding both books to my list, great review!!