Iwuoha tells the narrative with a distance and breeze that at first might catch the reader off guard, but it is clear the effect Iwuoha intended. By keeping the reader at arm’s length, the reader is able to feel what Valeria feels – almost as if life is experienced from behind a pane of glass – clear yet detached and devoid of some vital […]
Growing up too fast is a reality that many people must face, but for Judith Boggess, the author of Confessions of a Bar Brat: Growing Up in Rosendale, New York, adulthood was forced on her at a particularly young age. Falling asleep to the raucous sounds of a bar beneath you isn’t ideal for the maintenance of childhood innocence, and this memoir tells the visceral, and often disturbing truth of what it was like growing up in that strange place during a tumultuous time.
Boggess is an unflinchingly honest narrator of her own life, depicting the constant challenge of […]
In Hardbarned!: One Man’s Quest for Meaningful Work in the American South, an amusing and insightful memoir by Christopher J. Driver, readers are invited to commiserate with a hardworking American in a tough world, trying to pursue the happiness of writing over potential riches doing anything else.
Before this book was born, Driver spent years staring down some of the hardest questions of the last generation, namely: What am I supposed to do with this degree? What do I want to do with my life? Am I ever going to find a job that makes me happy? While these […]
In 2000, following a divorce and depression, Fiona Maria Simon heard an inner voice: “Sell your granola.” She decided to take the chance and created Fiona’s Natural Foods, which went on to great success, as movingly told in Gambling on Granola: Unexpected Gifts on the Path of Entrepreneurship.
Never having had any business training, and knowing only that friends loved her homemade grain mixes, Simon searched for expertise. She serendipitously met people who helped to transform her local sales of hand-packed products to nationally distribution of cereals and energy bars. Her innate integrity impelled her to oversee every aspect […]
Canadian author Shireen Jeejeebhoy recalls her years of seeking treatment, which is sometimes seemingly impossible to find, for a major concussion in Concussion Is Brain Injury: Treating the Neurons and Me.
For Jeejeebhoy, the immediate after-effects of a car accident – anxiety, pain, and fatigue – quickly multiplied and morphed in diverse, often frightening ways. A writer who was at work on an ambitious project, Jeejeebhoy could now barely read, remember, or organize. Her sight and hearing were affected, and she had outbursts of intense anger, while treatment options were limited or nonexistent. Her was perplexed by her altered […]
With an open heart and a sharp sense of humor, award-winning writer Joy Johnston chronicles both the reward and the heartache of caring for her parents in their last days in The Reluctant Caregiver.
Suffering through back to back hardship, Johnston’s father passed first from Alzheimer’s, and not long afterward, her mother developed colon cancer. Johnston lived with her mother for lengthy periods in the early stages of her cancer, coming back when death was imminent. Seeing these two strong people endure their final days was inspiring, harrowing and poignant, and Johnston eloquently expresses their strength of character, while […]
Homelessness is often the result of a long series of mishaps and misfortunes; M. D. Carter, author of The Little Green Wagon: A Book of Journeys, chose homelessness as a way of encountering the verities of life.
Struggling with addiction in his early twenties, alienated and alone, Carter thought of suicide as his only solution. In an intoxicated state he attempted to end his life by carbon monoxide poisoning; when that proved slow and unpleasant, he slashed his wrists and drove his car into a guardrail. He woke up, he recalls, wracked with pain, frustration and regret.
After problems […]
The author, identified only as Dr. Y, recalls the first time he passed out drunk – at age 12. He successfully finished medical school, with a failed marriage as a casualty of his secret problem. As a physician, he married again, enjoyed financial success, all while consuming alcohol daily and writing himself illegal opiate prescriptions.
Finally charged with a felony, he found himself in a years-long struggle with the DEA and his private demons of addiction. His recovery […]