Jamieson, Wendell 1966–

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Jamieson, Wendell 1966–

PERSONAL:

Born 1966; married Helene Stapinsky (an author); children: Paulina, Dean. Education: Attended Boston University.

ADDRESSES:

Home—Brooklyn, NY.

CAREER:

Journalist. Began career as a copy boy for the New York Post, c. 1987; Jersey Journal, former staff member, Jersey City, NJ; New York Newsday, New York, NY, police reporter, until 1995; New York Daily News, New York, NY, former staff member; New York Times, New York, NY, from staff editor to city editor and then day editor for metro desk.

WRITINGS:

(Editor) Portraits of Grief, Times (New York, NY), 2001.

Father Knows Less, or, "Can I Cook My Sister?" One Dad's Quest to Answer His Son's Most Baffling Questions, Putnam (New York, NY), 2007.

SIDELIGHTS:

Journalist Wendell Jamieson has had a successful career as a newspaper reporter since the 1980s. After studying at Boston University, he began as a New York Post copy boy. Later, he also worked for the Jersey Journal and New York Daily News, as well as a police reporter for New York Newsday. He then moved to the New York Times, where he has held several editorial positions, becoming a city editor and metro desk day editor.

After the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on U.S. soil, Jamieson was assigned to edit a special section for the newspaper about the families of the victims. Of the approximately three thousand victims of the attacks, Jamieson and the reporters who worked with him interviewed over one thousand family members and friends, who then recall the lives of the people they lost. "What struck me is how everyone who died that day seemed to have lived their lives to the fullest up to that point," Jamieson told Bill Hemmer in a CNN interview. "It's an incredible crime and tragedy that their lives were cut short. But so many people got so much out of the time they did have. It's very comforting."

As a journalist, it is Jamieson's job to answer people's questions about the world. As a parent, though, what caught him off guard were the many questions his young son, Dean, asked him. Befuddled as to how to answer some of these puzzlers, Jamieson decided to write a book in which he would obtain and reprint answers from the experts. It was published as Father Knows Less, or, "Can I Cook My Sister?" One Dad's Quest to Answer His Son's Most Baffling Questions.

Among the many questions from Dean, organized by topic, in the book are "How far up can my balloon go before it pops?" "Why are Democrats donkeys and Republicans elephants?" "Why is the sky blue?" and "Why did the Beatles break up?" More challenging questions include "What does ‘sexy’ mean?" "Are killer whales mean?" and "Why is there war?" Jamieson then went to generals, biologists, philosophers, and, for the Beatles question, Yoko Ono, for answers. The book's title question came when Dean was particularly upset with his little sister and wanted to cook her. A philosopher responded to the question involving cannibalism, noting that while some species of animals indulge in the practice it is extremely disturbing for people to do so. Jamieson also integrates the Q&A part of the book with memoir materials, because his son's questions reminded the author of what an inquisitive child he himself was at that age.

Although a Library Journal critic warned that many of the answers to child-inspired questions are "far above the intellectual level of children," the reviewer appreciated the "brief, fun, and uniformly excellent answers." A Publishers Weekly writer described the book as "a compendium of hilariously insightful questions … [accompanied by] often insightfully hilarious answers." Liesl Schillinger, writing in the New York Times, also enjoyed the "warmhearted memoir" portions of the book, concluding that the book "will surprise, amuse and humble, reminding us how little we learn when we stop asking ‘Why?’"

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

BOOKS

Jamieson, Wendell, Father Knows Less, or, "Can I Cook My Sister?" One Dad's Quest to Answer His Son's Most Baffling Questions, Putnam (New York, NY), 2007.

PERIODICALS

Booklist, September 1, 2007, Jerry Eberle, review of Father Knows Less, or, "Can I Cook My Sister?," p. 25.

Library Journal, September, 2007, Douglas Lord, review of Father Knows Less, or, "Can I Cook My Sister?"

Newsweek International, November 5, 2001, Wendell Jamieson, "All the Lives Fit to Print," p. 8. New York Times, September 30, 2007, Liesl Schillinger, review of Father Knows Less, or, "Can I Cook My Sister?"

Publishers Weekly, June 25, 2007, review of Father Knows Less, or, "Can I Cook My Sister?," p. 45.

USA Today, September 5, 2007, Bob Minzesheimer, "Kids Ask the Darnedest Questions," p. D5.