{"product_id":"the-acid-queen-isbn-9780593490051","title":"The Acid Queen","description":"\u003cb\u003e“Shines a light on one of the twentieth century’s most amazing untold life stories. ... An essential read—and an unforgettable trip.” —Robert Kolker, author of \u003ci\u003eHidden Valley Road\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e“Cahalan details a piece of lost but fascinating history, the story of a woman who embodied an era of freedom, experimentation, and psychedelic adventure. Meticulously reported and beautifully crafted.” —Susan Orlean\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe untold story of the woman who played a critical role in bringing psychedelics into the mainstream—until her audacious exploits forced her into the shadows—from the #1 \u003ci\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/i\u003e bestselling author of \u003ci\u003eBrain on Fire\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eRosemary Woodruff Leary has been known only as the wife of Timothy Leary, the Harvard professor-turned-psychedelic high priest, whose jailbreak captivated the counterculture and whose life on the run with Rosemary inflamed the government. But Rosemary was more than a mere accessory. She was a beatnik, a psychonaut, and a true believer who tested the limits of her mind and the expectations for women of her time.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eLong overlooked by those who have venerated her husband, Rosemary spent her life on the forefront of the counterculture, working with Leary on his books and speeches, sewing his clothing, and shaping—for better and for worse—the media’s narrative about LSD. Ultimately, Rosemary sacrificed everything for the safety of her fellow psychedelic pioneers and the preservation of her husband’s legacy.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDrawing from a wealth of interviews, diaries, archives, and unpublished sources, Susannah Cahalan writes the definitive portrait of Rosemary Woodruff Leary, reclaiming her narrative and her voice from those who dismissed her. Page-turning, revelatory, and utterly compelling, \u003ci\u003eThe Acid Queen \u003c\/i\u003eshines an overdue spotlight on a pioneering psychedelic seeker.\u003cb\u003eNamed a Best Biography of 2025 by \u003ci\u003eThe Guardian\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOne of \u003ci\u003eThe New York Times Book Review \u003c\/i\u003ePodcast’s “Books We're Excited About in Early 2025”\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eA \u003ci\u003eTown \u0026amp; Country \u003c\/i\u003eBest Book to Read This April\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eA \u003ci\u003eNew York Post \u003c\/i\u003eBest Book for Spring\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Cahalan shines a light on one of the twentieth century’s most amazing untold life stories. Rosemary Woodruff Leary blazed an astonishing trail through the red hot center of Sixties counterculture—the downtown Beats, the pioneers of hallucinogens, the Summer of Love, rock and roll royalty, the Weather Underground, the Black Panthers, and more. With her captivating storytelling, Cahalan helps us all see this wildly misunderstood epoch of American life with new eyes. An essential read—and an unforgettable trip.” \u003cb\u003e—Robert Kolker, author of \u003ci\u003eHidden Valley Road\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Rosemary Woodruff Leary was more than just the First Lady of 1960s counterculture. As this deeply researched, fun, and fascinating biography from the \u003ci\u003eBrain on Fire\u003c\/i\u003e author Susannah Cahalan reveals, Leary—who was married to psychedelic icon Timothy Leary—is no mere supporting character. Instead, the biography depicts a smart, driven, creative, and cunning woman who lived a life just as interesting, if far less known, than that of her one-time husband. After all, he wasn’t the one who broke her out of prison, was he?” \u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eTown \u0026amp; Country\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Explores how Woodruff fell into her husband’s powerful orbit. . . . \u003ci\u003eThe Acid Queen\u003c\/i\u003e focuses on the couple’s chaotic, drug- and sex-filled lives between their first meeting in 1965 and their split in 1971, years that included communal compounds in New York and California, arrests, jail time, a prison break and travel as fugitives in North Africa and Europe.” \u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eThe New York Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“\u003ci\u003eThe Acid Queen\u003c\/i\u003e reclaims the legacy of a psychedelic pioneer. . . . Marks yet another compelling entry in the growing body of work reclaiming the stories of women unfairly relegated to the footnotes of history.” —\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eSan Francisco Chronicle\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eA key a protagonist of the psychedelic counterculture, Rosemary Woodruff lived a life every bit as fascinating as her husband’s. . . . \u003ci\u003eThe Acid Queen\u003c\/i\u003e is a fond, imaginatively researched tribute to [Woodruff's] free, forever-seeking spirit” \u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eThe Guardian\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e“Cahalan is the perfect guide on this very trippy ride.” —\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eBoston Globe\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e“Rosemary Woodruff fell into a trippy world of trickery when she met the charming Timothy Leary. A thrilling biography tells her story. . . . An eye-widening account of the madcap melange of drugs, radical politics and idealism, and the quixotic search for kicks and deeper truths that made up the 1960s.” —\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eThe Telegraph\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Rosemary Woodruff Leary was one of the great unsung heroines of the 1960s. Susannah Cahalan’s brilliant account of this woman’s incredibly courageous life in troubled times not only brings Rosemary back to life but also finally accords her the place in the history of that era she has always so richly deserved.” \u003cb\u003e—Robert Greenfield, author of \u003ci\u003eTimothy Leary: A Biography\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Cahalan details a piece of lost but fascinating history, the story of a woman who embodied an era of freedom, experimentation, and psychedelic adventure. Meticulously reported and beautifully crafted.” \u003cb\u003e—Susan Orlean, author of \u003ci\u003eThe Library Book\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A fascinating portrait of an unsung shero of the counterculture. I couldn’t put it down!” \u003cb\u003e—Holly George-Warren, author of \u003ci\u003eJanis: Her Life and Music\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cbr\u003e“Cahalan has done the world a service in restoring Rosemary’s legacy with this stellar biography, which is rich in sumptuous detail, both personal and historic, and is artfully constructed from the archives. Whether you know anything about the acid scene or are a complete novice, there is so much to enjoy in this excellent book.” \u003cb\u003e—Kate Moore, author of \u003ci\u003eThe Radium Girls\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Rosemary Woodruff Leary defied the FBI, the CIA, the American prison system and her famous husband to become a fugitive. But who was she really running from? That fascinating question looms over Susannah Cahalan's insightful, intimate biography — part romance, part thriller, all astounding.” \u003cb\u003e—Maureen Callahan, author of \u003ci\u003eAsk Not\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“When I finished reading this intoxicating book I both better understood the American counterculture and had exhilarating new ideas about what it means to be a woman in the world.” \u003cb\u003e—Ada Calhoun, author of \u003ci\u003eAlso a Poet\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“[Cahalan] excavates the consequences—psychotic depersonalization, disillusionment, personal betrayal—that accompany attempts to dissolve boundaries of self, to blur mind and substance, especially for women whose emotional and psychological suffering is too often privatized or pathologized. \u003ci\u003eThe Acid Queen\u003c\/i\u003e joins the company of works that resist easy redemption, insisting that the edge of sanity is a lived terrain to understand, often with ambivalence, complexity, and cost.” \u003cb\u003e—Electric Literature\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Brilliant . . . [\u003ci\u003eThe Acid Queen\u003c\/i\u003e] brings Timothy Leary’s wife out of the LSD guru’s shadow.” \u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eBook and Film Globe\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“[A] vibrant biography . . . Cahalan uses Rosemary’s stranger than fiction story to offer a vivid portrait of how flower power cracked up in the ’70s. It’s an electric account of a remarkable life and the end of an era.” \u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003ePublishers Weekly\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A well-wrought narrative that brings deserved attention to a lost figure in the counterculture.” \u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eKirkus Reviews\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003eSusannah Cahalan\u003c\/b\u003e is a #1 \u003ci\u003eNew York Times–\u003c\/i\u003ebestselling author, journalist and public speaker. Her first book, \u003ci\u003eBrain on Fire\u003c\/i\u003e, has sold over a million copies and has been translated into more than twenty languages. Her second book, \u003ci\u003eThe Great Pretender\u003c\/i\u003e, was shortlisted for the Royal Society’s 2020 Science Book Prize. She lives in New Jersey with her family.","brand":"Viking","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46300399894757,"sku":"NP9780593490051","price":32.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780593490051.jpg?v=1767738001","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/the-acid-queen-isbn-9780593490051","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}