Memoir Archive

Called Back: My Reply to Cancer, My Return to Life - I have read my share of cancer memoirs, and I’m quite sure I have never encountered a woman whose reaction to the diagnosis of breast cancer --- a friend’s, not

Camp Camp - The kid freaked out, ran off the bus. Much screaming from other kids --- it was time to leave. The kid’s parents told their daughter they’d follow the bus ---

Can’t We Talk about Something More Pleasant? - "What sort of person calls after midnight?” New Yorker cartoonist Roz Chast asks herself that question twice in her memoir. The answer is obvious. Your aged parent. Or, worse, the hospital. I’ve

Carl Jung: Memories, Dreams, Reflections - Carl Jung’s writing is for the professional --- it’s not particularly readable for the likes of me. But then there’s “Memories, Dreams, Reflections,” the book he wrote and dictated when

Carolyne Roehm: Design & Style: A Constant Thread - Carolyne Roehm is 67 years old. This is not possible. She looks exactly as she did when I met her in 1986. Her face seems unlifted and unlined, her weight is a

Coffinman - In Japan, there's no job lower than washing corpses and putting them in coffins. This was, as Shinmon Aoki wryly tells us, not his dream job. He had dropped out

Come Back - The cover shows a little girl, aloft. Her mother's open hands are at the bottom of the photograph. It's a lovely, joyous picture. And one that

Come to the Edge - The longtime girlfriend of John F. Kennedy, Jr. --- a woman he should have married, and didn’t --- writes a book about their long friendship, glorious romance and fraught break-up.

Comfort - Video Ann Hood talks about knitting and grief Comfort is a very great book. I don't think most people would read it if I paid them. Consider: In April of 2002, Ann Hood's

Crazy for the Storm - Video Norman Ollestad, then and now “Dad and I were a team, and he was Superman,” Norman Ollestad says, in a line that millions of fathers wish their sons would write about

David Carr: The Night of the Gun - “Let's say, for the sake of argument, that a guy threw himself under a crosstown bus and lived to tell the tale,” David Carr writes. “Is that a

David Sedaris - Video The Stadium Pal Are you ever so thankful no one can read your mind? Not so fast. David Sedaris knows our secret thoughts and gives them away ---

David Sedaris: Theft by Finding: Diaries (1977-2002) - David Sedaris hasn’t published a book since 2013. “Let’s Explore Diabetes with Owls," like all Sedaris collections was a bestseller, but it was uneven --- here’s my review --- and

Dead End Gene Pool - The trick to money is to have a lot, but not too much. What’s too much? Best answer: Start accumulating wealth. When you have enough, you’ll feel great. When you have too

Death Be Not Proud - “Death Be Not Proud” could have been the worst book ever written. Consider: John Gunther, Jr. loses his only son to a brain tumor in 1947,

Desire: Where Sex Meets Addiction - I've always seen sex as a solution --- a reward for getting through the day. Sex as a problem? As addiction and obsession? And for Susan Cheever, daughter of the

Devotion - When we meet Elizabeth Gilbert on the first page of Eat, Pray, Love, it’s three in the morning, and she's on the bathroom floor of her country house, sobbing. And not for

Diana Vreeland: D.V. - ELTON JOHN: The Times asked him about the books he loves: "I think I might reread 'D.V.' It’s one of the campest books I’ve ever read in my life, and

Disassembly Required: A Memoir of Midlife Resurrection - DISCLOSURE: Beverly Willett found me through Facebook or Butler and asked if I’d look at her manuscript, and I had her send two chapters, and they were so compelling I

Dispatches - When the conversation turns to the military, it's easy to identify the assholes. They want to bomb the shit out of a country they can't find on a map. They