Small Fry
CBC Books | | Posted: August 15, 2018 6:20 PM | Last Updated: December 20, 2018
Lisa Brennan-Jobs
Born on a farm and named in a field by her parents — artist Chrisann Brennan and Steve Jobs — Lisa Brennan-Jobs's childhood unfolded in a rapidly changing Silicon Valley. When she was young, Lisa's father was a mythical figure who was rarely present in her life. As she grew older, her father took an interest in her, ushering her into a new world of mansions, vacations and private schools. His attention was thrilling, but he could also be cold, critical and unpredictable. When her relationship with her mother grew strained in high school, Lisa decided to move in with her father, hoping he'd become the parent she'd always wanted him to be.
Small Fry is Lisa Brennan-Jobs's poignant story of a childhood spent between two imperfect but extraordinary homes. Scrappy, wise and funny, young Lisa is an unforgettable guide through her parents' fascinating and disparate worlds. Part portrait of a complex family, part love letter to California in the 1970s and 1980s, Small Fry is an enthralling book by an insightful new literary voice. (From HarperCollins Canada)
From the book
By the time I was seven, my mother and I had moved thirteen times.
We rented spaces informally, staying in a friend's furnished bedroom here, a temporary sublet there. The last place had become unsuitable when someone had sold the refrigerator without warning. The next day, my mother called my father, asked for more money, and he increased the child support payments by two hundred dollars per month. We moved again, to an apartment on the ground floor of a small building at the back of a house of Channing Avenue in Palo Alto — the first place my mother rented with her own name on the lease. Our new place was just for us.
The house in front of our apartment was a dark brown Craftsman with dust-covered ivy where a lawn might have been, and two bent-over scrub oaks that almost touched the ground. Cobwebs stretched between the trees and the ivy, collecting pollen that lit up bright white in the sunshine. From the street you couldn't tell there was an apartment complex behind the house.
From Small Fry by Lisa Brennan- Jobs ©2018. Published by HarperCollins.