Popular North American Memoir Books

Find memoir books written by authors from North America for the next part of the Read Around The World Challenge. (80)

41.

Just Kids by Patti Smith EN

0 Ratings
Description:
It was the summer Coltrane died, the summer of love and riots, and the summer when a chance encounter in Brooklyn led two young people on a path of art, devotion, and initiation. Patti Smith would evolve as a poet and performer, and Robert Mapplethorpe would direct his highly provocative style toward photography. Bound in innocence and enthusiasm, they traversed the city from Coney Island to Forty-second Street, and eventually to the celebrated round table of Max's Kansas City, where the Andy Warhol contingent held court. In 1969, the pair set up camp at the Hotel Chelsea and soon entered a co... continue

42.

Knitting the Fog by Claudia D. Hernández EN

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Description:
A young Guatemalan immigrant's adolescence is shaped by her journey to the US, as she grapples with Chapina tradition and American culture.


44.

Mon frère by Jamaica Kincaid FR

Rating: 4 (1 vote)
Description:
Jamaica Kincaid raconte la disparition de son frère, mort du sida à l'âge de trente-trois ans, à Antigua, une petite lie des Antilles. Avec délicatesse, avec précision, parfois avec une brutalité inouïe, elle décrit ce qu'elle voit, ce qu'elle ressent. Elle s'efforce de comprendre pourquoi cet événement l'oblige à repenser toute sa vie, et avec elle celle de sa famille. " Pour moi, dit-elle, l'écriture n'est pas un moyen de se projeter dans la sphère publique, mais simplement une façon d'être. C'est un processus toujours très douloureux, mais je l'accepte comme une réalité qui ne doit pas être... continue

45.

My Brother by Jamaica Kincaid EN

Rating: 4 (1 vote)
Description:
Kincaid's poetic and often shockingly frank account of Devon's life is also the story of their family on the island of Antigua.

46.

Notes on a Foreign Country by Sally Hansen EN

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Description:
'Deeply honest and brave . . . A sincere and intelligent act of self-questioning . . . Hansen is doing something both rare and necessary' - Hisham Matar, New York Times In the wake of the 9/11 attacks and the invasion of Iraq, Suzy Hansen was enjoying success as a journalist for a New York newspaper. Increasingly, though, the disconnect between the chaos of world events and the response at home took on pressing urgency for her. Seeking to understand the Muslim world that had been reduced to scaremongering headlines, she moved to Istanbul. Hansen arrived in Istanbul with romantic ideas about a ... continue

47.

On The Plain of Snakes by Paul Theroux EN

Rating: 4 (1 vote)
Description:
WINNER OF THE EDWARD STANFORD AWARD FOR OUTSTANDING CONTRIBUTION TO TRAVEL WRITING 2020 The master of contemporary travel writing, Paul Theroux, immerses himself in the beautiful and troubled heart of modern Mexico Nogales is a border town caught between Mexico and the United States of America. A forty-foot steel fence runs through its centre, separating the prosperous US side from the impoverished Mexican side. It is a fascinating site of tension, now more than ever, as the town fills with hopeful border crossers and the deportees who have been caught and brought back. And it is here that Pau... continue

48.

París era una fiesta by Ernest Hemingway ES

Rating: 3 (1 vote)
Description:
Leí el inolvidable "París era una fiesta" varias veces, siempre con el mismo interés. Es un testimonio donde este genial escritor plasmó su fe inquebrantable en los hombres que tienen el valor para no claudicar. Los que, en medio de la pobreza y el frío de los inviernos sis calefacción, siguieron escribiendo y viviendo intensamente, dando un lugar a la creación por sobre todas las cosas. Un testimonio de aquel París que yo conocí como científico del Institut Curie, y que ya no conoceremos más. -Ernesto Sab... continue

49.

Rocks in the Water, Rocks in the Sun : A Memoir from the Heart of Haiti by Vilmond Joegodson Déralciné, Paul Jackson EN

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Description:
When Joegodson Déralciné was still a small child, his parents left rural Haiti to resettle in the rapidly growing zones of Port-au-Prince. As his family entered the city in 1986, Duvalier and his dictatorship exited. Haitians, once terrorized under Duvalier’s reign, were liberated and emboldened to believe that they could take control of their lives. But how? Joining hundreds of thousands of other peasants trying to adjust to urban life, Joegodson and his family sought work and a means of survival. But all they found was low-waged assembly plant jobs of the sort to which the repressive Duvalie... continue

50.

Run Towards the Danger : Confrontations with a Body of Memory by Sarah Polley EN

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Description:
*A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice* These are the most dangerous stories of my life. The ones I have avoided, the ones I haven’t told, the ones that have kept me awake on countless nights. As these stories found echoes in my adult life, and then went another, better way than they did in childhood, they became lighter and easier to carry. In this extraordinary book, Sarah Polley explores what it is to live in one’s body, in a constant state of becoming, learning, and changing. Each of these six essays captures a piece of Polley’s life as she remembers it, while at the same time exami... continue