Life Stories: How I Came Into My Inheritance & Strangers in the House (Paperback)

~ Dorothy Gallagher (Author), Daniel Mendelsohn (Foreword)
Key Phrases: Mark Simon, Donny Wilkens, New York (more...)

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Product Description

Here are two acclaimed memoirs in one remarkable volume. In an extraordinarily compelling voice, Dorothy Gallagher tells stories taking us from her parents’ beginnings in the Ukraine to her own childhood in 1940s New York, through the many adventures of her extended family and into her own adult life. Her themes are universal: the fragility of friendship, the power of love, the marital crisis brought on by chronic illness, the role of dumb luck at the heart of life–Gallagher dramatizes her stories with acute insight, strong feeling, and edgy wit.

About the Author

Dorothy Gallagher is the author of How I Came Into My Inheritance and Other True Stories, a New York Times Notable Book, one of Time magazine’s best books of the year, and a runner-up for the PEN/Martha Albrand Award for the Art of the Memoir; Hannah’s Daughters: Six Generations of an American Family, 1876—1976; and All the Right Enemies: The Life and Murder of Carlo Tresca, a New York Times Notable Book. Her work has appeared in The New York Times Magazine, The New York Times Book Review, and Grand Street. She was born and raised and now lives in New York.


From the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks (June 12, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0812972651
• ISBN-13: 978-0812972658
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.2 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #987,490 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

0 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Voice, June 12, 2009

By	Leo Vanderpot - See all my reviews

There is to me a question here about the author's voice, something that perhaps we were warned against way back -- in Strunk or Strunk and White -- not to assume a breezy manner. Humor is so hard to write and alas the voices we find most funny are the voices that try the least. On the other hand, Gallagher tells very good stories: the one about Rose and Albert that begins on page 25 is oh so grand -- and Gallagher proves again that there are no stories like the stories we learn growing up!