Recommendations based on "Paul Auster"

The Emmy-nominated host of Netflix’s Queer Eye follows up his New York Times-bestselling memoir, Over The Top, with this collection of thought-provoking essays on grief and healing, cannabis reform, LGBTQIA+ rights, imposter syndrome, personal style, the HIV safety net, and of, course, how to make your hairdresser love you.In his New York Times-bestselling memoir Over the Top, Jonathan van Ness showed readers how the incredibly difficult moments from his life (surviving sexual abuse and addiction, being diagnosed with HIV) have existed alongside great joy and positivity (landing a breakout role on Netflix’s Queer Eye, becoming an amateur figure skater and professional standup comedian, doting on his five cats).If Jonathan learned anything from the painful life experiences, it’s that in order to thrive, he needed to push past the shame and fear of being his true self, which meant getting comfortable with being uncomfortable. In this candid and curious essay collection, he takes a thoughtful, in-depth look at today’s hot-button issues, viewed through the lens of his personal experience. From the evolution of his signature style to an investigative report on the queer history of his hometown, Jonathan reflects on his life and how he has learned to embrace change—doing the work to challenge internalized beliefs, finding compassion and confidence, and learning more about what makes us all so messy and gorgeous.Balancing the dark and the light, the serious and the madcap, these essays allow us to examine our individual assumptions, expand our horizons, and give ourselves permission to be the flawed and fabulous humans we are.

A smart, funny, and refreshing memoir from Mark Hoppus, the vocalist, bassist, and founding member of pop-punk band blink-182.This is a story of what happens when an angst-ridden kid who grew up in the desert experiences his parents’ bitter divorce, moves around the country, switches identities from dork to goth to skate punk, and eventually meets his best friend who just so happens to be his musical soulmate.Bassist, songwriter, and vocalist for renowned pop-punk trailblazers blink-182, Mark Hoppus, tells his story in Fahrenheit-182. A memoir that paints a vivid picture of what it was like to grow up in the 1980s as a latchkey kid hooked on punk rock, skateboards, and MTV; Mark Hoppus shares how he came of age and forms one of the biggest bands of his generation. Threaded through with the very human story of a constant battle with anxiety and Mark’s public battle and triumph over cancer, Fahrenheit-182 is a delight for fans and also a funny, smart, and relatable memoir for anyone who has wanted to quit but kept going.

9.4" * 6.3". Cloth hardcover.

The National Book Award winning memoir with a new foreword by Kathryn Harrison, author of The Kiss.“Fiercely committed to bequeathing a map of his psychic terrain, to spare others the pain of his solitary journey, [Monette’s] fine memoir is affirmative and ultimately celebratory.” — New York Times Book ReviewA child of the 1950s from a small New England town, “perfect Paul” earns straight A’s and scholarships and shines in social and literary pursuits, all the while keeping a secret—from himself and the rest of the world. Struggling to be or at least to imitate a straight man, through Ivy League halls of privilege and bohemian travels abroad, loveless intimacy, and unrequited passion, Paul Monette was haunted, and finally saved, by a dream—“The thing I’d never even seen: two men in love and laughing.” This searingly honest, witty, and humane merging of memoir and manifesto has become the definitive coming out story—and a classic of the coming-of-age genre. It was awarded the 1992 National Book Award for nonfiction.

The #1 New York Times Bestseller One-half of the celebrated Men in Blazers duo, longtime culture and soccer commentator Roger Bennett traces the origins of his love affair with America, and how he went from a depraved, pimply faced Jewish boy in 1980’s Liverpool to become the quintessential Englishman in New York. A memoir for fans of Jon Ronson and Chuck Klosterman, but with Roger Bennett’s signature pop culture flair and humor. Being a teenager isn’t easy, no matter where in the world you live or how much it does or doesn’t rain in your hometown. As an outsider—a private-schooled Jewish kid in working-class, heavily Catholic Liverpool—Roger Bennett wasn’t winning any popu­larity contests. But there was one idea, or ideal, that burned bright in Roger’s heart. That was America— with its sunny skies, beautiful women, and cool kids with flipped collars who ate at McDonald’s. When he embraced American popular culture, the dull gray world he lived in turned to neon teal—a color which had not even been invented in England yet. Intro­duced first through the gateway drug of The Love Boat, then to Rolling Stone, the NFL, John Hughes movies, Run-DMC, and Tracy Chapman, Roger embraced everything that would capture the imagination of a teenager growing up Stateside. When he made a real, in-the-flesh American friend who invited him over for the summer, he got to visit the promised land. A month in Chicago, and a life-changing night spent in the company of the Chicago Bears, was the first hit of freedom, of independence, of the Roger Bennett he knew he could be. (Re)Born in the USA captures the universality of growing pains, growing up, and growing out of where you come from. Drenched in the culture of the late ’80s and ’90s from the UK and the USA, and the heartfelt, hilarious sense of humor that has made Roger Bennett so beloved by his listeners, here is both a truly unique coming-of-age story and the love letter to America that the country needs right now.

When Pittsburgh Dad debuted on YouTube, creators Chris Preksta and Curt Wootton little suspected their sitcom would receive more than sixteen million views and turn their blue-collar everyman into a nationally known figure. Illustrated with hilarious black-and-white photos, Pittsburgh Dad shares the best of the best, from rants about swimming pool rules to reflections on coaching little league to curmudgeonly movie reviews. With its heavy dose of nostalgia and pitch-perfect sensibility, Pittsburgh Dad will have readers laughing in recognition, especially those who love recent blockbusters like Sh*t My Dad Says and Dad Is Fat.

A Zibby Mag "Most Anticipated Book" * A San Francisco Chronicle "New Book to Cozy Up With" * A Publishers Weekly "Memoirs & Biographies: Top 10" * The Millions "Most Anticipated" * An Electric Lit “Books By Women of Color to Read"“We have more Native stories now, but we have not heard one like this. Whiskey Tender is unexpected and propulsive, indeed tender, but also bold, and beautifully told, like a drink you didn’t know you were thirsty for. This book, never anything less than mesmerizing, is full of family stories and vital Native history. It pulses and it aches, and it lifts, consistently. It threads together so much truth by the time we are done, what has been woven together equals a kind of completeness from brokenness, and a hope from knowing love and loss and love again by naming it so.” — Tommy Orange, National Bestselling Author of There ThereReminiscent of the works of Mary Karr and Terese Marie Mailhot, a memoir of family and survival, coming-of-age on and off the reservation, and of the frictions between mainstream American culture and Native inheritance; assimilation and reverence for tradition.Deborah Jackson Taffa was raised to believe that some sacrifices were necessary to achieve a better life. Her grandparents—citizens of the Quechan Nation and Laguna Pueblo tribe—were sent to Indian boarding schools run by white missionaries, while her parents were encouraged to take part in governmental job training off the reservation. Assimilation meant relocation, but as Taffa matured into adulthood, she began to question the promise handed down by her elders and by American society: that if she gave up her culture, her land, and her traditions, she would not only be accepted, but would be able to achieve the “American Dream.”Whiskey Tender traces how a mixed tribe native girl—born on the California Yuma reservation and raised in Navajo territory in New Mexico—comes to her own interpretation of identity, despite her parent’s desires for her to transcend the class and “Indian” status of her birth through education, and despite the Quechan tribe’s particular traditions and beliefs regarding oral and recorded histories. Taffa’s childhood memories unspool into meditations on tribal identity, the rampant criminalization of Native men, governmental assimilation policies, the Red Power movement, and the negotiation between belonging and resisting systemic oppression. Pan-Indian, as well as specific tribal histories and myths, blend with stories of a 1970s and 1980s childhood spent on and off the reservation.Taffa offers a sharp and thought-provoking historical analysis laced with humor and heart. As she reflects on her past and present—the promise of assimilation and the many betrayals her family has suffered, both personal and historical; trauma passed down through generations—she reminds us of how the cultural narratives of her ancestors have been excluded from the central mythologies and structures of the “melting pot” of America, revealing all that is sacrificed for the promise of acceptance.

An advertising executive remembers his childhood with his eccentric foster family and his early adulthood experiences of trying to establish an independent life for himself.

A trilogy of brilliant novels—The Sportswriter, the Pulitzer Prize-winning Independence Day, and The Lay of the Land—that charts the life and times of Frank Bascombe, one of the most beloved and enduring characters in modern fiction. When we meet Frank Bascombe in The Sportswriter, his unguarded voice instantly wins us over and pulls us into a life that has been irrevocably changed—by the loss of a marriage, a career, a child. We then follow Frank, ever laconic and observant, through Independence Day and The Lay of the Land, witnessing his fortune’s rise and his family’s fragmentation. With finely honed prose and an eye that captures the most subtle nuances of the human condition—all its pathos and beauty and strangeness—Ford transforms this ordinary man’s life into a riveting, moving parable of life in America today.

Ethan Mordden talks about narrative style, and how he came to write How Long Has This Been Going On? Allan Gurganus reminisces fondly about his childhood love of the Bible and the "music of sermons." David Leavitt muses on the identity of the gay reader - and the extent to which that readership defined a tradition. Andrew Holleran wonders how he might have made The Beauty of Men "more forlorn, romantic, lost" by writing in the first person.