I'm a Stranger Here Myself: Notes on Returning to America After Twenty Years Away

If you've lived outside the US, come from another country or ever wondered what people from other places think of Americans and the US on our home turf then this is a book you have to read. If this was written by a foreigner I might have taken some offense to parts of it. Bryson is an American and these are his humorous takes on what he saw when he re-entered his own country to live here again after time spent in Europe. A fun read (and if you see yourself occasionally, laugh it off.)

I thought this was one of Bryson's best......short weekly column type stories on one subject. They were humorous, to the point, and folksy. He does (as he says himself) complain a bit too much, but if there's only one side to the story, it sounds like marketing material instead of a commentary. Enjoyed this one.

This is the 2nd book I have read by Bill Bryson. I enjoyed it! I admire someone who can take normal life in America and write with such humor. I found myself giggling every few paragraphs. Such talent this writer has.
Basically this book is filled with essays that are organized by chapters. He writes about all kinds of things about America, after moving to New Hampshire after living in Britain for 20 years. He writes about baseball, shopping, lawyers, over-the-counter medicine, drive-inn movies, computers, waste, airplanes and taxes among countless other things that sets America apart from other countries. The thing I love about Bryson's writing is, I learn something as I laugh thru the pages. His outlook on things is sometimes like reading my mind and putting it on paper. I highly recommend these books and look forward to reading others by this author.

Not his best work. He is getting a bit too left leaning but still funny at times.

In 1995, Bill Bryson returned to live in the United States after living in England for 20 years. A British newspaper asked him to write a weekly column about America and I'm a Stranger Here Myself: Notes on Returning to America After Twenty Years Away is a compilation of those columns. His observations of America and family life are laugh out loud funny. I read many of them to my husband. He wrote these lines about his oldest child going off to college and they hit close to home for us:

"Once they leave for college they never really come back," a neighbor who has lost two of her own in this way told us wistfully the other day.

"This isn't what I wanted to hear. I wanted to hear that they come back a lot, only this time they hang up their clothes, admire you for your intelligence and wit, and no longer have a hankering to sink diamond studs into various odd holes in their heads. But the neighbor was right. He is gone. There is an emptiness in the house that proves it."

The columns are short and each one is an individual read making this book easy to read when you have a lot going on.