Böcker av Alexis Paige

"e;Thoughtful, instructive, profoundly useful-not to mention spit-out-your-drink funny."e; Timothy J. Hillegonds, author of The Distance Between At the ripe age of forty, when Alexis Paige was finally diagnosed with ADHD-Inattentive Type, she rolled her eyes even before the doctor could finish spelling out her new marching orders: "e;The goal now,"e; he said, "e;is to learn how to work smart, not hard."e;"e;But that doesn't sound like any fun,"e; she said. She was going to have to do this, too-ironically, inexplicably, comically-as she did everything else, the hard way. Part memoir, part craft guide, Work Hard, Not Smart, shows how Alexis lives her messy literary life. She invites you to step into her mismatched shoes. And if you do, you'll find the writing companion you've been looking for.

Not a Place on Any Map, winner of the 2016 Vine Leaves Vignette Collection Award, explores the switch-backing emotional terrain of traumas and triumphs, as well as the disparate landscapes where they unfold. In rich, evocative snapshots of Chicago, the desert Southwest, California, New England, and Texas, the book traces a peripatetic childhood shaped by loss and dislocation that tumbles into an early adulthood spent chasing excitement from coast to coast and abroad. After being raped in Italy on her first trip to Europe at twenty-five, the author goes adrift in despair from which only drugs and alcohol provide escape. The flash lyric essays in this debut collection pursue a lost sense of self and home after trauma, but as the author discovers, home is not a place marked neatly on any map. Reaching recovery takes years and detours through depression, blurred landscapes, rehab, and jail. Ultimately, the book maps not home at all, but a truer place, one made all the sweeter for having travelled so far to find it.