Lit

November 2, 2009
Karr returns with her third account (after "The Liar's Club" and "Cherry") of her dark and drunken years as a newlywed and new mother, written to help her son get the whole tale of their early years together. Before she wrote memoirs, Karr was driven with a vagabond spirit toward poetry, whose origins she traces to the rural colloquialisms of her Texas roots. That poetic sensibility infuses every sentence of her story with an alliterative and symbolic energy, conjuring echoes of poet Gerard Manley Hopkins, and occasionally, Sylvia Plath. She even marries a fellow poet, a moneyed and controlling man named Warren. Unlike Plath, however, Karr's impulse toward self-destruction originates more from the example set by her larger-than-life, emotionally stunted parents, who were often her drinking partners. Her slow trudge toward writing success and her marriage to yet another man who comes from wealth set off her drinking in earnest. Soon she's drinking daily at all hours, hiding it in shame. Years later she obtains sobriety but not mental health, and checks into a hospital after a halfhearted suicide attempt. What heals her most deeply, however, is when she opens herself to prayer. Fortunately, Karr's wry wit and deft prose do not render her slow conversion to Catholicism in a sentimental or proselytizing manner. "(Nov.)" .

Mary Karr bares her soul in this sharp, unflinching look back at her troubled life. In prickly, self-deprecating prose teetering on the edge of poetry, Karr (THE LIAR'S CLUB, CHERRY) traces her plunge into alcoholism, depression, the inevitable disintegration that confined her to a mental hospital, and her hard-won recovery. Karr narrates with just the right smart-alecky insouciance, smug at times, wildly out of control at others. Her slight Texas twang, tinged with dark humor and honest appraisal, turns melodramatic moments matter-of-fact. When the drunk Karr rationalizes her drinking, her intelligent reading makes her self-justifications reasonable. She gives substance to her crazy alcoholic mother, her good-old-boy dad, and her upper-crust Wasp husband. Karr's truthful performance and riveting story will keep listeners glued to their headphones. S.J.H. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award (c) AudioFile 2010, Portland, Maine

Starred review from October 1, 2009
Currently an award-winning, best-selling memoirist who described herself as an "on-my-knees [Catholic] spouter of praise" in a 2007 "New York Times" blog interview, Karr ("The Liars' Club; Cherry") narrowly escaped a troubled upbringing and early adulthood that included alcoholic, psychotic parents, being raped as a child, and her own descent into alcoholism. She describes hitting rock bottoman event that marked her transformation into the mother she was trying to escapeand her subsequent conversion to Catholicism in addition to the maturation of her writing style. The writing here sometimes seems affected, but her tale is riveting, her style clear-eyed and frank. That Karr survived the emotional and physical journey she regales her readers with to become the evenhanded, self-disciplined writer she is today is arguably nothing short of a miracle, and readers of her previous two books won't be disappointed. VERDICT This latest installment of Karr's autobiographical saga is essential for fans of lurid, meaty memoirs. [See Prepub Alert, "LJ" 7/09.]Megan Hodge, Randolph-Macon Coll. Lib., Ashland, VA

Copyright 2009 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from August 1, 2009
Acclaimed poet and bestselling memoirist Karr (English Literature/Syracuse Univ.; Sinners Welcome: Poems, 2006, etc.) deftly covers a vast stretch of her life—age 17 to her present 50.

The author picks up where her 2000 memoir Cherry left off—escaping her toxic childhood in small-town Texas for the California coast. Quickly bored, and realizing it was a mistake to turn her back on higher education, Karr secured loans and sought the book-lined security of the college campus. Most of the scenes that unfold from here, unlike those from her eccentric childhood, are more familiar: the college student desperate to manifest her intellect; the poor country girl trying to prove to her rich WASP dinner hosts that she's worthy of their son; a sleep-deprived new mom with a pot roast to cook; the AA newcomer who thinks she doesn't really have a problem; the sinful skeptic arriving at faith. The difference, though, is the way in which Karr renders these stories. She still writes with a singular combination of poetic grace and Texan verve, which allows her to present the experiences as fresh, but she also brings a potent, self-condemning honesty and a palpable sense of responsibility and regret to the narrative. These elements were necessarily absent from her previous memoirs, in which there were plenty of adults to blame; she is writing from a significantly different place now. Her confessional of outrunning her past only to encounter the same monsters, before being saved by prayer and love for her son, is richer for it. Karr also provides fascinating anecdotes from her experiences as a writer, especially her time at Harvard and the emotional publication of her universally praised debut memoir, The Liars' Club (1995).

Will ring as true in American-lit classrooms as in church support groups—an absolute gem that secures Karr's place as one of the best memoirists of her generation.

(COPYRIGHT (2009) KIRKUS REVIEWS/NIELSEN BUSINESS MEDIA, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.)