NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER ONE OF NPR'S BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR From the
National Book Award-winning author of Just Kids and M Train, a profound,
beautifully realized memoir in which dreams and reality are vividly woven
into a tapestry of one transformative year. Following a run of concerts at
San Francisco's legendary Fillmore, Patti Smith finds herself tramping the
coast of Santa Cruz. Unfettered by logic or time, she draws us into her
private wonderland as a surreal lunar year begins, bringing with it
unexpected turns, heightened mischief, and inescapable sorrow. In a
stranger's words, Anything is possible: after all, it's the year of the
monkey. For Smith--inveterately curious, always exploring--the year
evolves as one of reckoning with the changes in life's gyre: with loss,
aging, and a dramatic shift in the political landscape of America. Smith
melds the Western landscape with her own dreamscape. Taking us from
California to the Arizona desert; to a Kentucky farm as the amanuensis of a
friend in crisis; to the hospital room of a valued mentor; and by turns to
remembered and imagined places, this haunting memoir blends fact and
fiction with poetic mastery. The unexpected happens; grief and
disillusionment set in. But as Smith heads toward a new decade in her own
life, she offers this balm to the reader: her wisdom, wit, gimlet eye, and
above all, a rugged hope for a better world. Riveting, elegant, often
humorous, illustrated by Smith's signature Polaroids, Year of the Monkey is
a moving and original work, a touchstone for our turbulent times.