Memoirs Aren’t Fairytales by Marni Mann
After a traumatic college experience, and desperate to leave small town life, Nicole and her best friend Eric move to Boston in order to make some changes in their stagnant life. There though, Nicole and Eric find themselves plunging head first into a labyrinth of drugs, death and crime.
I feel as though I should start with a disclaimer. Although the title of this novel is called Memoirs Aren’t Fairytales, this book is a work of fiction. As I read this on my Kindle (which automatically starts books on the first page of text-NOT the front cover) I missed the book’s disclaimer.
Still, whether the book was truth or fiction there was no denying the book’s impact. I’ve read many books on drugs/addiction, both fiction and non fiction and I cannot recall one that punched me in the gut as hard and as often as this book did. Just when I thought that maybe, just maybe things were going to get better for Nicole-they didn’t.
It seemed as though the novel should have started to feel as though it was an after school special, but surprisingly it did not. Perhaps it was because I was still holding onto the belief that it was a memoir, it seemed completely real, believable and not at all preachy.
I am not quite sure I’d read this book again, or it’s sequel, Scars from a Memoir. It was a powerful read, but not one I want to revisit but I am not sorry that I read it at all, and I do think it’s one of those books that should be read.
I’ve read books that hit me that way – I didn’t regret reading them, but they were so gritty that I wouldn’t want to go back!
That book sounds like an exhausting read. If I like a character in a book, I really get emotionally involved. That happened to me with the characters in “Fifty Shades”. I was exhausted, but thankfully there were more ups than downs.