This is the most perfect book. Yes, perfect has degrees, or so life teaches me. I want to quote many paragraphs, to say, "This is me. This is also me. This is me, too. Hear this! Savor this!" The book gives rise to those desires because Jeanette Winterson really looks at herself. She sees. And she speaks the secret truths (perfectly, eloquently) that we all know (but can not express).

I want to send this book to loved ones and say, "If you can see her, truly see her, then you will be in the land I inhabit. And if you are there, when I meet you on the path, you will see me."

There are differences. My self-destructive reaction to childhood crazy was mostly self directed. And I am not scrappy. But the books-as-redeemer and the feelings and the having to find the bottom before you can really, truly live. That I know. Don't you? Have you really, truly lived? I predict that she will. And I can not wait to hear more from her.

She is, arguably, our most brilliant contemporary wordsmith. My words in review can not do her justice. The book is her craftsmanship, her craftsmanship is the book. If ever there was proof of Malcom Gladwell's 10,000 hours theory, she is it.