Raising Raffi

The First Five Years

By: Keith Gessen

Narrated by: Keith Gessen

“A wise, mild and enviably lucid book about a chaotic scene.”—Dwight Garner, The New York Times

“Memoirs of fatherhood are rarely so honest or so blunt.”—Daniel Engber, The Atlantic

“An instant classic.”—M. C. Mah, Romper

NAMED A MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK OF 2022 BY LIT HUB & THE MILLIONS

An unsparing, loving account of fatherhood and the surprising, magical, and maddening first five years of a son’s life

“I was not prepared to be a father—this much I knew.”

Keith Gessen was nearing forty and hadn’t given much thought to the idea of being a father. He assumed he would have kids, but couldn’t imagine what it would be like to be a parent, or what kind of parent he would be. Then, one Tuesday night in early June, the distant idea of fatherhood came careening into view: Raffi was born, a child as real and complex and demanding of his parents’ energy as he was singularly magical.

Fatherhood is another country: a place where the old concerns are swept away, where the ordering of time is reconstituted, where days unfold according to a child’s needs. Whatever rulebooks once existed for this sort of thing seem irrelevant or outdated. Overnight, Gessen’s perception of his neighborhood changes: suddenly there are flocks of other parents and babies, playgrounds, and schools that span entire blocks. Raffi is enchanting, as well as terrifying, and like all parents, Gessen wants to do what is best for his child. But he has no idea what that is.

Written over the first five years of Raffi’s life, Raising Raffi examines the profound, overwhelming, often maddening experience of being a dad. Gessen traces how the practical decisions one must make each day intersect with some of the weightiest concerns of our age: What does it mean to choose a school in a segregated city? How do you instill in your child a sense of his heritage without passing on that history’s darker sides? Is parental anger normal, possibly useful, or is it inevitably authoritarian and destructive? How do you get your kid to play sports? And what do you do, in a pandemic, when the whole world seems to fall apart? By turns hilarious and poignant, Raising Raffi is a story of what it means to invent the world anew.

©2022 Keith Gessen (P)2022 Penguin Audio

Lovely!

Gem for any parent of a small kid. Relatable, honest, and kind. Great gift for a Father’s Day :)

A Good Dad

Keith Gessen comes across as a good Dad in “Raising Raffi.” He describes with deadpan humor his frustrations with his son Raffi’s anger and misbehavior. Overall, both father and son are affable. The book is filled with insights into raising kids today, with thoughtful chapters on home birth, bilingual kids, picture books, school choice, sports and the pandemic. Little Raffi isn't really the terror his father sometimes claims. He's just a New York kid trying to understand his world. I picked this book because I liked “A Terrible Country,” Gessen’s novel about his year caring for his grandmother in Moscow. This new book shows how autobiographical that novel was. Gessen is an amiable narrator.

Great for non parents too

Im not a parent but it was interesting to hear about raising a family in Brooklyn.

On Being a Dad

If you’re a thinking-person dad or a fan of Keith Gessen, there’s so much to love here.

Painful Story of Ambivalent Parenting

I love books narrated by the author and Gessen did not disappoint. He has a great voice and inflections which naturally express exactly what he felt when he wrote his essays. There’s something about hearing a story in the writer’s own voice. I hate performance-reading. It’s grating.
Gessen’s son presented obviously with some kind of a behavioral disorder from a young age. I kept thinking, “ get that child to a Child Study team!” Every caring parent, which Gessen is, can relate to searching for effective parenting strategies that don’t jeopardize the precious connection with their beloved child. Gessen describes many resources he used. As a reader though, it was painful to witness Gessen and his wife’s ambivalence about setting and holding boundaries. I couldn’t help cringing at their apologizing, giving in, and refusal to accept their power as parents. A power to do good. How secure could their scratching, punching, throwing, demanding child feel with all the guilt his parents felt about setting basic boundaries?
I kept thinking, “ your kid won’t enrage you so much if you set clear limits and enforce them.”
Perhaps it’s Gessen and his wife’s generation that is terrified of victimizing any one, afraid to exercise authority, or acknowledge that though their children are precious that doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be pointedly taught that everyone deserves basic consideration, most especially the people who do everything for you.
Even if dear Raffi had a diagnosis, he would need decisive, unapologetic parenting.

I didn’t appreciate the politics woven through Gessen’s story telling but he is entitled to his views of course.
I couldnt help but connect though, his ridiculous and needless white guilt with his parenting struggles. I’m still cringing.

Loved it

I can relate to so many different aspects of this book. Recommend it to every parent.