This Boy's Life: A Memoir - Softcover

Wolff, Tobias

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0802136680 ISBN 13: 9780802136688

Publisher: Grove Press, 2000

Synopsis

The 30th anniversary edition of Tobias Wolff's "extraordinary memoir" (SF Chronicle), now with a new introduction by the author

About this title

Review:

Fiction writer Tobias Wolff electrified critics with his scarifying 1989 memoir, which many deemed as notable for its artful structure and finely wrought prose as for the events it describes. The story is pretty grim: Teenaged Wolff moves with his divorced mother from Florida to Utah to Washington State to escape her violent boyfriend. When she remarries, Wolff finds himself in a bitter battle of wills with his abusive stepfather, a contest in which the two prove to be more evenly matched than might have been supposed. Deception, disguise, and illusion are the weapons the young man learns to employ as he grows up--not bad training for a writer-to-be. Somber though this tale of family strife is, it is also darkly funny and so artistically satisfying that most readers come away exhilarated rather than depressed.

About the Author:

Tobias Wolff lives in Northern California and teaches at Stanford University. He has received the Rea Award for excellence in the short story, the National Medal of Arts, a Los Angeles Times Book Prize, and the PEN/Faulkner Award.

About this edition

• Publisher: Grove Press
• Publication date: 2000
• ISBN 10: 0802136680
• ISBN 13: 9780802136688
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 304