Felicia Sullivan's volatile, beautiful, deceitful, drug-addicted mother disappeared on the night Sullivan graduated from college, and has not been ...
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Mar 15, 2010
I have bad luck with memoirs. I don't know why. It's probably my fault, but they almost always end up alienating me somehow and I almost always end up finishing them out of obligation. There is nothing more annoying to me than struggling to finish a book while thinking of all the other books I could be reading and enjoying instead.
Thank God that was not the case with Felicia Sullivan's memoir, The Sky Isn't Visible from Here.
I LOVED THIS BOOK.
It brought m More...
Thank God that was not the case with Felicia Sullivan's memoir, The Sky Isn't Visible from Here.
I LOVED THIS BOOK.
It brought m More...
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Apr 14, 2008
Karl
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This book was well written, decently engaging, somewhat disturbing, but in the end I keep wondering if the author will inevitably return to a life of addiction? She claims to be done with drugs, but drinks no more than two glasses of wine a week. She grew up with a mother who never told her who her father was. Mom was introduced to cocaine by a boyfriend and from that time on it's one horrific event after another. The author's telling of her story seems to be a drawn out disgorging of the ps
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Sep 25, 2008
Peter
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Felicia Sullivan is a skilled writer. I read a previous reviewer who wrote that Sullivan’s writing is 'workshoppy'. Sullivan touches on criticism of her writing in the book. There’s a brief section where she expresses what many writers feel when their work is dismissed out of hand. I felt for her when she wrote about the difficulty of exposing oneself to other people and then getting shot down for errors in syntax and spelling. Workshops are a trust, sacred to me, and participants have a duty of
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Feb 03, 2008
Katrina
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Once in a while I read a book that brings me to my figurative knees. This is one of those books. Felicia writes of growing up in the shadow of a fiercely protective (at times), careless (at other times), seductive, larger-than life, drug-addicted mother who disappeared from her life when Felicia graduated from college. Amazingly, she survived the dangerous situations in which her mother placed her, but not unscathed. Like the generational cycles that occur in many families, Felicia found herself
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Nov 24, 2008
Kathleen
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Normally, I find memoirs some of the best books I read. I love compelling details like the Red Pumas in this book. Perhaps I've read too many books about down and out childhoods recently. I found the book to be very depressing, and choppy the way that she went back and forth in time. One wonders how someone like this was even able to grow up with the neglect, berating, anger. While similar in content to The Glass Castle, I found it to be not nearly as well written.
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Dec 17, 2009
Engineous
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This is a good autobiography. It's honest in many ways that most autobiographies are not, and her ambivalence about her mistakes and flaws give this an unsettling, thought-provoking realism that you don't find a lot nowadays. It's not perfect; there are no clear-cut decisions, no good/bad divide - it's just fucked up, that's all. And living with what is described as - but never stated as - a truly borderline mother gives you a good hefty dose of fucked-up, in case you were missing any.
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Aug 08, 2008
Krishanna
rated it:
Troubling memoir reminiscent of The Glass Castle. Felicia grows up on the tough streets of Brooklyn with a drug addicted mother who cares more about the abusive men in her life than her own daughter. Felicia has her own lapses into the world of drugs and dysfunction as a young woman, but pulls herself together and enters Columbia University to work on her career as a writer.
Sep 17, 2009
Ewurama
rated it:
Written by the author of a blog (feliciasullivan.com) I enjoy reading, The Sky Isn't Visible from Here is a memoir told in nonlinear fashion, a series of vignettes and disconnected memories. Sullivan’s story was remarkable to me largely because I know from her blog how radically she’s turned her life around. What made the difference between her and others who had similar experiences as children but spiraled in the other direction, unable to recover? Particularly interesting is that so much of he
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Feb 02, 2009
Carolyn
rated it:
NOTE: THREE AND A HALF STARS (not 3)
First of all, somebody smack me and get me off of this Memoir Carousel. Jeeeeez!
Who isn't glued to a story about tragedy? Am I the only one who thinks reading about other peoples darkness is like watching a train wreck? Maybe that's where my memoir kick is coming from.
This story consumed me. I think part of it was being close to the age of the author and identifying w/ her references. The authors relationship w/ her mother throug More...
First of all, somebody smack me and get me off of this Memoir Carousel. Jeeeeez!
Who isn't glued to a story about tragedy? Am I the only one who thinks reading about other peoples darkness is like watching a train wreck? Maybe that's where my memoir kick is coming from.
This story consumed me. I think part of it was being close to the age of the author and identifying w/ her references. The authors relationship w/ her mother throug More...
Feb 01, 2008
Judy
rated it:
Loved, loved, loved this book--couldn't put it down! It's a beautifully horrifying memoir that details Felicia's heinous childhood and yet not once does the author lapse into self-pity. It's brave and completely riveting. Oh, and unless your mom was Hitler, she's going to look pretty great next to Sullivan's.
Mar 20, 2008
Krista
rated it:
Horrifying memoir about a daughter's struggle to grow up with an alcoholic and drug addicted mother. We follow Felicia as she begins her descent into the same hell as her mother and are mesmorized as she begins to pull her life around.
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May 20, 2008
Julie
rated it:
A fast read. This may be the last in a string of my-life-was-really-messed-up-due-to-my-crazy,-drug-dealing-parent(s) that I read. I've had enough of that already.
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Jun 24, 2008
Alison
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Felicia Sullivan had a terrible mother and a terrible childhood and somehow she grew up to be a really insightful person and a beautiful writer. I love memoirs.
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Jun 03, 2011
Em
rated it:
Another author, by the name of Felicia Sullivan, has moved me by her personal account of the real stories that broke her heart and made it stronger.
The Sky Isn’t Visible from Here tells about the significant moments where the author had to deal with her drug-addicted mother, who is also the main reason why she led a troubled life. She attempted to live double lives where in one she pretended to be exactly what she is not, making up stories and lies about her history and family backgr More...
The Sky Isn’t Visible from Here tells about the significant moments where the author had to deal with her drug-addicted mother, who is also the main reason why she led a troubled life. She attempted to live double lives where in one she pretended to be exactly what she is not, making up stories and lies about her history and family backgr More...
Oct 12, 2008
Smallworld
rated it:
My review here:
http://smallworldreads.blogspot.com/2008...
http://smallworldreads.blogspot.com/2008...
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Oct 07, 2011
Amy
rated it:
I would recommend this book to anyone who struggled growing up with their mother. It isn't as though I ever lived the life that the author did....she grew up in an Inner City lifestyle with drugs and alcohol and sex abuse all around. I did not...I grew up in a pretty safe house with two parents and a blue collar family life. But I connected with her struggle to accept her mother...forgive her mother..love her mother. It was an easy read for me and an absolutely incredible story. I recommend
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Jan 12, 2012
Vanessa
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It takes guts to write a memoir. Whether your life was plagued by happy moments or ones you want to bury forever, there is no denying the strength and resilience that comes out of writing your own experiences down on paper. After having read Felicia's tale of survival and strength, I am surprised that I haven't come across this book before.
The book jumps from the past to the present, and this helps explain the writer's hectic past while describing her successful career in the present. More...
The book jumps from the past to the present, and this helps explain the writer's hectic past while describing her successful career in the present. More...
Dec 31, 2009
Arlene
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NEVER. . .have I had a reading experience like this one.
Completely unprepared for this, Sullivan's book took me by surprise. One does not expect a memoir be thrilling, terrifying, cliff-hanging -- I mean the way Tom Clancy's CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER is.
Reading THE SKY ISN'T VISIBLE FROM HERE is like riding on a runaway train. The journey begins:
"In the spring of 1997, a few weeks before my college graduation my mother disappeared. Ove More...
Jun 21, 2011
Tracy
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I wish the author had written the book chronologically. Although I normally like sprinkling flashbacks throughout the narrative, there was so much jumping around that I felt nauseated. There were also repetitions in the story that would have been eliminated had the story been told in a linear fashion. I did like the book a lot, though, and highly recommend it.
Dec 29, 2008
Caryn
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Halfway through the book I wanted to stop - no, take that back - 1/4 way through the book I wanted to stop, because it made me angry. It's a tough book, but well written and a worthwhile read.
Nov 20, 2008
Kristy
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I couldn't put this book down. You root for this author in her true tale of living a far from healthy existence with her mom's issues always lurking in the shadows.
Jan 06, 2008
Jenna
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The story, itself, was intriguing. Sad, yes. Or, rather, more than sad, brutally honest. I wasn't a total fan of the back-and-forth composition of the story, especially how it varied from year-to-year instead of a true-to-form back-and-forth.
But it was deeply moving. I'd suggest it to just about anyone, but especially those who drank one or two more than they should have in college and wondered just how close you can get to "that line" without going over. The book made me g More...
But it was deeply moving. I'd suggest it to just about anyone, but especially those who drank one or two more than they should have in college and wondered just how close you can get to "that line" without going over. The book made me g More...
Nov 12, 2009
Pamela
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Excellent, but emotionally tough to read. Surviving a tough chilhood is hard, thriving and blooming is a miracle.
Apr 18, 2009
Mary (BookHounds)
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This was a wonderfully written memoir that is both sad and hopeful at the same time. I only wish there was another chapter detailing what the author did with her life at the end of the book.
May 11, 2009
Amy
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I would recommend this book to anyone who struggled growing up with their mother. It isn't as though I ever lived the life that the author did....she grew up in an Inner City lifestyle with drugs and alcohol and sex abuse all around. I did not...I grew up in a pretty safe house with two parents and a blue collar family life. But I connected with her struggle to accept her mother...forgive her mother..love her mother. It was an easy read for me and an absolutely incredible story. I recommend
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