First, it's important to know I'm a fan. I've always loved the poetry of her songs as well as the music. I loved this book, because one of my favorite musicians also had problems and made the best of them. ( )

It's very easy to see (or, more appropriately, hear) why Janis Ian won an Audie and a Grammy for this audiobook. It's fantastically produced. I loved the snippets of her songs that she starts each chapter off with and sometimes includes within a chapter too.

Her life was fascinating and I loved listening to it. Much of the book, particularly the first half, read like a who's who of the music scene, with Janis dropping names like Bruce Springsteen, Ella Fitzgerald, Janis Joplin, and Pete Seeger like they were old friends -- and it took a bit for me to realize, they actually were her friends. It was also fascinating to hear how the music industry changed over the decades.

But the book was far more than just a story of the music industry and Janis Ian's rise to fame. It was also about her path of self-discovery and self-acceptance. The hardest parts of the book to listen to were of her emotional and physical abuse at the hands of her ex-husband, and then later as she was taken advantage of by her therapist. I appreciated how frank, open, and honest she was on abuse and the mental and emotional toll that abuse does to the victim and the long path of recovery after.

The section of the book about her continued troubles with the IRS was riveting. I found myself walking around with my earbuds firmly in, ignoring everybody until it I knew she was okay, only to then get sucked into her battle with CFS. May you live in interesting times, indeed.

Before this book, I already liked Janis's music. After, I found I also liked her. She's lived a full, rich, and hard life, but I'm glad that she seems to have found herself in a good place in the end. I look forward to whatever she does next. ( )

I've never been a rabid fan of Janis Ian, though I'm not unfamiliar with her music.I bought her first album back in 1966 and liked it well enough, but didn't buy another Ian record until "At Seventeen" hit the charts some years later. After that I lost track of her. Her memoir, SOCIETY'S CHILD (2008), is a rather sad story, much of it seeming joyless even. Her early success as a teen pop singer-songwriter certainly didn't bring instant happiness. In fact that first song, "Society's Child, " sometimes brought scorn and hate, dealing as it did with the taboo topic of interracial dating and love. But it did make her famous before she was even sixteen. Too much too soon maybe. But she did meet folks like Pete Seeger, Baez, Dylan, Tom Paxton and more. Her family life went south, however, when her parents divorced and she was left pretty much on her own. It didn't help that she was conflicted about her sexual identity. After a gay relationship, she was in an abusive marriage that left her fearful, broke and unhappy. And there was clinical depression and other serious health problems, including Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, which plagued her intermittently for years. A couple failed relationships exacerbated her depression. Her music career had definite ups and downs, and a crooked accountant landed her in IRS trouble which took years to straighten out, and reduced her to abject penury. You see? Joyless stuff. And I almost gave up on it because of the unremitting sadness of her story. But there is a lot of interesting trivia about the music industry here that kept me reading. And she finally did meet a woman who loved her, and, as far as I know, they're still together, after nearly thirty years. As a writer, I find Ian only okay. (I cringed every time she misused lay, when she meant lie.) She only finished tenth grade, but claims to be an avid reader. A decent editor should have fixed that.

I was especially moved by her description of the final days of her mother, who suffered from MS. It brought back my own mother's last days. And her marriage to her longtime partner in Toronto was equally evocative, when she was surprised at how emotional and teary she became over this ceremony, considering they'd been together for nearly twenty years by then. I get it though. I felt the same way, renewing vows with my wife of fifty years. Got very choked up in fact.

SOCIETY'S CHILD was actually a pretty decent read. I hope Janis and Pat are still together, still in love, happy. Will recommend it highly to folk music fans, and even more enthusiastically to Janis Ian fans.

- Tim Bazzett, author of the memoir, BOOKLOVER ( )

I really wanted to like this book, but I come away disappointed. It's not that Janis Ian hasn't had an interesting life. Monster hit song at 15, nervous breakdown before she was 20, abusive relationships, etc. The problem with the book wasn't the content, but the tone. It came across as rather passive-aggressive throughout.
I'm glad I read it if for no other reason than to correct many misconceptions I had about her. I am doubly glad I decided to get it in audiobook because not only does Ms. Ian narrate it, she sings small snippets of her songs at the beginning of each chapter.
If you are a Janis Ian fan, this book is worth the read, but if you aren't, I would probably pass. ( )

Society’s Child
My Autobiography
Janis Ian

MY RATING ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️▫️
PUBLISHER Audible
PUBLISHED June 7, 2012
NARRATOR Janis Ian

A poignant book, written from the heart of a creatively brilliant woman with amazing perseverance.

SUMMARY
Janis Ian wrote her first song at twelve and was launched into the spotlight in 1966, at 15 when her song Society’s Child became a hit. This was only the beginning of a long and illustrious career for the young genius. Ian chronicles her 40 years in the music business and how she did drugs with Jimi Hendrix, and went shopping for Grammy clothes with Janice Joplin all the while never ceasing to create resonating music.

In 1975, Ian‘s song At Seventeen earned two Grammy awards and five nominations. Her next two albums brought her worldwide platinum hits. But after seven albums in seven years, she walked away from the music business. During this period, she struggled through a difficult marriage and a sudden illness that very nearly cost her life. The break from music lasted for close to a decade until in 1993, Janice returned with the release of the Grammy nominated Breaking Silence. In SOCIETY’S CHILD, JANIS IAN provides a deeply honest account of the successes and failures and hopes and dreams of her life.

REVIEW
JANIS IAN is revealed as an amazing woman with tremendous inner strength, who was not afraid to show us her weaknesses in this emotionally powerful book. All her creative and lyrical storyteller skills evident in her music, are apparent in SOCIETY’S CHILD. IAN reveals an uncanny amount of turmoil; molestation, abuse, theft, illness, and the IRS. It is inspiring that after all the bad, that she was willing and able to get back on her feet, and find joy in her life again. Not only did she persevere, but that she chose to honestly share her life story with us, is a gift. It’s an expertly delivered self-portrait of an amazing artist.

The audiobook includes IAN singing a portion of a song in the introduction to each chapter, and detailing the song’s inspiration. Music and biography lovers will delight in Society’s Child. The audiobook won three awards: Audi Award, Narration by Author, 2013; Grammy Award Winner, Best Spoken Word Album, 2013; and Booklist Top 10 Biography Audiobooks. ( )