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W hen I mentioned to a few friends that I was reading Ian Brown’s new book, The Boy in the Moon, about his disabled son, I got pretty much the same response: “I can’t bring myself to read that book. I read the Globe series he wrote and cried. The book would be too upsetting for me."

Home Game: An Accidental Guide to Fatherhood

by Michael Lewis

W.W. Norton

Hardcover, $30.00

Michael Lewis, Slate columnist and author of the New New Thing, Moneyball and the recent memoir Home Game, is an indifferent and inattentive father, if this book is anything to go by, and it seems that he’s okay with that, perhaps at least in the sense that his performance as a parent provides material for his writing.

NurtureShock: New Thinking About Children

by Po Bronson and Ashley Merryman

Twelve Books

Hardcover $29.99

According to the new book NurtureShock, everything you know about parenting is wrong.

Manhood for Amateurs: The Pleasures and Regrets of a Husband, Father and Son

by Michael Chabon

Harper Collins Publishers Ltd.

Hardcover $32.99

“A father is a man who fails every day.”

At least that's what Michael Chabon says in “The Losers Club,” the opening piece in his new non-fiction collection Manhood for Amateurs. Ever since a humiliating attempt to start a comic book club in his teenage years, Chabon has suffered from an overwhelming feeling of inadequacy in his roles as a man, writer and father.

In his introduction to The Book of Dads, editor Ben George recounts the difficulty he had in finding books on fatherhood that had anything interesting or substantial to say. His wife had been reading Annie Lamott's Operating Instructions over the course of their baby's first year and felt an epiphany in its humour and honesty. The search for a similar experience, but for dads, was not fruitful.

A yelet Waldman became semi-famous for declaring in a New York Times column that she loved her husband more than her children (http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/27/fashion/27love.html). After receiving death threats, she went on Oprah to defend herself. I missed that episode (and every other Oprah episode since I returned to work last year), but heard a bit about the hullabaloo and was eager to read her new book, Bad Mother.

The Film Club: A True Story of a Father and Son

by David Gilmour

Thomas Allen Publishers

(paperback), $18.95

I see David Gilmour in our neighbourhood a lot. If we make eye contact, there’ll be a brief second of a “Do I know you?” look, probably from crossing paths for many years. But we’ve never met*, and until recently, I’d never read any of his books. Oh, sure, I knew him from TV, as the CBC’s film critic or his show, Gilmour on the Arts, but his books have always seemed meant for another kind of reader.

Into the Ravine is a novel for young adults and its protagonists are three 13-year-old boys, of whom one is the narrator. While reading it, I tried to keep these facts in mind and to consider whether I would want Oliver to read it at that age, but as an adult reader I was probably overly critical of the writing and the realism of the story in general.

E lisha Cooper’s got a problem. He’s a stay-at-home dad, and he’s doing his best to raise his daughter Zoë, which includes cleaning and feeding, regular walks in the park, and plenty of interaction time. Unfortunately, he also swears like a sailor, so he’s sure that his daughter’s first word will be “*&#@” or “@!&*” or even “^&$#*.”