Let's Never Talk About This Again

Starred review from March 23, 2020
In this entertaining memoir, Alterman (Tears of a Class Clown), a writer and producer for the Mortified podcast, writes of her attempt to make sense of her father’s secret pornographic writing career. While exploring the bookshelves in the family den—known affectionately as the “Duck Room” (so named for its duck-themed decor)—12-year-old Alterman makes the startling discovery that her father, Ira, is the author of such books as Games You Can Play with Your Pussy (which, much to Alterman’s surprise, is not about cats) and Bridget’s Sexual Fantasies. She keeps her discovery to herself for 25 years, until Ira, at age 64, loses his job as a development and marketing executive in Boston and informs Alterman that he is reviving his writing career and needs her help with a book inspired by her wedding, tentatively titled The Naughty Bride. What follows is a funny, tender, and compassionate narrative in which Alterman—while living and working on the West Coast and starting her own family—helps her parents navigate this new phase of Ira’s life amid his declining mental capabilities due to Alzheimer’s. It is only after her father dies that Alterman comes to terms with his pornographic side gig (“I’ll always have unanswered questions about who he really was, and why he hid it from me, and whether I’m just being way dramatic about some campy books that aren’t a big deal to anyone but me”). Entertaining, moving, and at times uncomfortable, this will especially resonate with those caring for an aging parent.

May 1, 2020
A daughter discovers her puritanical father's dark secret hobby. Though her suburban Boston childhood was comfortable, Alterman was raised by two "straitlaced squares," most notably her quirky father, Ira, who was "allergic to difficult conversation." In a childhood "act of quiet mutiny," Alterman snooped through the volumes cloistered high up in the family den's bookshelves. She was shocked to discover a trove of pornographic books all authored by her father. Keeping this discovery secret, she spent her early teen years fumbling with awkward advances from boys before experiencing her first romance and sexual experience with Ace. After Ira was laid off in his 60s, he began penning a blog with his daughter's help, until the articles morphed into a revival of the provocative material of his past, along with accompanying graphic pictorials--including one "called 'The Sex Missionary, ' which showed a balding man, in monk's clothing, tossing handfuls of condoms into the sky." Ira also announced his work on a new book for the virginal honeymooner, "so virgins understand how to please their men. It'll be great for bachelorette parties." Alterman admits to being shocked and repulsed yet unsurprised at the material in a strangely sentimental way. However, she wasn't prepared for the devastation brought about by Ira's Alzheimer's diagnosis, which led to the author's having to navigate his well-being from afar as he continued to decline. Alterman leavens some heavily emotional subject matter with a razor-sharp sense of humor that will help readers smile through the more painful passages. A distinctive knack for witty descriptions will also resonate--e.g., a teacher who spoke with "a thick slab of Massachusetts accent," and Ira, the "cheddar sharp cheeseball who couldn't resist a pun." Readers providing care for an elderly parent will find this memoir particularly appealing. A vividly written, compassionate homage to a beloved and eccentric parent.

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