Vicodin, valium, a ruptured disc and a good book.

For the LA Review of Books, Katherine Taylor (my client) wrote a paean to Vivian Gornick and her new memoir, The Odd Woman and the City. This piece is so good I’ve lost track of how many times I’ve read it. Most importantly, it does two things: #1. Makes me want to read everything by Vivian Gornick (who I feel lame saying it but I haven’t read before). And #2. Makes me like Katherine Taylor, and her writing, more than I already did, which was a lot.

You can read the essay, How Vivian Gornick Saved My Life, here.

If you are feeling lazy and didn’t click the link, here is part of the essay to entice you, (the first paragraph from Gornick, the next two from Katherine):

On Upper Broadway a beggar approaches a middle-aged woman. “I don’t drink, I don’t do drugs, I just need —,” he starts. To his amazement, the woman yells directly in his face, “I just had my pocket picked!” The beggar turns his face northward and calls to a colleague up the block, “Hey, Bobby, leave her alone, she just got robbed!”

No good can come from leaving the house. I love to say this, and I tend to pick friends who agree with me. What good could come? Embarrassment, boredom, death? Instead: have your groceries delivered, climb up and down the stairs for exercise, find a hairdresser who does house calls, use the telephone if you must or — much better — text and email and never speak to anyone unless they’re funny. Live your life inside books (or TV, or whatever).

Unfortunately, there are not enough books so good that you want to live your life inside of them. When you find one, one that helps you live, one that reminds you how to engage with the world when it’s impossible to engage with the world, you must read it over and over, because it has instructions for you.

How Vivian Gornick Saved My Life: A True Story by Katherine Taylor

Valley Fever, the new novel by Katherine Taylor and an excerpt here.

The Odd Woman and the City by Vivian Gornick