DON'T CALL ME HOME

A memoir by the daughter of Warhol superstar Viva and big sister of actor Gaby Hoffmann.

"I’m certain that if she and the Dalai Lama were locked in a cell together, and she turned the screw on him, he would crack within the hour,” writes Auder about her mother. “He might even kill her because he has been kowtowed to his whole life and never forced to contend with a Viva. I’ve always suspected I’m more patient and loving than the great masters because I’ve been in a cell with her for a lifetime and have physically attacked her only twice." Auder’s vibrant memoir of her larger-than-life mother alternates between the present, as she and her husband and child host the aged diva at their home in Philadelphia, and her roller-coaster childhood. The author, a performance artist and actor, spent much of that time living frugally at the Chelsea Hotel and hanging out around the corner at the Squat Theatre. Her childhood also featured regular visits to her mother's family home on the St. Lawrence River. Auder's vivid writing illuminates a deep and sparkling trove of storytelling riches. Especially memorable is her description of her mother’s meeting of her father, which occurred "on the streets of Paris, just after she’d filmed the sex scene in Warhol’s Blue Movie that would make her both superstar and criminal”—and just before "she and Michel made off for Rome (both draped in ruffled silk shirts, jewel-toned velvet blazers, capes, beaded necklaces, and chunky silver bracelets) to make their own movie.” In Quebec, Viva's extended family sometimes devolved into bloody brawling; other times, the author's five tall, slender aunts, dressed in tiny crocheted bikini bottoms, flocked sweetly around her like birds. In the acknowledgements, Auder reveals that she has "been writing versions of this memoir for over twenty-five years.” The work has paid off.

Auder makes the most of her magnificent mess of material, celebrating her bohemian upbringing and her crazy mother in style.