The New One: Painfully True Stories from a Reluctant Dad

Comedian Birbiglia (Sleepwalk with Me) reflects on fatherhood in this fast-paced memoir, which also features his wife Stein’s brief, intimate poems. In 2016, 40-year-old Birbiglia was happily married and happily childless: “I’ve lost a lot of great friends to kids,” he notes. Then, Stein (Little Astronaut) tells him that she wanted to abandon their vow of childlessness; desperate to change her mind, he cites his dangerous sleepwalking disorder, high cholesterol, and a teenage bout with cancer as proof he’s “a walking pre-existing condition,” but his wife won him over. Stein develops complications during her pregnancy (she writes of her unborn daughter, “my body may fail you,/ (sorry)”), while the expectant father engages in “sympathy eating.” (“I’m so sorry you’re having cramps—are you gonna finish those fries?” writes Birbiglia). In the months after daughter Oona’s birth, Birbiglia grows fearful that he may never connect with his “little monkey,” yet soon enough he wins small victories, like receiving “record-high approval ratings” from Oona for his rendition of “Ave Maria.” The turning point comes when he plays hide and seek with her in a furniture showroom, and she begins “laughing so hard that I start laughing in a new way... We’re laughing as one.” Birbiglia’s witty take on new parenthood will resonate especially with those who’ve been there. (June)