**Combining the insight of Anna Quindlen and the comic storytelling of Garrison Keillor with her own singularly outrageous humor, a commentator on NPR's All Things Considered takes us on a tour of the minefield of chance and circumstance that make up a life.

"Winik's voice is so true and clear and compassionate, we're happy to listen to any story she wants to tell." —Los Angeles Times Book Review**

Along the way, she offers razor-sharp takes on everything from adolescence in suburban New Jersey ("Yes, I wanted to be a wild teenage rebel, but I wanted to do it with my parents' blessing") to hellish houseguests and bad-news boyfriends; from the joys of breastfeeding in public to the sometimes-salvation of motherhood.

Candid, passionate, and breathtakingly funny, Marion Winik maintains an unshaken belief that following one's heart is more important than following the rules—and a conviction that the secrets we try to hide often contain the deepest truths.

"A born iconoclast, an aspiring artiste, a feminist vegetarian prodigal daughter, from early youth I considered myself destined to lead a startling life far outside the bounds of convention. I would be famous, dangerous, brilliant and relentlessly cool: a sort of cross between Emma Goldman, Jack Kerouac, and Georgia O'Keeffe.... So where did this station wagon come from?" —from Telling