Mark Twain famously pronounced that you couldn’t write an honest memoir if it would be published before you died. Having written a memoir, I believe he was mostly right. The collection of short stories that make up The Fourth Moment is true only to my memory of dozens of big and small life events. It is part catharsis, part storytelling, and part instruction. A very few stories lack the details that would have indicted others in my confessions. So, although cold stone factual recounting is not to be found in my book, my biggest fear was being critiqued or denigrated while I’m still around.On the road to celebrate Thanksgiving with family, I received an email from a colleague who had recently bought my book. I share her response with you because it makes me grateful that I am indeed alive to read it and, shamelessly, to encourage you to read it too!
“I have lost sleep from one vignette, laughed uproariously with another, cried, been through hell with you, got really livid with jerks, and fell in love with GERT, for better or worse. Also, went back to Peace Corps multiple times with the agonies and ecstasies of village life and hierarchies with all the joy and pain. And I still have 2/5 left to read. I am the self-appointed Shiksa president of your fan club. Wow.”
Carole J. Garrison 