While I think this type of parenting, and this book especially, is wildly misunderstood, I thought it wasn't that great. I felt that the author hadn't actually had a proper plan in place before she started writing the book and it was just all over the place. There was no order to the stories at all, and some of the stories she told were just tedious and had no point to the story as a whole. I guess it's hard to critique a memoir but this book really could have done with some more work instead of releasing it with the hope that it would be popular because of its shock factor. I hated this book. It reads like a braggy mother's instruction guide on how to raise children who win awards but cannot make their own choices. Children who might get into an Ivy League schools but have a obscure sense of love and parental relationships. Regardless of the anecdotal evidence of Amy Chua's daughters' success or feelings toward their mother, there is a wealth of research that shows children with overscheduled lives have more trouble making and reaching goals than children who have had less structured lives. Do we really want salaries and awards to be the extrinsic motivators for our children? What kind of world would we live in if those were everyone's goals? What makes the book even worse is that you can tell throughout that Chua is moving towards some kind of redemption for her awful behavior, but she takes it all back in the end lays more hate on Western parenting. It's tragicomedy.
Do You like book Battle Hymn Of The Tiger Mother (2011)?
An excellent memoir on Amy Chua's 'Chinese' way of raising her children.
—NBrown0379
Very interesting read. Surprisingly humorous as well.
—shubham
Great look at the asian philosophy of child rearing
—cheekyboy987
This is exactly what I plan to do with my children.
—jess
