Father-ish

Book excerpt: Father·ish: adjective. When a man is trying his best. Clint Edwards equates fatherhood to the time he did an important live TV interview from home: To the viewers, he looked put-together in a nice button-up shirt . . . but below the camera he wasn’t wearing any pants. And it may have looked like he was in a nice office, but he was in fact hidden in his bedroom closet because his whole house was too messy to show. This highly relatable collection gets to the heart of parenting: all those unexpected fails, awkward conversations, and well-intentioned little white lies. Clint chronicles all these things and more with stories like “The Time My Son Realized I Was Santa,” “I’ve Never Been to Hell, but I Have Been to a Little Girl’s Birthday Party,” and “How to Get the Sex Talk Very, Very Wrong.” And with each story you’ll see over and over again that there really aren’t any rules when it comes to parenting, and all you can do is try your best. Whether you’re a first-time parent unaware of what you’ve gotten yourself into yet, or a father of five, clinging to your last ounce of sanity, you’ll find relief in knowing that at end of the day, we’re all not wearing any pants.