Her: A Memoir (Thorndike Press large print biography) - Hardcover

Parravani, Christa

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1410460444 ISBN 13: 9781410460448

Publisher: Thorndike Press, 2013

Synopsis

Relates the author's life with her identical twin sister, Cara, the downward spiral that resulted in Cara's early death, and the author's determination to defy the odds that she herself would die within two years of her twin.

About this title

About the Author

Christa Parravani is a writer and photographer. Her photographs have been exhibited internationally, and are represented by the Michael Foley Gallery in New York City and the Kopeikin gallery in Los Angeles. She has taught photography at Dartmouth College, Columbia University and UMass, Amherst. She earned her MFA in Visual Art from Columbia University and her MFA in Creative Writing from Rutgers Newark. She lives in Brooklyn with her husband, the writer Anthony Swofford ("Jarhead") and their daughter.

Review

"Christa Parravani's lyrical, no-nonsense "Her" ranks with the best American memoirs of the decade. This incandescent story of loving and losing one's twin is an uncompromising love poem to the joys and dangers of shared identity, and an unforgettable treatise on addiction, trauma, survival, and triumph."--Jayne Anne Phillips, author of "Lark and Termite" and "Machine Dreams"

"Christa Parravani writes with extraordinary emotional honesty about being a twin and losing that beloved other self, and with equally remarkable candor about being an artist and about marriage, grief and much more. I have never read a book that so directly engaged the perils and exaltations of being a female. The scenes between the sisters in this book are breathtaking. And Christa's difficulty looking in the mirror after the death of her identical twin becomes the reader's desire to see him or herself, and the world, more sensitively. A fine and rare book."--Alice Elliott Dark, author of "In the Gloaming" and "Think of England"

"The best memoirs should come with a warning label, the kind that makes you take a deep breath before you open the cover. "Her" announces its challenges immediately while also establishing the voice that will pull you through the darkness of loss, memory and expiation. Suddenly bereft, twinless, distrusting the talent that has been her mainstay and questioning what it means to be a survivor, Christa Parravani carries us with her into the excavation of what it means to keep living, a lost twin and a woman digging herself out of her sister's loss. That she comes out the other side is never predictable--merely miraculous."
--Dorothy Allison, author of "Bastard Out of Carolina"

"Out of a maelstrom of love, loss, and grief comes this beautiful clear-eyed memoir, one that reveals the power and peril of twinhood even as it explores ideas that affect us all: Why are we drawn to what may destroy us? What makes us hurt the ones we love? And when we experience tragedy, how do we keep grief from eating us alive? With a photographer's sharp eye and a gifted writer's penetrating insight, Parravani writes about being torn apart and then about piecing her life back together, brilliantly illuminating along the way what it means to be a sister, a daughter, a wife, an artist, and--ultimately, and triumphantly--herself."
--Julie Orringer, author of "The Invisible Bridge"

"Christa Parravani's exploration of her relationship to her troubled identical twin sister is deeply thoughtful, lyrical, even magical. As she struggles for identity amid her sister's suffering, Parravani's own strength and talents emerge. There is rarely much redemption in losing the people we love, but Parravani transforms her pain into true beauty on the page.
-- Kerry Cohen, author of "Loose Girl: A Memoir of Promiscuity"

"In this powerful memoir about the death of her identical twin and its impact on her own life, Christa Parravani explores what it means to be a woman of creative spirit as few

"Full of headlong energy, Christa Parravani's HER is reckless yet delicate, familiar yet otherworldly, precise yet with the soul of a fairytale, and deeply moving in surprising ways."
--Nick Flynn, author of "Another Bullshit Night in Suck City" and "The Ticking is the Bomb

""The best memoirs should come with a warning label, the kind that makes you take a deep breath before you open the cover. "Her" announces its challenges immediately while also establishing the voice that will pull you through the darkness of loss, memory and expiation. Suddenly bereft, twinless, distrusting the talent that has been her mainstay and questioning what it means to be a survivor, Christa Parravani carries us with her into the excavation of what it means to keep living, a lost twin and a woman digging herself out of her sister's loss. That she comes out the other side is never predictable--merely miraculous."
--Dorothy Allison, author of "Bastard Out of Carolina"

"Out of a maelstrom of love, loss, and grief comes this beautiful clear-eyed memoir, one that reveals the power and peril of twinhood even as it explores ideas that affect us all: Why are we drawn to what may destroy us? What makes us hurt the ones we love? And when we experience tragedy, how do we keep grief from eating us alive? With a photographer's sharp eye and a gifted writer's penetrating insight, Parravani writes about being torn apart and then about piecing her life back together, brilliantly illuminating along the way what it means to be a sister, a daughter, a wife, an artist, and--ultimately, and triumphantly--herself."
--Julie Orringer, author of "The Invisible Bridge"

"Christa Parravani's exploration of her relationship to her troubled identical twin sister is deeply thoughtful, lyrical, even magical. As she struggles for identity amid her sister's suffering, Parravani's own strength and talents emerge. There is rarely much redemption in losing the people we love, but Parravani transforms her

"A photographer and identical twin tells the intimately delineated, raw story of her beloved sister. . . a finely wrought achievement of grace, emotional honesty, and self-possession" "- Publishers Weekly"
"Full of headlong energy, Christa Parravani's HER is reckless yet delicate, familiar yet otherworldly, precise yet with the soul of a fairytale, and deeply moving in surprising ways."
--Nick Flynn, author of "Another Bullshit Night in Suck City" and "The Ticking is the Bomb

""The best memoirs should come with a warning label, the kind that makes you take a deep breath before you open the cover. "Her" announces its challenges immediately while also establishing the voice that will pull you through the darkness of loss, memory and expiation. Suddenly bereft, twinless, distrusting the talent that has been her mainstay and questioning what it means to be a survivor, Christa Parravani carries us with her into the excavation of what it means to keep living, a lost twin and a woman digging herself out of her sister's loss. That she comes out the other side is never predictable--merely miraculous."
--Dorothy Allison, author of "Bastard Out of Carolina"

"Out of a maelstrom of love, loss, and grief comes this beautiful clear-eyed memoir, one that reveals the power and peril of twinhood even as it explores ideas that affect us all: Why are we drawn to what may destroy us? What makes us hurt the ones we love? And when we experience tragedy, how do we keep grief from eating us alive? With a photographer's sharp eye and a gifted writer's penetrating insight, Parravani writes about being torn apart and then about piecing her life back together, brilliantly illuminating along the way what it means to be a sister, a daughter, a wife, an artist, and--ultimately, and triumphantly--herself."
--Julie Orringer, author of "The Invisible Bridge"

"Christa Parravani's exploration of her relationship to her troubled identical twin sister is deeply thoughtful, lyric

"Christa Parravani powerfully transforms her anguish over the traumatic death of her troubled identical sister into the astonishing "Her."" "- Vanity Fair"

"A photographer and identical twin tells the intimately delineated, raw story of her beloved sister. . . a finely wrought achievement of grace, emotional honesty, and self-possession" "- Publishers Weekly"
"Full of headlong energy, Christa Parravani's HER is reckless yet delicate, familiar yet otherworldly, precise yet with the soul of a fairytale, and deeply moving in surprising ways."
--Nick Flynn, author of "Another Bullshit Night in Suck City" and "The Ticking is the Bomb

""The best memoirs should come with a warning label, the kind that makes you take a deep breath before you open the cover. "Her" announces its challenges immediately while also establishing the voice that will pull you through the darkness of loss, memory and expiation. Suddenly bereft, twinless, distrusting the talent that has been her mainstay and questioning what it means to be a survivor, Christa Parravani carries us with her into the excavation of what it means to keep living, a lost twin and a woman digging herself out of her sister's loss. That she comes out the other side is never predictable--merely miraculous."
--Dorothy Allison, author of "Bastard Out of Carolina"

"Out of a maelstrom of love, loss, and grief comes this beautiful clear-eyed memoir, one that reveals the power and peril of twinhood even as it explores ideas that affect us all: Why are we drawn to what may destroy us? What makes us hurt the ones we love? And when we experience tragedy, how do we keep grief from eating us alive? With a photographer's sharp eye and a gifted writer's penetrating insight, Parravani writes about being torn apart and then about piecing her life back together, brilliantly illuminating along the way what it means to be a sister, a daughter, a wife, an artist, and--ultimately, and triumphantly--herself."
--Julie Orrin

"Concise and captivating, Parravani's prose paints her phoenix-like transformation such that the reader feels the flames of her fire. A poignant, book-arcing metaphor illustrates Christa's battle to accept herself with a mirror-image. Raw and unstoppable, Her illuminates the triumph of the human spirit - both individual and shared." - "Booklist" (Starred)

"Christa Parravani powerfully transforms her anguish over the traumatic death of her troubled identical sister into the astonishing "Her."" "- Vanity Fair"

"A photographer and identical twin tells the intimately delineated, raw story of her beloved sister. . . a finely wrought achievement of grace, emotional honesty, and self-possession" "- Publishers Weekly"

"Christa Parravani's new memoir, "Her," is a glimpse into the most intimate chambers of the identical twin relationship. . . "Her i"s a tribute to the truly beloved, as well as a celebration of the push-and-pull between sisters."--"The Oregonian
"

"Moving... just the right balance of joyous, melancholic and bitter. [We sometimes read memoir hoping] for a small glimpse into the inside of someone else's reality in all its messy glory. With humility and an unbreakable love and respect for her other half, Christa Parravani allows us that in droves."--"20somethingreads.com"
"Full of headlong energy, Christa Parravani's HER is reckless yet delicate, familiar yet otherworldly, precise yet with the soul of a fairytale, and deeply moving in surprising ways."
--Nick Flynn, author of "Another Bullshit Night in Suck City" and "The Ticking is the Bomb

""The best memoirs should come with a warning label, the kind that makes you take a deep breath before you open the cover. "Her" announces its challenges immediately while also establishing the voice that will pull you through the darkness of loss, memory and expiation. Suddenly bereft, twinless, distrusting the talent that has been her mainstay and questioning what it means to be a survivor,

""Her "instantly became my reading obsession. . . . Parravani tackles her potentially melodramatic material with forthrightness and a flair for the darkly comic, while also remaining witchily true to the romantic uncanniness of twinhood. The tone she strikes is brashly ghoulish and heart twanging, the route through her past artfully circuitous. "Her "invites obsessional reader behavior because Parravani has the ability to make life, even at its worst, feel magic-tinged and vital and lived all the way down to the bone. She spins out of her dire experiences an enthralling story laced with weird luck and coincidences. . . . The final sentence, honest to god, made me cry." - Heidi Julavits, "Bookforum"

"Parravani succeeds in 'writing Cara back to life' and saving her own life in the process. No punches are pulled here, and Parravani's matter-of-fact tone does nothing to shield readers from the enormity of her loss . . . . Imagine looking in a mirror and not seeing yourself. Imagine living the rest of your life with half of yourself missing. Imagine looking at your own corpse. You don't have to imagine: Parravani's story makes it all clear." - "Library Journal" (Starred)

"Concise and captivating, Parravani's prose paints her phoenix-like transformation such that the reader feels the flames of her fire. A poignant, book-arcing metaphor illustrates Christa's battle to accept herself with a mirror-image. Raw and unstoppable, Her illuminates the triumph of the human spirit - both individual and shared." - "Booklist" (Starred)

"Christa Parravani powerfully transforms her anguish over the traumatic death of her troubled identical sister into the astonishing "Her."" "- Vanity Fair"

"A photographer and identical twin tells the intimately delineated, raw story of her beloved sister. . . a finely wrought achievement of grace, emotional honesty, and self-possession" "- Publishers Weekly"

"Christa Parravani's new memoir, "Her," is a glimpse into the most intimate ch

Edition details

• Publisher: Thorndike Press
• Publication date: 2013
• ISBN 10: 1410460444
• ISBN 13: 9781410460448
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 337