A Preparation for Death

Author(s): Greg Baxter

Biography & Memoir

'Traditional autobiography is composed after the experience has passed. I wrote this book in the very panic of the experiences that inspired it'. In his early thirties, Greg Baxter found himself in a strange place. He hated his job, he was drinking excessively, he was sabotaging his most important relationships, and he was no longer doing the thing he cared about most: writing. Strangest of all, at this time he started teaching evening classes in creative writing - and his life changed utterly. "A Preparation for Death" is a document of the chaos and discovery of that time and of the experiences that led Greg Baxter to that strange place - an extraordinarily intimate account of literary failure (and its consequences), personal decay, and redemption through reading, writing, and truth-telling. Studded with vivid, loving portraits of the people closest to him - his Austrian grandmother, who narrowly survived the Second World War; his mother and father, both described with heartbreakingly close attention; and, his cousin Walter, whose own demons provide a striking counterpoint to the author's - it is above all a stunningly vivid and searching self-portrait: possibly the most honest book you'll ever read.

About the author:
Greg Baxter was born in Texas in 1974. For the past ten years he has lived in Dublin, where he works as a journalist.

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Product Information

General Fields

  • : 9780141048437
  • : Penguin Books Ltd
  • : Penguin Books Ltd
  • : books

Special Fields

  • : 1
  • : Paperback
  • : Greg Baxter