Book picks similar to
Girl To City: A Memoir by Amy Rigby
music
memoir
punk
non-fiction
The Beauty in Breaking
Michele Harper - 2020
Brought up in Washington, DC, in an abusive family, she went to Harvard, where she met her husband. They stayed together through medical school until two months before she was scheduled to join the staff of a hospital in central Philadelphia, when he told her he couldn't move with her. Her marriage at an end, Harper began her new life in a new city, in a new job, as a newly single woman.In the ensuing years, as Harper learned to become an effective ER physician, bringing insight and empathy to every patient encounter, she came to understand that each of us is broken—physically, emotionally, psychically. How we recognize those breaks, how we try to mend them, and where we go from there are all crucial parts of the healing process.The Beauty in Breaking is the poignant true story of Harper's journey toward self-healing. Each of the patients Harper writes about taught her something important about recuperation and recovery. How to let go of fear even when the future is murky. How to tell the truth when it's simpler to overlook it. How to understand that compassion isn't the same as justice. As she shines a light on the systemic disenfranchisement of the patients she treats as they struggle to maintain their health and dignity, Harper comes to understand the importance of allowing ourselves to make peace with the past as we draw support from the present. In this hopeful, moving, and beautiful book, she passes along the precious, necessary lessons that she has learned as a daughter, a woman, and a physician.
Tainted Life: The Autobiography
Marc Almond - 1999
It recounts his "de rigeur" plunge into drink, drugs, and debauchery as well as being an intimate portrait of the star-making personalities of the 1980s.
Nerd Do Well
Simon Pegg - 2009
Having blasted onto the small screens with his now legendary sitcom Spaced, his rise to nation's favourite son status has been mercurial, meteoric, megatronnic, but mostly just plain great.From his childhood (and subsequently adult) obsession with Star Wars, his often passionate friendship with Nick Frost, and his forays into stand-up which began with his regular Monday morning slot in front of his 12-year-old classmates, this is a joyous tale of a homegrown superstar and a local boy made good.
You're Not Doing It Right: Tales of Marriage, Sex, Death, and Other Humiliations
Michael Ian Black - 2012
In it, he takes on his childhood, his marriage, his children, and his career with unexpected candor and deadpan wit, as he shares the neuroses that have plagued him since he was a kid and how they shaped him into the man he is today.In this funny-because-it's-true essay collection, Michael says the kinds of things most people are afraid to admit, and as a husband and father living in the suburbs, asks the question so many of us ask ourselves at one point or another. How did I end up here?
Concrete, Bulletproof, Invisible + Fried: My Life as a Revolting Cock
Chris Connelly - 2007
Live shows were transformed into an ear-splitting redneck disco from hell, under the influence of a mind-boggling cocktail of every conceivable narcotic, with sleazy strippers and even reports of live cattle on stage.As well as Jourgensen and all the Wax Trax crew, the book features cameo appearances by Ogre of Skinny Puppy, Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails, Killing Joke, Jah Wobble, and Cabaret Voltaire.Despite the unrelenting chaos, both Ministry and the Revolting Cocks have been immensely successful; Connelly appeared on two US gold albums ("The Land of Rape and Honey" and "The Mind is a Terrible Thing to Taste") and worked as songwriter on the million-plus selling platinum album "Psalm 69: The Way to Succeed and the Way to Suck Eggs."Connelly's superbly written, funny, irreverent, and sometimes downright scary memoir is one of the finest portrayals of a man trapped in the eye of a post-punk industrial storm this side of Armageddon.Chris Connelly was born in Edinburgh, Scotland, and now lives in Chicago where he has pursued a successful solo career.
Have a Bleedin Guess - the story of Hex Enduction Hour
Paul Hanley - 2019
Even the circumstances of its recording, purportedly in an abandoned cinema and a cave formed from Icelandic lava, have achieved legendary status among their ever-loyal fanbase. Have a Bleedin Guess tells the story of the album, including how each song was written, performed and recorded. It also includes new interviews with key players. Author Paul Hanley, who was one of The Fall's two drummers when Hex was created, is uniquely placed to discuss the album's impact, both when it was released and in the ensuing years.