It’s true. I am Cheryl Strayed obsessed. I can’t remember the last time I was this crazy anxious, waiting for a book release. It’s bad. So bad that I started a new book yesterday and I’m panicked I won’t finish it by next week when WILD arrives.
Do you follow Cheryl as Sugar over at The Rumpus? How about this column: What would you tell your 20 year old self?
I remember the first time I read Cheryl’s essay “The Love of My Life.” I’ve reread it many, many times. It breaks my heart over and over and over and over …
Are you going WILD with me? What was the last book you couldn’t wait to read?
Teri Carter's Library 
i can’t remember a book i was waiting to read as much as this one. ever.
i started anne lamott’s newest yesterday (some assembly required…the first year of my son’s son) and it’s soooo good, yet i find myself distracted while reading it wondering about whether or not wild is on its way to my bookstore yet or not. i bought the last issue of vogue to read the excerpt and then didn’t read it because i didn’t want to only have a bite vs. waiting and getting to eat the entire pizza at once (this is the bulimic in me getting to make decisions. definitely a red flag).
if i could, i would buy my copy next week, go straight to the airport, fly to you and wait to open it until we were both sitting on your deck, with coffee and able to read it in its entirety together. of course, we would finish simultaneously, jumping with joy and finding the most indulgent of restaurants to go spend the evening talking about how much we loved the story.
now i have to stop because i realize i have crossed the blurry line of appreciative reader into obsessed fandom. (i am now having an anxiety-fantasy of cheryl reading this and asking for her signed mug back.)
Now that’s my kind of crazy! And for the record, anyone who has the motto “write like a motherfucker” and signs mugs stating the same would never, never take said mug back.
There is no point to eating one slice of pizza. Anybody who says otherwise is lying.
Relentless beautiful writer that Strayed woman. Alas I live on another side of mother loss, a black hole that does not include the burning close love she radiates.
The further I get with my book, the more I recall how complicated my relationship was with my mother vs. the dream of an image I tried to create after her death.
But speaking of black holes, this weekend I’m reading Jeanette Winterson’s WHY BE HAPPY WHEN YOU COULD BE NORMAL. Wow.
She has been an inspiration to me. Why I started posting my novel as non fiction on my blog. Her latest is a retelling of an earlier novel.
She’s reading tonight about an hour from me — we’re trying to figure out if we can go see her.
She read here in la last Thursday night–the day of my eye surgery– so no go. You go and tell me about it.
I don’t really know Cheryl Strayed, but since everyone loves her I will read WILD too. I’m interested to know what you think of THE FACE THIEF, have you started it yet?
THE FACE THEIF is next to my bed — in line right after WILD. Did you read it right after it came out?
Yes, I bought it the day Betsy posted its release and read it immediately.
It sounds like you devoured it fast. If so that’s a great endorsement! Can’t wait to read it, too!
Well, I did read it quickly. I’m not entirely sure I’d give it a ringing endorsement, however. But I don’t want to spoil it for you, I’d rather wait to see what you think. The opening scene is kick-ass and the writing is lovely.
Those two essays you linked to killed me. I’m now a fan. Wow.
She’s got a combination of raw and elegant that’s hard to describe.
Yes. That last paragraph in the letter to her 20 year old self… I’ve been thinking about it ever since.
“You will regret the small thing you didn’t say for the rest of your life.” I can’t read that paragraph without feeling the pressure build behind my eyes.
SHE’S Sugar??? How did I miss this?
I’ve been reading so much about this book (and still I missed the above reveal?) and I am absolutely going to go WILD.
To be continued, for sure…
Here’s a video of her at the coming out party last month.
I’m excited for this one as well. I know Reese Witherspoon’s company has optioned it for a film so that will be interesting.
The Vogue excerpt was delicious. And delicious is rarely a word I’d use when it comes to a story. But it was. Like the perfect appetizer.
Take a knife, cut open the vein, and get it down on paper…she is an amazing woman.
I wonder how she does it, such brutal honesty, and then I think, no, that isn’t the question. She had to do it. People who write like that have one day had to say, if I don’t get this out, it will kill me. Nothing short of that could make it happen.
Bravo.
And yet I still can’t imagine writing it, organizing it, selling it. What a pile of ____ she worked through, writing and otherwise. I’m thrilled for her.
I only know Cheryl Strayed through you girls. I don’t remember who first introduced me to her but the column on the loss of her mother was so moving. I’ve passed it on more times than I can remember.
Hmmm. What book am I looking forward to? Well, I really want to read THE FACE THIEF. I remember Averil talking about how she had flipped open on her keypad while she was pretending to be working. I pictured her like a young girl, under her covers with a flashlight, reading way beyond bedtime. I also have to try HUNGER GAMES again. My 10 year old is desperate to read it and given my track record lately on good mothering techniques, it would be probably be best for me to read it first.
Yea for THE HUNGER GAMES —- pure and simple fun! Loved all 3 books.
AHHH is it released tomorrow?? I knew it was sometime in March but managed to put it out of my mind so I wouldn’t get too antsy. I preordered it from the independent bookstore in Oregon that will send a signed copy. I hope the signing part doesn’t somehow slow it down…
Here’s what a whack-a-doodle I am. I cancelled my order because it could not be here until March 23-27, and there was NO WAY I was waiting 3 or 7 extra days for this book!