Synopsis
I danced and danced because the neon light across the road had just blinked on, because it was the middle of spring, because I was twenty-one, because my father was playing beside me . . . In this vivid, seductive, gorgeously written memoir, Mandy Sayer recounts the fascinating years she spent performing on the streets of New York and New Orleans with her father. Gerry Sayer was a jazz drummer, a beguiling Irish charmer with a million stories and an insatiable love for jam sessions and all-night parties. Mandy grew up captivated by his outrageous tales even after he left the family for good and her mother descended into the distance of drink. When her siblings failed him by rejecting the bohemian performing life, Mandy saw her chance to become a character in his stories, part of the only life he really loved. So she learned to tap-dance, and they set off together to satisfy their grand ambitions on the toughest stage in the world - New York. Driven by their dream of making it big, Mandy and Gerry arrived in the city with no place to stay and only costumes to their names. They became part of the thrilling, precarious world of street performers - jugglers, magicians, fire-eaters, dancers - who eked out their livings at the mercy of the elements, the cops, complaining neighbors, and lurking thieves.
"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.
Review
"A reminder of just how dynamic a memoir can be. Sayer has crafted a spell-binding story of family mythology and betrayal that delights in the melody of each and every word rather than in its exotic subject matter. Layered with fluid, evocative descriptions that belie the eleven years' sweat that went into it, the book is the literary cousin to all those old tap routines". -- Interview
About the Author
Mandy Sayer won the Australian-Vogel Award at age 26 for her first novel Mood Indigo. Since then she has published five works of fiction and two anthologies, and has been named by the Sydney Morning Herald as one of Australia's Best Young Novelists. Her first memoir, Dreamtime Alice, won the 2000 National Biography Award, Australian Audio Book of the Year, the New England Booksellers' Award in the U.S. and was translated into several European languages. Her second memoir, Velocity, won the 2006 South Australian Premier's Award and The Age Book of the Year for Non-Fiction. Her most recent work of non-fiction is Coco: Autobiography of my Dog. She lives in Sydney with her husband, writer Louis Nowra, and their two dogs, Coco and Basil.
"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.
