If, as one reviewer claims, the best criteria for judging a memoir is whether it’s as good as a novel, then Mary Karr’s latest memoir, Lit, definitely makes the cut. Displaying the precise insights of the poet that she is, along with her trademark wit, Karr once again proves what an amazingly gifted writer she is. Though not quite the wild ride that her first two (The Liar’s Club and Cherry) were, Lit manages to be just as compelling in its own way with a poignancy and depth that was perhaps lacking in her earlier works.

The book opens with Karr leaving her Texas roots and striking out on her own. It ends with her a successful writer and teacher. In between, the book follows her as she pursues a rather sketchy college career, becomes a graduate student and teacher, marries a fellow poet (whom she later divorces), has a child, and becomes an alcoholic. Eventually acknowledging her addiction, she joins AA where she manages to get sober and finally rather surprisingly (even to herself) embraces Christianity and converts to Catholicism.

Perhaps the most harrowing parts of the book come when she revisits the alcoholic daze she inhabited while raising her infant son, trying to hold together a failing marriage and at the same time pursue her career as a poet, teacher and writer. Never, however, through all of this does she portray herself as a victim, observing at one point that this would be quite a different story if told through the eyes of her husband. It is this brutal honesty and striking self-awareness that infuses her story with a freshness and life not seen in the usual shopworn accounts of addiction and recovery. Thus the redemption she achieves through her faith feels particularly solid and real, allowing her to finally make peace with her family and her childhood memories in a very moving and beautiful way.

Valerie Sayers writing for The Washington Post sums it up quite well:

“This is a story not just of alcoholism but of coming to terms with families past and present, with a needy self, with a spiritual longing Karr didn’t even know she possessed.”

-Billie

Mary Karr was at Lemuria on Wednesday, July 14, 2010 for a signing and reading.

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