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Portrait of an Addict as a Young Man: A Memoir
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.
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Portrait of an Addict as a Young Man: A Memoir
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 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 Clegg is a literary agent in New York. He is the author of Portrait of an Addict as a Young Man and Ninety Days.
What People are Saying About This
Elinor Lipman
I devoured Portrait of an Addict as a Young Man, couldn't put it down. The writing throughout is beautiful, and all the while it is reportorial and efficient and honest—a rare combination of feats!
Irvine Welsh
Bill Clegg's story of a man-largely locked in hotel rooms, engaged in a desperate, heart-wrenching battle with himself—is destined to become a cult classic of writing on drug addiction.
Danielle Trussoni
Bill Clegg's memoir is a startling, hair-raising, and compulsively readable account of one man's descent into the hell of addiction.
Andrew O'Hagan
Portrait of an Addict as a Young Man is an instant classic. Anybody who knows anything about addiction will feel morally altered by this book. To an extraordinary degree, it has both beauty and truth.
