Little Failure: A Memoir

Shteyngart's (Absurdistan) latest title is a rambling memoir, as hairy and pungent as the giant fur coat young Igor/Gary wears and is ridiculed for as a seven-year-old Russian Jewish immigrant. Unlike the coat in question, Little Failure has considerable charms as it follows young Igor's transformation into Gary. We begin with his asthmatic early childhood in Leningrad, follow his family's 1979 journey to the United States, and ultimately conclude with his return visit to Leningrad many years later, accompanied by his still-challenging parents and in search of the answer to a small but pivotal mystery of his own psychology. Whatever shame young Shteyngart may have felt as a boy, as a writer, he doesn't shy away from the most cringe-worthy but hilariously character-revealing details. The portraits of his parents are a high point of the book—appropriately complex, confusing, unflattering, sympathetic and almost helplessly affectionate. Jonathan Todd Ross is a game reader, taking on Shteyngart's parents' accents, the Talking Heads, and children's lullabies with aplomb.