Goat: A Memoir Paperback – 8 Mar. 2005

Good quality, pretty fast delivery.

The book is excellent and heartbreaking at the same time. Imagine that, for no real fault of your own, you were the victim of an extremely violent crime. How do you really rebuild yourself? How do you reinvent yourself? How do you deal with people questioning your judgement and more importantly blaming *you* for the crime committed against you?Brad Land is 19 years old and wants to go to college and continue living as much of a normal life as he possibly can. One thing he really desires is “fitting in” or more importantly, being accepted by others. Another thing he deeply desires is to be loved by those around him.However, what happens to Brad shows how many people around him had failed him. His family does not offer as much of a support system. His brother and those around him treat him as though he is too difficult to bear. And the very fraternity that was supposed to offer him acceptance offers him something very similar to the two thugs had brutalized him.The book showcases his journey of self-acceptance, and forgiveness of those around him. It reads like “Catcher in the Rye”. It’s not for everyone.I think the book is sad and shows a lot about lack of humanity and how certain people are able to fall through the cracks. I feel that if one person had made the effort to really be Brad’s friend this story would have been completely different. That one person could have made the difference in his life and the absence of that is what makes this book so incredibly sad. The takeaway I got from this is showing more kindness to those who may initially seem "different" or "weird" because you never really know where that person has been.I've seen the movie as well. The movie is an excellent adaptation but it doesn't hold a candle to this book.

Shocked and in slight disagreement would be my take aways from this book. Brad Land writes in an attention grabbing free flowing style with no quotes around when someone speaks and frequent paragraph breaks make for a very quick read. I ordered this book after hearing about and seeing the trailer for the soon to be released movie under the same title. What shocked me was how starkly different the movie trailer and the book are. The movie seems to be out to ruin the reputation of fraternities and revolves solely around the hazing that transpires in fraternities and even tries to generalize that this story is true of some 500,000 young men who go through pledging every year as it says in the trailer. While in the book there is detailed accounts of hazing that Land endured while pledging Kappa Sigma at Clemson, the book is not about the hazing or the fraternity really, it's about the inner struggle that Brad Land and his brother Brett endure following a traumatic event that occurs. I actually thought I was reading the wrong book when I was nearly 40 pages into the book because it begins and never mentions hazing, fraternities, or Clemson at all until Brad's younger brother Brett decides to go to Clemson some 60 pages into the already short book. I am interested to see the movie once it is released because I myself am in a fraternity and I want to see what I believe will be a disgraceful movie that takes some information from Land's book about hazing, and ramps up the severity of it times 100 in the movie.My final thoughts are this was a very interesting and attention grabbing read that only took me about 3 days to finish. It's deep and full of emotional struggle, making it a good read for any English class. Good book but the movie takes the name and the "true story" and puts the Hollywood effect on it. My advice, read the book, then watch the movie once it's released in order to truly understand Goat.

It seems that this book has gained strong opinions in one direction or the other. After reading multiple magazine articles on the book, my interest peaked. Once I started the book, I had trouble putting it down. It made me curious as to why there are bad reviews. Could it be those with an interest in the foolishness of fraternities?Brad Land captures the college years of Generation X perfectly. The memior of his life comes off as tragic at many points. Land is kidnapped and beated in his first years of college. Despite being beaten and having his car stolen, he sees little sympathy. After a transfer of colleges with his brother, Land joins his brother's fraternity only to be subject to more beatings and humiliation. While this happens, his relationship with his brother deteriorates. Eventually, he quits the fraternity which sees one of Land's fellow pledges die after his rejection by the fraernity.Does the book seem a little depressing at times? Yes. The reason it grabs the reader's attention is its sense of authenticity. At times, Goat makes me think of Holden's "Catcher in the Rye" joining a fraternity. The similarities between the characters are eerie.The other major question raised in this book is about the nature of fraternities. Much like Land, I question why somebody would subject him/herself to such humiliation to join a "brotherhood". Realistically, what good comes from the fraternity experience? It does prove who among the college students are merely sheep following a crowd.Land's style is honest and fast paced. He does not spend excessive time describing unnecessary stimuli to meet a page quota. Land is a gifted storyteller and I would look forward to reading any future work.

I discovered that this was written by an author from the town I presently live in and was curious. Its very informative and pretty scary that these events really happened, you are def rooting for the author to make it big one day!

It starts off with a compelling and unique voice, written in spartan prose with considerable style. Brad Land’s youth is scarred by an act of random violence but most of his memoir focuses on his experiences rushing a fraternity at Clemson, a succession of grim, violent, and humiliating trials which he undergoes in an attempt to fit in, afraid that if he fails he will amount to nothing and have nothing. The book deals thoughtfully with some interesting issues but the characters and incidents don’t have enough detail and depth to draw you in. The ending is pretty sad but I just wish there was more humour and variety to balance some of the dreary and disgusting content. This is a book about masculinity and alienation on a modern college campus with some good insights into the many social pressures affecting young men on their path to adulthood.