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Smashed: Story of a Drunken Girlhood
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Binding: Hardcover
Dewey Decimal Number: 616.861092
EAN: 9781419353239
ISBN: 0670033766
Label: Viking Adult
Manufacturer: Viking Adult
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 368
Publication Date: February 07, 2005
Publisher: Viking Adult
Release Date: February 07, 2005
Studio: Viking Adult
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Editorial Review:
From earliest experimentation to habitual excess to full-blown abuse, twenty-four-year-old Koren Zailckas leads us through her experience of a terrifying trend among young girls, exploring how binge drinking becomes routine, how it becomes the usual. With the stylistic freshness of a poet and the dramatic gifts of a novelist, Zailckas describes her first sip at fourteen, alcohol poisoning at sixteen, a blacked-out sexual experience at nineteen, total disorientation after waking up in an unfamiliar New York City apartment at twenty-two, when she realized she had to stop, and all the depression, rage, troubled friendships, and sputtering romantic connections in between. Zailckass unflinching candor and exquisite analytical eye gets to the meaning beneath the seeming banality of girls getting drunk. She persuades us that her story is the story of thousands of girls like her who are not alcoholicsyetbut who use booze as a short cut to courage, a stand-in for good judgment, and a bludgeon for shyness, each of them failing to see how their emotional distress, unarticulated hostility, and depression are entangled with their socially condoned binging.
Like the contemporary masterpieces The Liars Club, Autobiography of a Face, and Jarhead, Smashed is destined to become a classic. A crucial book for any woman who has succumbed to oblivion through booze, or for anyone ready to face the more subtle repercussions of their own chronic over-drinking or of someone they love, Smashed is an eye-opening, wise, and utterly gripping achievement.
Garnering a vast amount of attention from young people and parents, and from book buyers across the country, Smashed became a media sensation and a New York Times bestseller. Eye- opening and utterly gripping, Koren Zailckas's story is that of thousands of girls like her who are not alcoholics-yet-but who routinely use booze as a shortcut to courage and a stand-in for good judgment. With one stiff sip of Southern Comfort at the age of fourteen, Zailckas is initiated into the world of drinking. From then on, she will drink faithfully, fanatically. In high school, her experimentation will lead to a stomach pumping. In college, her excess will give way to a pattern of self-poisoning that will grow more destructive each year. At age twenty-two, Zailckas will wake up in an unfamiliar apartment in New York City, elbow her friend who is passed out next to her, and ask, ""Where are we?"" Smashed is a sober look at how she got there and, after years of blackouts and smashups, what it took for her to realize she had to stop drinking. Smashed is an astonishing literary debut destined to become a classic.
Customer Reviews
Average Rating: 
Rating:  - Not what I thought it would be...
This book isn't about alcohol abuse, really. It's about a girl from a priviledged family who grows up with lots of friends, becomes a college cheerleader/sorority sister, interns in New York, makes and maintains friendships along the way, and should be an all-around productive, happy citizen. But this girl, from an early age, wants to be a writer. She is especially awestruck by tortured female writers, like Sylvia Plath and Virginia Woolf. I think she assumed that to be a great writer/poet, suffering ... Read More
Rating:  - shockingly hit home
When I first picked up the book I thought it was fiction. I got into bed and at first was disappointed to find out it was not. However I decided to give it a chance. I was hooked right away. My breath was stolen while I connected to the writer. At my age now I look at my adolescence and young adulthood as if it was someone else but while reading that book it brought back so much emotion. I encouraged my friends and sister to read it because I felt we all could relate and everyone has loved this ... Read More
Rating: - Self-absorbed and not well written
I read this in conjunction with 'Blackout Girl'. Both books suffer from the same disease...that the authors think the facts of their life story are interesting in and of themselves. But they are not. Tales of dysfunctional parents and wild debauchery may make for a good hour on the Jerry Springer Show, they do not necessarily make interesting reading.
The other issue is that most of the writing is cliched and trite to the point of exhaustion. It did get to the point where ... Read More
Rating:  - Not convinced.
I read Smashed while stuck at an airport half the night due to a tornado in the area and managed to finish it on the airplane on my way back home. While I have to admit the book kept me distracted from my situation, I didn't particularly care for her writing style. The absurd amount of metaphors she used were a bit distracting.
My main problem with the book is that she seems to be glorifying what she went through. She insists she is not an alcoholic and I simply cannot understand that. ... Read More
Rating: - This book really made me think....
Smashed: Story of a Drunken Girlhood is a work of nonfiction by Koren Zailckas, chronicling her love affair with alcohol. The book's organizational structure is telling itself, split into four sections: "Initiation," "The Usual," "Excess," and "Abuse." It begins with Koren's first taste, swigging sips of Southern Comfort on the sly, peer-pressured into it by her friend Natalie at age 14. Koren then moves through high school and college and has what almost anyone would consider a normal relationship with ... Read More
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