It’s been a while since I read a memoir in book or Kindle form. When I saw the cover and blurb for Destroy This House by Amanda Uhle, I had to get my hands on it.
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Amanda Long grew up amidst the towering piles of goods collected by her mother and various money-making schemes orchestrated by her father. Over the span of her childhood, the Long family moved from state to state and house to house, never truly finding stability.

When one of her father’s business ventures finds success, the family is suddenly surrounded by luxury – only to have it all collapse around them. From riches to rags, the Longs live a complex life, and Amanda, a complex childhood. As she chronicles her unique upbringing defined by her mother’s hoarding disorder and her father’s dubious tendencies, she explores the challenges she encountered on her quest for independence.
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If you enjoy memoirs, this is a good one to pick up.

Destroy This House is similar to The Glass Castle in the way that the family is constantly on the move, and the children are at the receiving end of confounding parental behaviors and deceit.

I enjoyed reading this book, though I do believe it could’ve probably been shorter. The last 30% or so was riveting and fast-paced, but there were times in those early years where I think some additional editing would’ve helped the overall pace of the book.

Nonetheless, a fascinating account of a childhood unlike my own. I love reading memoirs that expand my worldview and give me a look into the lives of others.

Thank you to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for an advance copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

3.5* This was such an interesting memoir, and I believe a relatable story to those who grew up with loving parents that don't make the best choices, especially financially. There were a lot of complicating feelings the author laid out in this book that made me feel seen and heard. This is a story of how to love an imperfect family for sure.

Thank you to NetGalley and S&S/Summit Books for a copy. This is out now!

What a surprise hit for me. Just enjoy humor and crazy stories to keep your interest but a lot of heart and love and sadness. A great memoir that I’ll be recommending.

The Longs were masters of reinvention. Our lives were aspirational, or desperate, or occasionally genuinely deceitful. from Destroy This House by Amanda Uhle

I read an article on this memoir in the Detroit Free Press and knew I had to read it. Not only because of its Michigan and Detroit setting but because Uhle’s father became a pastor mid-life. I had to know more.

Uhle’s parents were dysfunctional. They were intelligent, likeable, hard working people. But they constantly made decisions that created hardships. Growing up, Uhle recognized that their house was not like other kid’s.

Her mother was a shopaholic hoarder. She was a sewer and purchased tons of fabric. She couldn’t throw out bottles with a last squeeze left or food that had spoiled. When the fridge was too full, frozen food was left on tables and in the car in the winter.

Her dad came up with a invention but his partner betrayed him. Without patent rights didn’t make a penny on it. He ignored bills and didn’t file income tax forms. He allowed their property and houses to fall into decay. He purchased things he didn’t need or use. He would borrow money from his daughter and not pay it back.

Uhle was overwhelmed with the stuff in the house, especially the disaster zone of spoiled food, some of which her mom tried to feed to her. She dreamed about clearing out the stuff, destroying the house, getting free of it all.

The Longs moved frequently. When one large house didn’t sell, they just left town, leaving their furnishings and possessions behind. Then, these were people whose wedding presents flew from the top of the car and they kept going.

After her dad became a Lutheran pastor called to a church in Downriver Detroit, he wouldn’t fix the parsonage because he didn’t have equity in the house. But the church insisted that he got free housing and should fix it up. (I heard that argument once from a Trustee!)

Uhle’s mother was oddly over communicative about her daughter’s sexual maturity, expecting her to get a boyfriend and gaining experience long before she was ready. She didn’t listen to her daughter but told her what she wanted or needed.

Uhle tried to contain the mess, cleaning the house and cooking safe food. When she left home for college she still couldn’t break free of her parent’s craziness. She discovered they never filed a FAFSA and at graduation she had student loans when her parents said they ‘paid’ for her college.

Her mom had become a nurse and became a hypochondriac. Her dad burned out and broke down from an abusive church. He was in and out of Hospice.

For years and years, I’d had a lingering worry: what would happen to my parents when all of their terrible choices came due? from Destroy This House by Amanda Uhle

Uhle had a supportive husband and a child, but could not break free from her parents’ messy life as age and illness came. She joined a support group for children of hoarders. She was left with the job of cleaning up the mess her parents left behind.

Writing this memoir dredged up more questions than answers. Her younger brother responded positively when he read the memoir.

Their surname Long was also a verb, she concludes. He parents strove for a better life, but were tripped up by their own poor decisions.

Uhle’s memoir is an addictive read. Readers from similar backgrounds will fell seen.

Thanks to the publisher for a free book through NetGalley.

This is the story of the author's parents' 40 or so years of marriage. There were good years and bad. They were successful and then just surviving. Quirky. Sorry to say that this book didn't pull me in.

Thank your to Simon & Schuster | S&S/Summit Books and NetGalley for an early copy of this memoir! This is one of those books that I feel everyone needs to read. What a world shattering story of a world undone by those who should protect us. WOW. Thank you for this piece of writing!

I love books about dysfunctional families. The Liars Club is one of my favorite non-fiction books. Maybe it's a look at other families, knowing that the American Dream is a fallacy.

Amanda Uhle has written the story of her family. A bulk of this book is focued on her parents, and I do wish there was a bit more focused on her, however, that fact didn't make it any less interesting.

This is about survivng despite the odds. It's about moving forward and moving on. It's about overcoming your trauma to be a talented writer and storyteller.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for the opportunity to read and review this book.

"Destroy This House" by Amanda Uhle may be my unexpected favorite read of 2025. An absolute rollercoaster of a memoir, Uhle does a masterful job of delving into her unconventional upbringing while also understanding the nuisances of mental illness. Even though I was mortified at some of the situations that the Uhle often found herself in because of her parents (I mean, the expired food?!?), I still found myself laughing out loud at the author's humor and way with words. Ultimately, this memoir was one of generational trauma and the exploration of childhood and the relationship with the nuclear family.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for my advanced copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Wow, I thought my family was dysfunctional. I really felt for Amanda growing up in such an unstable environment with parents who are constantly changing jobs/career paths, moving all the time, the financial abuse and all the gaslighting. I have a lot of respect for those who come out as better people in the end when they come from these kinds of backgrounds.

I found the prologue fascinating and wished the book mimicked it more. Instead, I felt like the prologue and the last 20% of the book was the only time where I got reflection from the author that gave me an insight into her. These were the portions of the book that really pulled me in and made me feel things. The rest of the book was just telling me about her parents. I wanted to know how these incidents impacted her.

While this book was written well, it felt underdeveloped. The author frequently started a provoking thought but left it at just a mention. And these provoking thoughts appeared throughout the manuscript at random points, which made it hard to connect all the threads as a reader. An example of two that confused/made me wish for more was 1) the “goriness” of the end and 2) “long” as a verb. Both of these could’ve been a powerful thread to weave through, but only appeared in a small capacity.

Written chronologically, the structure made sense, but a lot of the details just felt unnecessary. I’m not sure what the driving infractions added. Or why we needed so many descriptions of furniture. The flow could’ve been much better without all the superfluous details.

Overall, the writing of this one kept me reading, but I did wish for more connection: with the author and with the points made. Fans of sad-tinged memoirs, children examining their childhood as adults, and books that say hard things out loud will enjoy this one.

This was my favorite genre of book: memoirs by adult children of flawed parents. Uhle's parents weren't just flawed in a typical way; their hijinks were jaw-dropping.

The writing is flawless, and while there are some jumps in time, it's primarily linear. The narrative is engaging and interspersed with actual quotes and documented evidence of the parents' actions.

I appreciated the author's candidness about the exhaustion and judgment she faced in her parents' later years. It is difficult for those who haven't been manipulated and parentified to understand that sometimes it's not safe to have blind loyalty to those who raised you.

I read this devastating memoir in just over a day, staying up far too late to finish it. Uhle was born to write, born to be an investigative journalist, and born to tell this story of her family. Her dad was a larger-than-life inventor, salesperson, and later-in-life Lutheran pastor. Her mom an early engineer for IBM, fashionista, seamstress, nurse, and incurable hoarder. Uhle takes us inside their series of claustrophobic homes, filled by their mother no matter how large, and to the inevitable disaster awaiting them all at the end of their lives. Unforgettable.

Destroy This House Isaac really well written memoir.The story of her mother and father’s dysfunctional life from her mom extreme hoarding and both her parents mental health issues issues.The author had me shocked at time and hilarious at others.I was engaged from first to last page @netgalley @s&s

A chaotic tempestuous childhood. Uhle's memoirs of life her parents is surprisingly affectionate and funny. Her father serially reinvented himself even as her mother hoarded and she grew up in the middle trying to keep the balls in the air. Her parents clearly have mental health issues but the exact nature isn't explored in part because this is about how they reflected onto Uhle rather than a deep dive into their psychology. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. Children of dysfunctional parents will likely recognize bits of themselves in Uhle's reflections.

really effective, really fun memoir with some interesting vibes and interesting feelings. would definitely recommend this one. 5 stars. tysm for the arc.

It’s hard to judge a memoir. So I applaud the author for sharing her story. This one wasn’t my favorite, it felt like long but not deep enough.

Thank you for the advanced reader copy.

Destroy This House is a fascinating memoir by a daughter who deeply loved her troubled, enigmatic parents. The structure of this memoir is very effective, dividing the author's life and experiences with her parents into four parts, ranging throughout her life until her parents' deaths. The book is an effort to tell the story of the Stephen and Sandie Long's entire 40-year marriage and also includes chapters regarding the time before Amanda's birth, as well as insights from news articles, medical records, and correspondence. This all comes together very well, providing Amanda's perspective of her parents and her childhood, the effects the Longs' behavior had on her life, and a look at how much was hidden or misrepresented even to the person closest to them. The Longs were complicated people, with great strengths (charisma, intelligence, professional skill) and equally troubling downsides (hoarding, manipulation, disastrous financial ineptitude). You'll find yourself both feeling bad for and greatly admiring the author as she recounts her efforts to help parents, clean up their house(s), save them from financial ruin, break free from their cluttered toxic household, and maintain her own life and dreams. Highly recommend. 

Thank you to @SimonBooks and @netgalley for the electronic ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Amanda Uhle’s Destroy This House is a haunting, poetic debut that unpacks the weight of generational trauma, memory, and the myth of the American family. With razor-sharp prose and a structure as fragmented as the house at its center, Uhle crafts a narrative that is equal parts grief and reclamation.

Told through a series of lyrical vignettes, the novel follows a narrator returning to their childhood home—both physically and emotionally—to confront the ghosts of abuse, silence, and survival. The “house” becomes more than a setting; it’s a metaphor for inherited pain, systemic failures, and the false sanctity of domestic life. Uhle’s language is sparse but loaded, capable of conveying devastation in a single line.

What makes Destroy This House particularly gripping is its refusal to conform to conventional narrative structure. Instead, it moves like memory—fractured, nonlinear, echoing the disorientation of revisiting a place that once shaped and scarred you. Uhle doesn’t offer easy resolution, but rather insists on truth-telling as a form of resistance.

This is not a comfortable read, nor is it meant to be. It’s a reckoning. Uhle demands the reader sit with discomfort, to bear witness alongside her. But in that witnessing, there is a strange kind of healing—raw, real, and necessary.

Final Verdict:
Destroy This House is a powerful and unflinching exploration of personal and cultural collapse. It’s a must-read for fans of Carmen Maria Machado, Lidia Yuknavitch, or anyone drawn to literature that dares to tear down before it rebuilds.

Reading this book is like being unable to look away from an accident on the highway. It's simply un-putdown-able so you continue reading going from one horror to the next. Yet, the author is able to convey a love for her dysfunctional parents as well, so you are tugged both ways as you read. What child doesn't WANT to love their parent? And if you grow up in a home like this, at least while you are young, you're going to accept it as normal. But it certainly wasn't a normal family.

As a reader, I am left with some questions. Was there really no intervention from any agencies? How did they get away with just leaving huge amounts of stuff when they snuck out to a new location? And there are gaps. But all in all, it will keep the reader engaged, so there is that.

Thank you to NetGalley for an advance copy of this book. It's certainly an original!

My favorite kinds of memoir. The family dysfunction was shocking at times, the story was told with such care though. It almost read like fiction in parts. What a story.