I wore the ocean in the shape of a girl : a memoir

 by Kelle Groom. Poet Groom's stunning memoir reads more like poetry than prose and leaves th. brain singing with neurons like a city at night. Precise diction and punchy syntax coupled with raw subject matter give birth to an intense narrative containing some matter-of-fact passages almost too grueling to accept. Already an alcoholic at 19, Groom was pregnant and slated to surrender her son to relatives. While her addiction provides sufficient subject material, she reaches beyond external experiences to explore the fear, shame, and deception involved in her self-destructiveness. That self-examination makes her pain palpable as she exposes an otherwise unimaginable inner conflict. Furthermore, Groom's introversion is distinct in its intensity from that found in many other memoirs and fuels a major shift in tone as she reports enduring her son's death. In her search for validation, forgiveness, and redemption, Groo. died and came back to life. Her astonishing struggle and unique resurrection illuminate the universal human effort to embrace one's self, accepting personal flaws, demons, and methods of survival. --Booklist (Check Catalog)