sculpture: Andrew Livingston & George Morris
Just read No Place Like Home: A Memoir in 39 Apartments.
It's an easy read, even a bit boring in places with the plot line repeating like a record player stuck in endless spin. Brooke moves into a sublet in New York, she tries to make it at writing and has to supplement income with jobs she doesn't like. She has trouble with a relationship. She has to move. Repeat.
Repeat 39 times.
The value of the repetition is the direct and unglamourous way in which it refuses to allow the reader to escape the unyielding, mundane existence of the "starving artist" lifestyle. Fantasizing about a career in the arts and pursuing one are not the same thing. Brooke can't escape some pretty brutal realities and she's not going to sugarcoat for us.
She's not going to be overly dramatic either, which I appreciate. She experiences trials throughout the book (rape, identity theft, death, heartbreak, empty bank accounts) and she writes about them directly and succinctly and without dwelling on negatives or overemphasizing how any of these secondary themes might steer her story toward the next abode.
Simple words, not flowery or flowy or Lilith Fair-ey. I haven't (at least, that I know of) read any of her many award-winning plays but know I will like them based on the distinct tone and pace of this novel. She has a humorous self-depreciation/work ethic/art soul combo I relate to. I (based on my age, if not social and career situation to boot) like that it took Brooke twenty years to feel like she was settled. I like she had many mini-triumphs along the way. I like she is over 30.
The "point" of this, of course, is to say you're home is where you lay your head, or some variation of that euphemism (the title is No Place Like Home for goodness sake). But, for me, the point was more about the perseverance of a successful artist, how sacrifices are pre-requisites and how "home" isn't an apartment or person (with the rare exception of co-dependent/cosmic muse situations) but ones art and soul itself.
