Book Review: Dead End Gene Pool

Confession, I was almost a history major. Seriously. I was accepted into school as a history/education major. Before I even went to orientation, I switched to political science and the rest is…quite literally…history.

I took a class my senior year called American Elites. A class on wealthy families throughout history that have made a huge impact – the Vanderbilts, the Astors, the Kennedys and the Roosevelts among others.

It was incredibly fascinating to me, since I have a major interest in wealthy (yet dysfunctional) American families.

So when TLC asked if I’d review a copy of Dead End Gene Pool by Wendy Burden as a part of her online book tour, I said, sure, why not? (BTW, You can check out the rest of the book tour here!)

The book is full of anecdotes – stories of her grandparents, her siblings and her dysfunctional and often MIA mother who is searching for the perfect tan after her father’s unfortunate suicide. I found many of the stories to be amusing, and some to be incredibly heartbreaking – she herself has said that in her book she wanted to show the “humorous and the tragic side” of being wealthy…”but mostly the humorous.” Which she does quite well. Don’t get me wrong, the book was a great read. But I found myself wondering why she was going into great detail about her grandfather’s summer boat, and what the Chef had to do with anything. The cast of characters was interesting, and all were as complex as you would think – especially the overly flatulent grandmother, the chauvinistic grandfather and the uncle who has an excessive love of Hitler. Still though, as lovable and endearing as most of the characters were (and I say characters as if they’re fictional even though they totally weren’t) I still found the book to be a little trying at times.

Over all? Great book. The stories were amusing enough to keep me interested, and the compassionate side – especially with Wendy’s relationship with her mother, kept me reading. If you love American History, or just have a knack for elite American families throughout history, I’d pick this book up, it’s a quick read for the most part – the stories keep it flowing despite the sometimes lack of sense of time throughout the book.

You can check out the book over at amazon here, and while you’re at it check out the video on the amazon page where Wendy speaks about the book and her family, and this NY Times interview with her.

{FTC, I was not paid for my review, however I was sent a free copy of the book which is valued at $10.}

Tagged as: books, reviews