Bill Clegg

"On the eve of her daughter's wedding, June Reid's life is completely devastated when a shocking disaster takes the lives of her daughter, her daughter's fiance, her ex-husband, and her boyfriend, Luke--her entire family ... Alone and directionless, June drives across the country ... In her wake, a community emerges, weaving a beautiful and surprising web of connections through shared heartbreak. From the couple running a motel on the Pacific Ocean where June eventually settles into a quiet half-life, to the wedding's caterer whose bill has been forgotten, to Luke's mother, the shattered outcast of the town--everyone touched by the tragedy is changed as truths about their near and far histories finally come to light."--Provided by publisher.

Did You Ever Have a Family

“Reading [The End of the Day] is like studying a stained-glass window up close, each piece bright and sharply cut, but when you step back and see it as a whole you discover a large, beautiful, mysterious work of art.” —David Ebershoff, New York Times bestselling author of The Danish Girl and The 19th Wife Following his acclaimed New York Times bestseller, Did You Ever Have a Family, Bill Clegg returns with a deeply moving, emotionally resonant second novel about the complicated bonds and breaking points of friendship, the corrosive forces of secrets, the heartbeat of longing, and the redemption found in forgiveness. A retired widow in rural Connecticut wakes to an unexpected visit from her childhood best friend whom she hasn’t seen in forty-nine years. A man arrives at a Pennsylvania hotel to introduce his estranged father to his newborn daughter and finds him collapsed on the floor of the lobby. A sixty-seven-year-old taxi driver in Kauai receives a phone call from the mainland that jars her back to a traumatic past. These seemingly disconnected lives come together as half-century-old secrets begin to surface. It is in this moment that Bill Clegg reminds us how choices—to connect, to betray, to protect—become our legacy. Deeply observed and beautifully written, this novel is a feat of storytelling, capturing sixty years within the framework of one fateful day.

The End of the Day

"The author chronicles the dark secret life he led when, despite building for himself a respectable career as a literary agent, he embraced crack cocaine; went on a two-month binge; and lost his job, his home and all his money."

A Memoir

Portrait of an Addict as a Young Man

The goal is ninety. Just ninety clean and sober days to loosen the hold of the addiction that caused Bill Clegg to lose everything. With six weeks of his most recent rehab behind him he returns to New York and attends two or three meetings each day. It is in these refuges that he befriends essential allies including Polly, who struggles daily with her own cycle of recovery and relapse, and the seemingly unshakably sober Asa. At first, the support is not enough: Clegg relapses with only three days left. Written with uncompromised immediacy, NINETY DAYS begins where Portrait of an Addict as a Young Man ends-and tells the wrenching story of Clegg's battle to reclaim his life. As any recovering addict knows, hitting rock bottom is just the beginning.

A Memoir of Recovery

Ninety Days

This book of dark secrets opens with a blaze. On the eve of her daughter's wedding, June Reid's world is destroyed when her entire family - her daughter, her daughter's fiance, her ex-husband, and her boyfriend, Luke - all die in a house fire, with June the only survivor. She drives away, stricken and alone, from her small Connecticut town to a beach on the Pacific Northwest, and in the turbulence of grief and gossip left in her wake we slowly make sense of the unimaginable. The novel is a gathering of voices, and each testimony has a new revelation about what led to the catastrophe - the wedding caterer who never got paid; the teenage pothead; the staff in the motel where June lives like a ghost; Luke's mother, the town's pariah - everyone touched by the tragedy finds themselves caught in the undertow, as their secret histories finally come to light. Elegant and devastating, and one of the most accomplished first novels of the year, Did You Ever Have a Family is an absorbing, unforgettable story that reveals humanity at its worst and best, through loss and love, fracture and forgiveness. At the book's heart is the idea of family - the ones we are born with and the ones we create.

Did you ever have a family

Portrait of an Addict as a Young Man: A Memoir

The author chronicles the dark secret life he led when, despite building for himself a respectable career as a literary agent, he embraced crack cocaine; went on a two-month binge; and lost his job, his home, and all his money.

Portrait of an addict as a young man

Jeanette Winterson

Stone Gods

What makes one of the most gifted, charismatic and successful literary agents in New York fall into full-blown crack-addiction: a collapse that would cost him his business, his home, many of his friends and - very nearly - his life? In his utterly compulsive narrative, Bill Clegg leads us through the grimiest back-rooms of Manhattan's underbelly, through scenes of blank-eyed sex and squalor, into the febrile paranoia of a mind gone out of control.

This book of dark secrets opens with a blaze. On the morning of her daughter's wedding, June Reid's house goes up in flames, destroying her entire family - her present, her past and her future. Fleeing from the carnage, stricken and alone, June finds herself in a motel room by the ocean, hundreds of miles from her Connecticut home, held captive by memories and the mistakes she has made with her only child, Lolly, and her partner, Luke. In the turbulence of grief and gossip left in June's wake we slowly make sense of the unimaginable. The novel is a gathering of voices, and each testimony has a new revelation about what led to the catastrophe - Luke's alienated mother Lydia, the watchful motel owners, their cleaner Cissy, the teenage pothead who lives nearby - everyone touched by the tragedy finds themselves caught in the undertow, as their secret histories finally come to light. Lit by the clarity of understanding that true sadness brings, Did You Ever Have a Family is an elegant, unforgettable story that reveals humanity at its worst and best, through loss and love, fracture and forgiveness. At the book's heart is the idea of family - the ones we are born with and the ones we create - and the desire, in the face of everything, to go on living.

'A writer with a profound comprehension of emotional destruction, loss and redemption' Sunday Times A retired widow in rural Connecticut wakes to an unexpected visit from her childhood best friend whom she hasn't seen in forty-nine years. A man arrives at a Bethlehem, Pennsylvania hotel to introduce his estranged father to his newborn daughter and finds him collapsed on the floor of the lobby. A sixty-seven-year-old taxi driver in Kauai receives a phone call from the mainland that jars her back to a traumatic past. These seemingly disconnected lives come together as half-century-old secrets begin to surface over the course of one fateful day...

Following his acclaimed New York Times bestseller Did You Ever Have a Family, Bill Clegg returns with a “delicate, deeply observed, and deftly crafted” (Nickolas Butler, author of Shotgun Lovesongs) second novel about the complicated bonds and breaking points of friendship, the corrosive forces of secrets, the heartbeat of longing, and the redemption found in forgiveness. A retired widow in rural Connecticut wakes to an unexpected visit from her childhood best friend whom she hasn’t seen in forty-nine years. A man arrives at a Pennsylvania hotel to introduce his estranged father to his newborn daughter and finds him collapsed on the floor of the lobby. A sixty-seven-year-old taxi driver in Kauai receives a phone call from the mainland that jars her back to a traumatic past. These seemingly disconnected lives come together as half-century-old secrets begin to surface. It is in this moment that Bill Clegg reminds us how choices—to connect, to betray, to protect—become our legacy. “Written in lyrical, beautiful prose that makes even waking up seem like a poetic event” (Good Morning America), this novel is a feat of storytelling, capturing sixty years within the framework of one fateful day.

Come Bill Clegg, giovane agente letterario di successo, si lascia travolgere dalla tossicodipendenza e perde tutto, dal lavoro agli affetti, sprofondando in una vita fatta di mille alberghi tutti uguali, voli aerei mai presi, avidità e paranoia, incontri maschili e sesso consumato senza ombra di passione. Un memoir lacerante: l'esplorazione di una deriva cieca, narrata senza facili giustificazioni e priva di autocompiacimento. La storia di una dipendenza assoluta, senza un vero perché. Una discesa negli abissi della paranoia, raccontata con l'implacabile precisione ed eleganza della grande letteratura.

Ritratto di un tossico da giovane

USA TODAY BESTSELLER • NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • LONGLISTED FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD, MAN BOOKER PRIZE, PEN/ROBERT W. BINGHAM PRIZE, AND ANDREW CARNEGIE MEDAL FOR EXCELLENCE • AN ALA NOTABLE BOOK • NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY Amazon • Library Journal • Booklist • NPR • Kirkus Reviews • Guardian • St. Louis Post-Dispatch • Google Play • Kobo • Literary Hub • Powell’s • Indie Next List Hailed as “masterly” by The New York Times Book Review, “a brilliantly constructed debut set in the aftermath of catastrophic loss” (2015 Man Booker Prize Judges). The stunning debut novel from bestselling author Bill Clegg is a magnificently powerful story about a circle of people who find solace in the least likely of places as they cope with a horrific tragedy. On the eve of her daughter’s wedding, June Reid’s life is upended when a shocking disaster takes the lives of her daughter, her daughter’s fiancé, her ex-husband, and her boyfriend, Luke—her entire family, all gone in a moment. June is the only survivor. Alone and directionless, June drives across the country, away from her small Connecticut town. In her wake, a community emerges, weaving a beautiful and surprising web of connections through shared heartbreak. From the couple running a motel on the Pacific Ocean where June eventually settles into a quiet half-life, to the wedding’s caterer whose bill has been forgotten, to Luke’s mother, the shattered outcast of the town—everyone touched by the tragedy is changed as truths about their near and far histories finally come to light. Elegant and heartrending, and one of the most accomplished fiction debuts of the year, Did You Ever Have a Family is an absorbing, unforgettable tale that reveals humanity at its best through forgiveness and hope. At its core is a celebration of family—the ones we are born with and the ones we create.

Bill Clegg had a thriving business as a literary agent, a supportive partner, trusting colleagues, and loving friends when he walked away from his world and embarked on a two-month crack binge. He had been released from rehab nine months earlier, and his relapse would cost him his home, his money, his career, and very nearly his life. What is it that leads an exceptional young mind want to disappear? Clegg makes stunningly clear the attraction of the drug that had him in its thrall, capturing in scene after scene the drama, tension, and paranoiac nightmare of a secret life--and the exhilarating bliss that came again and again until it was eclipsed almost entirely by doom. He also explores the shape of addiction, how its pattern--not its cause--can be traced to the past. Portrait of an Addict as a Young Man is an utterly compelling narrative--lyrical, irresistible, harsh, honest, and beautifully written--from which you simply cannot look away.

Bill Cleggs skönlitterära debut Familjen jag hade har rosats av kritikerna och nominerats till Man Booker Prize och National Book Award 2015. Det är en berättelse om förlust och tröst, om hur förutfattade meningar kan stå i vägen för sanningen. Och inte minst om familjer – de vi föds in i och de som vi själva skapar. Natten före hennes dotters bröllop slås June Reids liv i spillror. I ett ögonblicks verk förlorar hon alla hon älskar: sin före detta make, sin pojkvän, sin dotter och dotterns blivande man. Hela sin familj. Ensam och utan mål sätter hon sig i sin bil och kör västerut. Hon lämnar allt bakom sig: det lilla samhället i Connecticut, människorna där. Runtomkring henne finns alla som berörs av det som inträffat. Alltifrån pojkvännens mamma, som kvar i staden får handskas med trångsynt skvaller och spekulationer, till paret vars motell vid Stillahavskusten blir Junes tillflyktsort. Deras röster blandas, och fram träder historien om den tragedi som länkat dem samman. Översättare: Manni Kössler, Omslagsformgivare: Johan Petterson

Bill Clegg

About

Books

Join the club