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At twenty-one, just starting to comprehend the puzzles of adulthood, Sarah Manguso was faced with another: a wildly unpredictable disease that appeared suddenly and tore through her twenties, vanishing and then returning, paralyzing her for weeks at a time, programming her first to expect nothing from life and then, furiously, to expect everything. In this captivating story, Manguso recalls her nine-year struggle: arduous blood cleansings, collapsed veins, multiple chest catheters, the deaths of friends and strangers, addiction, depression, and, worst of all for a writer, the trite metaphors that accompany prolonged illness. A book of tremendous grace and self-awareness, The Two Kinds of Decay transcends the very notion of what an illness story can and should be.
"Starred Review. What makes this lightning-quick book extraordinary is...the compassion she acquires as she comes to understand her pain in relation to the pain of others." - Publishers Weekly.
"Manguso's abundant analytic and compositional gifts are evident throughout this harrowing memoir." - Kirkus Reviews.
This information about The Two Kinds of Decay was first featured
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Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Photo: © Beowulf Sheehan
Sarah Manguso is the author of nine books, including the novel Very Cold People, a finalist for the PEN/Jean Stein Book Award. Manguso is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Hodder Fellowship, and the Rome Prize. She lives in Los Angeles.
Link to Sarah Manguso's Website
Name Pronunciation
Sarah Manguso: man-GOO-zoh
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