The Joplin Globe, Joplin, MO

Globe Life

Related Photos

Discussion

November 28, 2008

Book review: Memoir an unmerciful mirror

‘The Night of the Gun’

By David Carr

Although I love a good autobiography, the one genre I tend to avoid is the addiction memoir. I usually find them mawkish and somewhat lacking in truthfulness, as evidenced by the debacle with James Frey’s “A Million Little Pieces.”

When I picked up “The Night of the Gun” by David Carr, it was with some trepidation. But I had heard him interviewed on National Public Radio and was intrigued by the book’s subtitle: “A reporter investigates the darkest story of his life. His own.”

His story did not disappoint. There are few books about which I say this, but I hated to put it down when sleep or work beckoned. Carr details his descent from hard-partying college student to full-blown crack addict, as well as repeated trips to rehab. Along the way, he raises twin daughters, squanders opportunities both professional and personal, battles cancer, and becomes a successful journalist.

What struck me most about “The Night of the Gun” was Carr’s lack of self-pity. He takes a microscopic, unsympathetic look at himself. He had a family that loved him, some education, a lot of talent, and a series of jobs that would have allowed him to advance far in his chosen career had he managed to stay clean.

Basically, he was a major screw-up, and it was no one’s fault but his own. As he puts it, “Truly ennobling personal narratives describe a person overcoming the bad hand that fate has dealt him, not someone like me, who takes good cards and sets them on fire.”

As expected, he admits to abusing ridiculous amounts of illegal substances, but he also doesn’t spare the reader the grittier aspects of his dark period. He confesses to dealing drugs, beating up his girlfriend, pulling a gun on a good friend, even leaving his infant daughters alone in a car on a cold Minnesota night while he went to score drugs.

The latter two incidents become central to the book. “The Night of the Gun” touches on an event that was a mystery to Carr until he started researching his hazy past. (He put his reporting skills to work, spending years interviewing people who had known him at various points in his life, and examining old medical and arrest records.)

He recollects a night when he ended up on a good friend’s doorstep, very high and very confrontational; his friend met him at the door with a gun. Or so Carr thought, until he interviewed his friend years later. He closes this first chapter with a sentence replete with meaning: “This is a story about who had the gun.”

The winter night he abandoned his daughters in a car for hours was his rock-bottom. The walk back to his car — “with drugs in my pocket and a cold dread in all corners of my being” — must have been the longest of his life. He knew they were alive only when he saw their breath.

“God had looked after the twins, and by proxy me, but I realized at that moment that I had made a mistake. He could not easily forgive. I made a decision at that instant never to be that man again.”

From that point on, his story takes a more hopeful turn, though not a completely charmed one. His daughters go into temporary foster care while he again checks in to rehab. (The passage in which he describes rehab staff disinfecting the oozing track marks in his arms left me a bit queasy.)

After completing treatment, he takes back his daughters and gradually rebuilds his life, only temporarily sidetracked by a battle with Hodgkin’s lymphoma. He begins to eke out a living in journalism, building on his successes and repairing his tarnished image. He marries and has another child.

Yet he continues to fight his demons. It makes for painful reading when he describes how he started drinking again, nearly losing everything he had worked so hard to rebuild.

As the book closes, Carr admits that his sobriety — like any addict’s, I suppose — is not an entirely rock-solid thing: “I could be drunk tomorrow or shooting dope even as you read this but the chances of that are low as long as I make a daily decision to embrace who I really am and then be satisfied with that at the end of the day.”

In keeping with the candor that imbues “Night of the Gun,” Carr remains realistic but hopeful to the end. And despite his determination not to be heroic, there is something ennobling about that.

Lisa E. Brown is the administrative assistant at the Joplin Public Library.

Text Only
Globe Life
  • 051913_star-rack2.jpg Prototype of a drying rack for Stars of Hope earns award, emotional response

    Michael Moritz, Travis Coffee and Kenneth Paylor had no idea that an assignment for their senior design class at Missouri Southern State University would win an award or the emotional gratitude from a service organization.

    May 20, 2013 2 Photos

  • ryan richardson Ryan Richardson: Groups give tips for preventing dog bites

    When I was a teenager in the '90s I had an unfortunate incident with my neighbor's dog, a Brittany, that I had grown up with. It took a chunk out of my thigh when I went into the neighbors' yard to retrieve a ball.

    May 20, 2013 1 Photo

  • 091108-Frankie-Meyer_c.jpg Frankie Meyer: Information is only as good as its source

    Those details later become crucial as contradictory information is found, which it will be. How can one decide which detail is correct if the sources of the details are unknown?

    May 20, 2013 1 Photo

  • Jeana Gockley 2013.jpg Jeana Gockley: Library lines up reading club books

    The Joplin Public Library's annual Summer Reading Club kicks off on Tuesday, May 28, so in preparation for a great summer of reading, I have been digging for titles that fit with this year's "Dig Into Reading" theme.

    May 20, 2013 1 Photo

  • 091108-Frankie-Meyer_c.jpg Frankie Meyer: Prepare for holiday visits to cemeteries

    Memorial Day weekend is the ideal time to not only decorate the graves of loved ones, but also learn the location of unmarked graves -- and learn about relatives who are buried nearby. That weekend is also a great time to contact living relatives.

    May 13, 2013 1 Photo

  • images_sizedimage_032123610 Patty Crane: Mystery series should appeal to Reacher fans

    In the novel "Taken" by Robert Crais, a bajadores is a predator that kidnaps people being smuggled into the country. The bajadores, the Syrian, demands ransom from families of the people he kidnaps. His ransom demands are low, and as long as the families pay, the demands continue.

    May 13, 2013 1 Photo

  • ryan richardson Ryan Richardson: Harness works better than a leash

    This is the time of year to take your dog outside to enjoy the weather. You both get exercise, you bond more, and it gives you an opportunity to work together as a team. I take my dog out as much as I can, and my dog is happy to see other dogs when we go on walks.

    May 13, 2013 1 Photo

  • r050713academicstars5.jpg Mutual admiration: Academic Team members thank teachers for inspiration, drive

    Members of The Joplin Globe's All-Area Academic Excellence Team thanked teachers for inspiring them to push themselves during a recognition banquet Monday at Missouri Southern State University.

    May 13, 2013 1 Photo

  • images_sizedimage_312124454 Linda Cannon: Book covers subtleties' effects on humans

    I'm always a sucker for books on what makes people tick, so I grabbed "Drunk Tank Pink: And Other Unexpected Forces that Shape How We Think, Feel, and Behave" by Adam Alter as soon as I saw it. Alter holds a Ph.D. in applied psychology from Princeton and is an assistant professor at NYU.

    May 6, 2013 1 Photo

  • 091108-Frankie-Meyer_c.jpg Frankie Meyer: Old home sites treasures to discover

    We genealogists do a similar activity as part of our research. The treasures that we seek are old home sites. Instead of using GPS coordinates, we use clues such as the presence of rusted metal, cellar holes and vintage plants.

    May 6, 2013 1 Photo