03/28/2022
Actor Driver parlays her ebullient charm from the screen to the page in this sparkling debut, a series of amusing essays on Hollywood, motherhood, and the vicissitudes of life. Taking readers from her fraught English childhood in the 1970s to the glittering career that followed her breakout role in 1995’s Circle of Friends, Driver muses on everything from her famous curls (“like giant springs pogoing in perpetual motion”) in “Butterfly Hair” to the unglamorous trials of being a working actress (when “all the momentum gathered in making Circle of Friends seemed to have disappeared,” she writes, “I couldn’t even book a fake orgasm”) and surviving 2018’s devastating wildfires in Malibu with her husband and son, in the introspective “Sea-Based Incursion.” Throughout, Driver’s beguiling wit and candor steal the show, even as she contends with the more difficult subjects later in life, such as the grief of losing her mother to cancer. Movingly recalling their final days and conversations together—including one about bread, which they concluded was “really just a butter vessel”—Driver observes, “We are on an adventure, and this is not some eleventh-hour reach to spin death into a more palatable destination.” Humorous and heartfelt, this is sure to please fans. (May)
"We have all been charmed by Minnie Driver on the screen, but it’s a divine pleasure to learn the woman behind some of our most beloved characters is a writer of true precision, wit and style who has had a life more compelling than any movie. This book will be a companion to those struggling to make sense of their own story and a clarion call to mothers (of all kinds) grappling with their identity. I was comforted, galvanized, touched and - no surprise considering the author - charmed, too. — Lena Dunham
"Sharp observations and quirky irreverence make for a delightful read." — Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
“To reveal oneself in a manner that is at once poignant and fiercely intelligent while also being funny, warm, and genuine, is quite a feat. Minnie Driver shows us she is even more than what’s met the eye all these years. Simply put: I love this book!” — Therese Ann Fowler, author of A Good Neighborhood and Z: A Novel of Zelda Fitzgerald
“Actor Driver parlays her ebullient charm from the screen to the page in this sparkling debut, a series of amusing essays on Hollywood, motherhood, and the vicissitudes of life… Humorous and heartfelt, this is sure to please fans.” — Publishers Weekly
"Completely captivating.” — Lily King, award-winning and bestselling author of Writers & Lovers and Euphoria
“[Managing Expectations] reflects an actor’s close attention to strange, exasperating, heartbreaking behavior all around her, conveyed with wit and poise.” — USA Today
"We have all been charmed by Minnie Driver on the screen, but it’s a divine pleasure to learn the woman behind some of our most beloved characters is a writer of true precision, wit and style who has had a life more compelling than any movie. This book will be a companion to those struggling to make sense of their own story and a clarion call to mothers (of all kinds) grappling with their identity. I was comforted, galvanized, touched and - no surprise considering the author - charmed, too.
[Managing Expectations] reflects an actor’s close attention to strange, exasperating, heartbreaking behavior all around her, conveyed with wit and poise.
To reveal oneself in a manner that is at once poignant and fiercely intelligent while also being funny, warm, and genuine, is quite a feat. Minnie Driver shows us she is even more than what’s met the eye all these years. Simply put: I love this book!
"Completely captivating.
09/01/2022
Actress, singer, and songwriter Driver allows listeners in on her colorful perspective of her life. She narrates her own memoir, unleashing her full storytelling abilities. Her bohemian upbringing, her nontraditional family life, and especially her hair struggles are woven into this memoir, which pulls the listener right into her inner circle. People with wavy, curly, and uncontrollable hair will find affirmation in her beautiful description of her hair trying to escape from her head, each lock headed toward a different direction. Her parents, her sister, a primary grade teacher, and her agents all periodically take center stage to guide her through her early life and career. Her life isn't always easy and doesn't work out exactly as she thought; she has horrible, painful moments. Then there are the moments of existential joy. Her pitch never changes, but the pauses work miracles as she weaves the story. In an interview included in the audiobook, she relates how reading the story aloud lets the full weight of the experiences described land so much more powerfully. The listener will experience this as well. VERDICT Will certainly meet listeners' expectations!—Laura Trombley
English actor Minnie Driver’s captivating performance of her exceptional memoir will have you listening 24/7. In witty prose and with great storytelling skill, Driver offers beautifully crafted, often funny, always wise snapshots of her life. Ten-year-old Minnie revenge-shopping on a solo trip from Barbados to Florida to England. Minnie evading the Coast Guard while delivering supplies on a paddleboard to fire-ravaged Malibu. Minnie sitting with her dying mother. In between, there are sage truths about family and life. Driver’s chameleon skill with accents populates the essays with memorable English and American personalities. And her warm, inviting voice makes you wish to stay long in her company. The postscript conversation between Driver and Emma Forrest, her dear friend, is also a must-listen. A.C.S. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2022, Portland, Maine
English actor Minnie Driver’s captivating performance of her exceptional memoir will have you listening 24/7. In witty prose and with great storytelling skill, Driver offers beautifully crafted, often funny, always wise snapshots of her life. Ten-year-old Minnie revenge-shopping on a solo trip from Barbados to Florida to England. Minnie evading the Coast Guard while delivering supplies on a paddleboard to fire-ravaged Malibu. Minnie sitting with her dying mother. In between, there are sage truths about family and life. Driver’s chameleon skill with accents populates the essays with memorable English and American personalities. And her warm, inviting voice makes you wish to stay long in her company. The postscript conversation between Driver and Emma Forrest, her dear friend, is also a must-listen. A.C.S. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2022, Portland, Maine
★ 2022-02-15
The veteran actor delivers a memoir in a series of deftly crafted essays.
In her debut, Driver engagingly writes about family dramas, self-doubt, her unruly hair, unexpected motherhood, and the trajectory of her career. She grew up partly in England, with her mother, sister, brother, and the man her mother had recently married; and partly in Barbados, where her father lived. “None of it makes any sense,” she writes about her childhood. “There is no conversation about all this change. New people wander into our landscape and nobody but me thinks it’s weird.” Fed up with Driver’s rudeness toward his girlfriend, her father sent her back to England, which required an overnight stay, alone, at Miami’s Fontainebleau Hotel. Reflecting on her feelings then, she writes, “I always want grown-ups to like me, but find it difficult to behave in a way that seems to consistently please them.” After graduating from acting school, she was despondent about being the only one in her class without an agent. “The place I found myself stuck, at twenty,” she writes, “was being a new adult—still furnished with a child’s dream plan, but being asked to manifest it in a world of adult expectations.” After appearing in the lead role in the 1995 film Circle of Friends, for which she was paid $10,000, Driver expected other offers to roll in. But these were so slow in coming that she took off to Uruguay, where her sister was living with a boyfriend. For the author, beach life seemed a possible future—until she was summoned to New York for an audition. Walking anonymously through the streets of Manhattan, she suddenly felt liberated. “I can consciously decide who I am and not let circumstance or previous damage dictate it,” she gushed to her sister. “I can be the conscious architect of my own life!” Driver’s spirited prose informs all the essays; a standout is her graceful, moving chronicle, radiant with love, of her mother’s last days.
Sharp observations and quirky irreverence make for a delightful read.
