This brave and engaging memoir is a gift to readers struggling with drinking problems.
A leading American mystery writer and her son recall their lives as alcoholics and their diverse paths to sobriety.
Martha Grimes (Fadeaway Girl, 2011, etc.), winner of the 2012 Mystery Writers of America Grandmaster Award, was drinking four to five strong martinis nightly when she hit bottom and entered an outpatient rehab for two years of weekly meetings. Her son Ken, a book publicist, grew up drinking and partying in the 1970s; used speed, cocaine and other drugs, finally settling on marijuana and beer; and then began “a process of redemption” at a sober beach house and in 12-step meetings. In alternating chapters, the authors craft an honest, moving and readable account of the drinking life and the struggle for recovery. While their informative book considers the many sources of help for alcoholics (AA, therapy, rehab, etc.), their main mother-son message, in Martha’s words, is “You can stop only by stopping.” Moreover: “Stopping is hard. You might as well learn how to play the violin.” Neither her mother nor father was a drinker, writes Martha, but Mrs. D., her mother’s business partner in a summer hotel, was an angry alcoholic, and Martha would drink with her often in a back office. At the age of 30, Martha bought a bottle of sherry and hid it in a closet. She never drank while writing her more than 30 mysteries. Nor was she aware of Ken’s drinking and drugging as he grew up. The latest of four generations of alcoholic men in his family, Ken offers vivid glimpses of his experiences: spending tuition money on drugs, carousing in British pubs, bad-mouthing Donald Trump at a book party, and finally learning life-changing lessons from Hollywood producer, author and cocaine-user Julia Phillips.
This brave and engaging memoir is a gift to readers struggling with drinking problems.Pub Date: June 4, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-4767-2408-9
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Scribner
Review Posted Online: April 27, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2013
Well-told and admonitory.
Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.
Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.
Well-told and admonitory.Pub Date: June 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-074486-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
This autobiography might almost be said to supply the roots to Wright's famous novel, Native Son.
It is a grim record, disturbing, the story of how — in one boy's life — the seeds of hate and distrust and race riots were planted. Wright was born to poverty and hardship in the deep south; his father deserted his mother, and circumstances and illness drove the little family from place to place, from degradation to degradation. And always, there was the thread of fear and hate and suspicion and discrimination — of white set against black — of black set against Jew — of intolerance. Driven to deceit, to dishonesty, ambition thwarted, motives impugned, Wright struggled against the tide, put by a tiny sum to move on, finally got to Chicago, and there — still against odds — pulled himself up, acquired some education through reading, allied himself with the Communists — only to be thrust out for non-conformity — and wrote continually. The whole tragedy of a race seems dramatized in this record; it is virtually unrelieved by any vestige of human tenderness, or humor; there are no bright spots. And yet it rings true. It is an unfinished story of a problem that has still to be met.
Perhaps this will force home unpalatable facts of a submerged minority, a problem far from being faced.
Pub Date: Feb. 28, 1945
ISBN: 0061130249
Page Count: 450
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1945
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