James Frey wakes up on a plane, with no memory of the preceding two weeks. His face is cut and his body is covered with bruises. He has abused alcohol and every drug he can lay his hands on for a decade - and he is aged only twenty-three. This work presents an account of a life destroyed and a life reconstructed.

This is the story of a boy whose mother (a poet with delusions of grandeur) gave him away to be raised by her psychiatrist, a dead ringer for Santa Claus and a certifiable lunatic. Suddenly at the age of 12, Augusten found himself living in a dilapidated Victorian house in perfect squalor.

Paul McLeod, patriarch of a Scottish family and a retired newspaper editor, is on a package tour after the death of his wife. The story of his departure from the family home in Scotland and late gesture towards some sort of freedom gives way to his eldest son's life. This a novel about how we live and how family ties can offer redemption and joy.

Stunning reissue of the phenomenal worldwide bestseller: Frank McCourt's sad, funny, bittersweet memoir of growing up in New York in the 30s and in Ireland in the 40s.

Mary Karr grew up in East Texas refinery town in a volatile and defiantly loving family. This memoir looks back at life with a painter mother, seven times married, whose outlaw spirit could tip over into psychosis, and a heavy-drinking, fist-swinging father who liked nothing better than to spin tales with his cronies at the Liars' Club.