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This was an interesting tale of a girl growing up and pushing against the boundaries of the life laid out for her. It spans the range of her childhood, starting with a girl who doesn't fit in and moving to a teenager experimenting with love and sex, and on to a twentysomething getting caught in the drug craze of the 1970s and the penalties that come with it. Throughout, you get the sense that although Mary Karr made some questionable decisions, she was a good person at heart. Autobiographies are supposed to give you a full, unvarnished look at the whole and scope of a person's life, and Cherry accomplished exactly that.
Spoiler
It was a powerfully relatable moment when she was sitting in jail and wanting to tell the police that she was the same girl that won the spelling bee in elementary school.
I read this book years ago, but just re-read it. I love the clever structure, the astute observations and self-examination, and the realistic -- heartfelt but not sappy -- depiction of teen sexuality. Toward the end, I felt like it sort of went off in a different direction, and that diminished it a little bit in my opinion. (If only my writing had "flaws" like Karr's .... )
I adore Mary Carr's writing style and her ability to process the traumas she experienced in a way that others can relate to. In particular, one of the messages that stuck with me was how the people she considered friends changed - actually altered their personalities - due to their extensive drug use.
The Liar's Club was brilliant, and Lit, Karr's third memoir was good, but this one was awful. Self-indulgent, with no sense of story arc. The worst sort of memoir in which the writer thinks (perhaps because of the success of the first memoir) that every single thing must be of interest to the reader. Not so.
I really enjoyed this memoir! She writes of her drug-ridden youth beautifully. I’m looking forward to reading The Liars’ Club next.
This is a good book. Well-written. Didn’t grab me as much as Liar’s Club. And reading it second felt redundant.
I LOVE spending time with Mary Karr, this is a three star book only graded on a curve with the Liar's Club & Lit.
Gritty, raw and candid. Not as impactful as The Liar's Club (which I recommend reading first) but it's a solid continuation of Mary's life story. Will certainly be reading Lit in the future. Masterful prose, as always.
Finally, a book that I can relate to. Mary Karr writes about boys and drugs in a way that actually captures what they feel like- even though I couldn't articulate those feelings at the time.
I'm only disappointed I didn't find this book earlier in my life.
I'm only disappointed I didn't find this book earlier in my life.
It can be difficult to review a memoir. What if you don't like the person's life story? I really disliked a few parts of this book that described acid trips - they made me feel a bit unhinged just reading them, but I suppose that's a sign of good writing. I do appreciate Ms. Karr's writing. It somehow makes me become more observant in my own life.