{"product_id":"lit-a-memoir-isbn-9780060596989","title":"Lit: A Memoir","description":"\u003cp\u003eMary Karr’s bestselling, unforgettable sequel to her beloved memoirs \u003cem\u003eThe Liars’ Club\u003c\/em\u003e and \u003cem\u003eCherry\u003c\/em\u003e—and one of the most critically acclaimed books of the year—\u003cem\u003eLit\u003c\/em\u003e is about getting drunk and getting sober; becoming a mother by letting go of a mother; learning to write by learning to live. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eThe Boston Globe\u003c\/em\u003e calls \u003cem\u003eLit\u003c\/em\u003e a book that “reminds us not only how compelling personal stories can be, but how, in the hands of a master, they can transmute into the highest art.\" \u003cem\u003eThe New York Times Book Review\u003c\/em\u003e calls it “a master class on the art of the memoir” in its Top 10 Books of 2009 Citation. Michiko Kakutani calls it “a book that lassos you, hogties your emotions and won’t let you go” in her \u003cem\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/em\u003e review. And Susan Cheever states, simply, that \u003cem\u003eLit\u003c\/em\u003e is “the best book about being a woman in America I have read in years.\" \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn addition to the \u003cem\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eLit\u003c\/em\u003e was named a Best Book of 2009 by the \u003cem\u003eNew Yorker\u003c\/em\u003e (Reviewer Favorite), \u003cem\u003eEntertainment Weekly\u003c\/em\u003e (Top 10), \u003cem\u003eTime\u003c\/em\u003e (Top 10), the \u003cem\u003eWashington Post\u003c\/em\u003e, the \u003cem\u003eSan Francisco Chronicle\u003c\/em\u003e, the \u003cem\u003eChicago Tribune\u003c\/em\u003e, the \u003cem\u003eChristian Science Monitor, Slate\u003c\/em\u003e, the \u003cem\u003eSt. Louis Post Dispatch\u003c\/em\u003e, the \u003cem\u003eCleveland Plain Dealer\u003c\/em\u003e, and the \u003cem\u003eSeattle Times. \u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e | \u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eThe Liars' Club\u003c\/em\u003e brought to vivid, indelible life Mary Karr's hardscrabble Texas childhood. \u003cem\u003eCherry\u003c\/em\u003e, her account of her adolescence, \"continued to set the literary standard for making the personal universal\" (\u003cem\u003eEntertainment Weekly\u003c\/em\u003e). Now Lit follows the self-professed blackbelt sinner's descent into the inferno of alcoholism and madness—and to her astonishing resurrection. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eKarr's longing for a solid family seems secure when her marriage to a handsome, Shakespeare-quoting blueblood poet produces a son they adore. But she can't outrun her apocalyptic past. She drinks herself into the same numbness that nearly devoured her charismatic but troubled mother, reaching the brink of suicide. A hair-raising stint in \"The Mental Marriott,\" with an oddball tribe of gurus and saviors, awakens her to the possibility of joy and leads her to an unlikely faith. Not since Saint Augustine cried, \"Give me chastity, Lord—but not yet!\" has a conversion story rung with such dark hilarity. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eLit\u003c\/em\u003e is about getting drunk and getting sober; becoming a mother by letting go of a mother; learning to write by learning to live. Written with Karr's relentless honesty, unflinching self-scrutiny, and irreverent, lacerating humor, it is a truly electrifying story of how to grow up—as only Mary Karr can tell it. \u003c\/p\u003e | \u003cp\u003e“[Karr] seems to have been born with the inability to write a dishonest-or boring-sentence.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eLev Grossman, Time (Top 10 Citation)\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“A brutally honest, sparkling story.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eGlamour\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Affecting…. Karr’s lurch toward faith is narrated with her familiar irreverence and humor, but this tone does not preclude a more heartfelt expression of the value of faith.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eThe New Yorker\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“No one should be surprised to find a certain combination of gut-spilling emotional volatility along with the survivor’s keen ability to detach far enough to tell a rollicking story. But the book is more than a recovery memoir. Karr writes unflinchingly about marriage, class, guilt, and the struggle to make peace with her raw, melodramatic, yet wildly interesting past.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eNPR\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“A master class on the art of the memoir. Mordantly funny, free of both self pity and sentimentality, Karr describes her attempts to untether herself from troubled family in rural Texas, her development as a poet and writer, and her struggles to navigate marriage and young motherhood even as she descends into alcoholism.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eNew York Times Book Review, Top 10 Books Citation\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Mary Karr restores memoir form’s dignity with \u003cem\u003eLit\u003c\/em\u003e.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eMichiko Kakutani, New York Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Irresistible. . . . [Written] with trademark wit, precision, and unfailing courage.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eMichiko Kakutani, New York Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Searing. . . . A book that lassos you, hogties your emotions and won’t let you go. . . . Chronicles with searching intelligence, humor and grace the author’s slow, sometimes exhilarating, sometimes painful discovery of her vocation and her voice as a poet and writer.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eMichiko Kakutani, New York Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Scrappy, gut-wrenching. . . . Irresistible. . . . [Written] with trademark wit, precision, and unfailing courage.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003ePam Houston, O Magazine\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“There isn’t a single false note in\u003cem\u003e Lit\u003c\/em\u003e.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eCarmela Ciuraru, Christian Science Monitor\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“With this third book Karr has managed to raise the bar higher still on the genre of memoir.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eSteve Ross, Huffington Post\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“[Karr] continues to delight with her signature dark humor and pitch-perfect metaphors delivering large doses of wit and painful insights. . . . There are plenty of memoirs about being drunk, but this one has Karr’s voice-both sure-footed and breezy-behind it.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eBeth Greenfield, Time Out New York\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Mary Karr has never lacked for material. But she’s always delivered on the craft side, too, with her poet’s gift for show-and-tell.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eElizabeth Foy Larsen, Minneapolis Star Tribune\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Mary Karr restores memoir form’s dignity with \u003cem\u003eLit\u003c\/em\u003e.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eVanity Fair\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Karr could tell you what’s on her grocery list, and its humor would make you bust a gut, its unexpected insights would make you think and her pitch-perfect command of our American vernacular might even take your breath away…. [Karr] holds the position of grande dame memoirista.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eSamantha Dunn, Los Angeles Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“As irresistible as it is unflinchingly honest. . . . With grace, saltiness and profanity galore, Karr undeniably re-establishes herself as one of our finest memoirists and storytellers.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eMelanie Gideon, San Francisco Chronicle\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Dazzling. . . . Lit reminds us not only how compelling personal stories can be, but how, in the hands of a master, they can transmute into the highest art.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eRebecca Steinitz, Boston Globe\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“A redemptive, painfully funny story.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eBob Minzesheimer, USA Today\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Karr movingly depicts her halting journey into AA, making it clear her grit and spirit remain intact.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003ePeople\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Karr’s sharp and funny sensibility won me over to her previous two volumes, but what wins me over to \u003cem\u003eLit\u003c\/em\u003e is the way her acute self-awareness conquers any hint that hers is the only version of this story. . . . As with all stories that surprise us, the specificity of the account gives it its punch. . . . The language often captures, precisely, the tension between the intellectual and the emotional, the artistic and the spiritual. This is a story not just of alcoholism but of coming to terms with families past and present.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eValery Sayers, Washington Post\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“What distinguishes Karr’s book from most others . . . is her mordant humor and exceptional writing. Throughout, her descriptions are startling and poetic. . . . This is a truly harrowing story, but so poetically written that unlike many memoirs, the material seems riveting rather than repugnant. And not once does the author paint herself as the heroine of her own life. (There isn’t a single false note in \u003ci\u003eLit\u003c\/i\u003e.)  Her hard-won contentment is inspiring, and above all, miraculous.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eCarmela Ciuraru, Christian Science Monitor\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“\u003cem\u003eLit\u003c\/em\u003e matches its predecessors in candor and outstrips them in insight.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eCommonweal\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Karr writes with such intensity and poetry. . . . This struggle to reconcile her past and present, her family and her future, is the steel-wired ribbon that not only runs through this affecting book, but that also connects it to Ms. Karr’s two earlier memoirs—the bright, elastic thread on which she so deftly strings the colored beads of her tumultuous life.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eMichiko Kakutani, New York Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Karr could tell you what’s on her grocery list, and its humor would make you bust a gut, its unexpected insights would make you think and her pitch-perfect command of our American vernacular might even take your breath away. . . . The Guggenheim Fellow in poetry holds the position of grande dame memoirista.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eSamantha Dunn, Los Angeles Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“In a gravelly, ground-glass-under-your-heel voice that can take you from laughter to awe in a few sentences, Karr has written the best book about being a woman in America I have read in years.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eSusan Cheever, New York Times Book Review\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“[Karr] manages to report her self-imposed decline in a blunt and darkly humorous voice that is as irresistible as it is unflinchingly honest. . . .  \u003ci\u003eLit\u003c\/i\u003e is a testament to the healing power of love that beats at the heart of every good story.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eMelanie Gideon, San Francisco Chronicle\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“One of the best memoirists of her generation. . . . She is, as always, unsparing in her honesty and humanity. . . . [A] radiant, rueful, rip-roaring book. . . . [Karr writes] with a rare vividness, humor, and candor. . . . Warm enough to burn a hole in your heart. A.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eKen Tucker, Entertainment Weekly\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“[Karr] 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. . . . An absolute gem that secures Karr’s place as one of the best memoirists of her generation.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eKirkus Reviews, starred review\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Harper","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44889693618405,"sku":"NP9780060596989","price":25.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780060596989.jpg?v=1730231761","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/lit-a-memoir-isbn-9780060596989","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}