New Hampshire teacher and writer Chris Bujold explores memory, grief, fatherhood, and the films that shaped him.
In “Robot Dreams and Suburban Nightmares: A Memoir of Movies, Monsters, and a Mom of Steel,” Chris Bujold revisits the movies attached to the most vivid moments of his life.
For Bujold, “E.T.” is not simply a beloved family classic — it is humorous childhood trauma. “Star Wars” carries the memory of a complicated friendship. “RoboCop” becomes a route toward understanding his father. “Man of Steel” is forever connected to his mother.
Structured across childhood, adolescence, and adulthood, the book blends comic storytelling, cultural memory, family memoir, and grief writing. Its recognizable films open the door, but the people, relationships, and emotional histories attached to them give the book its depth.
Bujold teaches English, film, and theater at a public high school in New Hampshire. An occasional community theater actor and improv performer, he brings a storyteller’s timing and a teacher’s reflective intelligence to a book designed for anyone who remembers not only the movies they watched, but the lives they were living when they watched them.
“Robot Dreams and Suburban Nightmares” will be published by Library Tales Publishing in 2026.