LIFE AND HOW TO LIVE IT

A memoirist recalls his traumatic years as a ’90s-era young adult in this second installment of a multivolume work.

Holesworth’s debut memoir surveyed his childhood in a working-class Philadelphia neighborhood as the son of a drug-addicted father and strict born-again Christian mother. In this sequel, he picks up where his first book left off, with the then-17-year-old author dropping out of his fundamentalist Christian high school to enter “into the cruel world to make it on [his] own.” Much of the book centers around the aimless years of his late teens and early 20s, when he navigated poverty, relationships with women, and finding an identity apart from his dysfunctional family. Another central theme is religious trauma—the author struggled to overcome what he describes as an evangelical Christian “cult” mindset that pressured believers to avoid sex that fell “beyond the boundaries set by this mystical white guy in the sky.” Even while he was estranged from his parents, they continued to loom large in Holesworth’s thoughts; the author describes his father’s influence on his use of drugs and alcohol “to relieve some of [his] stress and suffering” (entire chapters are dedicated to Holesworth’s escapades while under the influence of booze or tripping on acid with friends). Written in a raw style that lays bare the author’s battles with depression, suicidal ideations, and low self-esteem, the text concludes with the nadir of his life as a young adult, leaving readers without a resolution beyond the promise of a third volume. As a stand-alone read, this is a powerful, if incomplete, work—key details of the author’s childhood are left out with the assumption that readers will be familiar with Volume 1. Like the first book, this entry also serves as an ode to the power of early-1990s music and the ways in which it filled emotional voids in Holesworth’s life. As such, the book contains ample references to acts like R.E.M., Tori Amos, and Radiohead, among a throng of others, that will effectively bring readers back to a ’90s mood.

A gripping, emotionally devastating memoir.