Portrait of an Addict as a Young Man: A Memoir Book

This is the story of one of the most gifted charismatic and successful young literary agents in New York and his catastrophic fall into full-blown crack addiction: a collapse that would cost him his business his home many of his friends and - very nearly - his life. An utterly compulsive narrative of extraordinary frankness we are led through the grimiest back-rooms of Manhattan's underbelly through scenes of blank-eyed sex and squalor into the febrile paranoia of a mind gone out of control. The story is intercut with terrifying flashbacks to his childhood where a secret physical condition triggers shame psychological abuse and the beginnings of his hidden life and addictive personality. This is not a book about a literary agent or publishing or New York - nor is it a book about recovery and redemption - it is a completely compelling brilliantly written account of how a dynamic young middle-class professional can find himself finally exposed as a helpless addict de-railed and alone living for months on a steady diet of crack cocaine and vodka.Written with great literary skill and originality this is a memoir of disarming honesty and huge emotional power but it is also at its heart a manifest of pure terror.