Crooked Smile

Henry Gallagher is going to die. His liver is failing, and with each drink his chances of living past age thirty crumble around him. Over a chaotic two-year blur, he stumbles through inebriated nihilism strengthened with each self-destructive act, reveling in an unending parade of violence, blackouts, half-hearted AA meetings, psych ward stints, dangerous sexual encounters, suicidal behavior, and shattered relationships. Two events force Henry to look inward and face the disturbing truths left to fester for so many years, drenched in booze, but always staring up at him from the bottom of a whiskey bottle: during his darkest hour he receives an offer that threatens to change the trajectory of his life forever-and a mental diagnosis that, in Henry's mind, makes him more monster than man.In his highly personal and confessional style, Jack Moody's brutally honest and scathingly witty autobiographical debut novel follows the hero's journey of a man hurtling into the depths of addiction, mental illness, and self-destruction, while wrestling with his survival instinct and self-awareness that his journey will-inevitably soon, with his shield or on it-come to an end.