Scars from a Memoir by Marni Mann

“I could make up a story to cover the last eight years, but the scars on my arms told the
truth. So did my ankles, the skin between my toes, even the veins that had burst on my
breasts. Did my battle wounds really prove I was a survivor? Or was I too damaged to be glued back together?”

Nicole had only one skyline to remind her of the freedom she’d lost—a tattoo of inked
buildings dotting the skies of Boston, crisscrossed by scars. Heroin had owned her,
replaced everyone and everything she’d once loved. The past was supposed to be behind
her. It wasn’t, but that was the price of addiction.

Two men love her; one fills a void, and the other gives her hope of a future. Will love
find a way to help her sing a lullaby to addiction, or will her scars be her final good-bye?

When my story began, I was 19-years-old, a college dropout, living on my parents’ couch in Maine. I was…lost. There was pain gnawing inside me; memories I wanted to forget. My parents nagged me to meet with a therapist. They didn’t get it. I wanted to be left alone. I didn’t want to talk. I didn’t want to listen. And I sure as hell didn’t want to meet with a counselor who held a notebook and wrote as I talked, pretending like she cared or understood. So I didn’t. I convinced my best friend to move away from that hole of a town and we landed in Boston.

Heroin was my air and the silence between my breaths. It had a hold of me; it was like we were chained together. And those shackles weren’t just around my wrists—they were tied around my brain too.

I thought Boston would stop the nightmares that woke me in the middle of the night; smoking weed would take away that dirtiness I felt; drinking wouldn’t let me remember the dreams. Nothing helped. I was aimlessly wandering from one haze to another, letting the wind pull my feet, and place them where they needed to be. What was I looking for? I didn’t know. I didn’t know much of anything until I found something. Something that only wanted my attention. Something that wouldn’t hurt me. And touch me.

I could make up a story to cover the last eight years, but the scars on my arms told the truth. So did my ankles, the skin between my toes, even the veins that had burst on my breasts. I was like that board my dad used to tack papers to in his office. Eventually, the cork fell apart because it had too many holes, and my dad got a new one. Did my battle wounds really prove I was a survivor? Or was I too damaged to be glued back together?

I’d tasted drugs before. I had smoked my way through high school and sampled the harder stuff in college. Coke gave me energy. Ecstasy made me dance. Shrooms made me hallucinate. But heroin…shit, heroin was kind. It didn’t trip me out like acid or bring me into a dark hole like PCP. It showed me the quietness of the waves.

The dragon was back, loud and begging, clogging my mind. He missed the old Nicole, the one who sacrificed her body and morals to be with him. I rolled to my side and pulled a pillow over my open ear. It didn’t help. His screaming was on the inside, and he demanded I go downstairs, take a pill, crush it with a hammer, and sniff every speck. He lived inside that powder, and his touch could rub all my spots at once. He could show me the beauty behind the sun, the depth of water, the soft petals of a flower tickling up my arms. His words would be my lullaby. My body would shudder for hours.

I remember the D.A.R.E program at school, the posters they showed, and the consequences they listed. I remember when my parents and I had “the talk” about sex and drugs. I obviously didn’t listen. Someone should have made me listen. They should have taken me to the morgue and showed me the face of an addict who had died from an overdose. They should have taken me to the streets, made me eat out of a garbage can, and sell my body to complete strangers because that’s exactly what was waiting for me once heroin entered my body. I’m the reason addiction awareness is important. I’m the example. I’m the junkie who was given a second chance. But did I get clean?

My memoir is no damn fairytale.

When I met Marni Mann, I knew, through her eyes and her words, the world would be. It wasn’t long after she welcomed me as a writer into her community – it was hers, not mine, but it belonged to greats like Mann, Denmon, and Chester - and showed me the way of that world. It wasn’t two dimensional, white, framed by a thick black line, like so many of us trick ourselves into believing, but gray, with fine lines cutting into its core. Everything is a gray area, as Marni tells me in her stories, simultaneously beautiful and hideous, dark and way too damn bright, heartbreaking, and heart-making. This is what makes Marni Mann one of my favorite writers. She tells it like it is. And as a reader, you feel it… like it is.

My 5-star review of Memoirs Aren’t Fairytales

Personally, I can’t wait to lose myself in Scars from a Memoir as I did in Memoirs Aren’t Fairytales. Once Marni has touched you with her stories, (I know from experience) she’d love to chat with you on Twitter, her website, Facebook, or on Goodreads.

A New Englander at heart, Marni Mann, now a Floridian is inspired by the sandy beaches and hot pink sunsets of Sarasota. A writer of literary fiction, she taps a mainstream appeal and shakes worldwide taboos, taking her readers on a dark, harrowing, and gritty journey. When she’s not nose deep in her laptop, she’s scouring for chocolate, traveling, reading, or walking her four-legged children. Scars from a Memoir is her second book, a sequel to the highly regarded Memoirs Aren’t Fairytales: A Story of Addiction.

Read this, then read that.

“My imagination runs too deep to abandon it. I hope. Every day I dream. I will not stop. I can’t. The impossible thrives in me. Like… Alice in Wonderland, you know? That’s my life.“

A snippet from that novel I have been *occasionally* cheating on Amber Passion with. Just a little something I thought I’d share. More on that after the release of book 3 herself.

In the meantime, BOOKS. Some awesomeness I’ve read lately, that which has inspired me, not only in my writing but in my living, in the way I see the world in all its beauty.

Masterpieces of the written word I think you ALL should check out with some excerpts of my reviews of those masterpieces:

(I, um, genre hop. A lot.)

The Scorpio Races by Maggie Stiefvater
YA Fantasy/Romance
“As a writer about to release her third novel, all I can think is how much I want to write one like Maggie Stiefvater when I grow up.”

Memoirs Aren’t Fairytales by Marni Mann
Mainstream Fiction
“I don’t know how to describe Mann’s writing. The way the darkness she bleeds pulls you in and catches you by the throat until you beg her to stop. That saying, about taking all the words in the world and putting them in any order still couldn’t describe the way I feel about you? How much I love you? I guess it’s kind of like that.”

Oh. And if you like paranormal romance, Violet Midnight by Allie Burke is pretty good, too. ; )

Happy Reading!

Interview: Marni Mann, Author of Memoirs Aren’t Fairytales

When I was in fifth grade, a cop came into our classroom.  We were all wearing our black t-shirts with D.A.R.E across the front.  We stared at the cop while he paced in front of the chalkboard, showing us poster-sized pictures of different kinds of drugs.  When he got to heroin, he said it was like a terrorist.  I didn’t know what that meant, but I knew it was something bad.  During my sophomore year at UMaine, I watched on TV the attack on the twin towers.  How could that cop compare tragedy and murder to this harmless white powder?  Something that made me feel this incredible shouldn’t be categorized as a terrorist.

Coke gave me energy.  Ecstasy made me dance and want to be touched.  Shrooms made me hallucinate.  But heroin.  Shit.  Heroin was kind.  It didn’t trip me out like acid or bring me into a dark hole like PCP.  It showed me the quietness of the waves.

Memoirs Aren’t Fairytales by Marni Mann.

A dark, gritty story featuring Nicole, a… drug addict. This isn’t princesses or the Disney Channel or… the color pink. This is… addiction.

“Mrs. Mann’s book will capture your heart at the beginning, hold you riveted with the turning of each page, and choke the life from you as the story unfolds.”

A… disease.

“It’s been a while since I’ve been so moved by a book.”

Reality, for some. For more, than we, as a society, care or are willing to admit.

“Mrs. Mann writes from the depths of her soul and you can feel her love for this book on every page.”

This is life. Death. And someplace in between. This is… A Story of Addiction.

~~~

I feel honored to have the author of Memoirs Aren’t Fairytales over for a chat. I feel honored to… know her.

I met Marni Mann through a group of friends – writers – called the BNFF, or Best Nerd Friends Forever. I interacted with her on Twitter, Facebook, through her blog, and quickly realized that I… love her. She is a kind, lovable, beautiful person whom I adore, and I’m ecstatic for the chance to get to know her and her novel better, and to share her, with you.

Welcome to in the clouds, Marni.

Allie: If only for the sake of mandatory interview material, I gotta ask. Tell me something about yourself.

Marni: Music is a necessity and it can never be loud enough. I wish they made cinnamon toast and bagels without raisins. Raisins are just gross. I *might* use my fingers to count because I can’t wrap my head around an equation. In writing, there are no exact answers. Manicures make me happy. Without my iPhone, I would never survive on a deserted island.

Allie: Memoirs Aren’t Fairytales is no lighthearted… anything. It’s quite… dark, and… deep. What made you want to tell this story?

Marni: Someone really close to me overdosed. I felt like I’d been hit by a train. I know when it comes to addiction, overdosing is something you should expect, but nothing can prepare you for that phone call. Nothing. The other addicts in my life weren’t doing much better. Addiction was all over the news and appeared on several of the TV shows I watched. It was mentioned on the radio. There was a billboard in my town that advertised a rehab clinic and I drove past it twice a day. Everyone I talked to used the word addiction in some form or another. Were these signs? I had to believe it was more than a coincidence.

After that phone call, I was in pain. I cried. A lot. I shared my feelings with the people around me until I ran out of the things to say. But the pain was still there. Writing had always been a release, so I took a notebook and pen, and poured my soul onto the paper. A few hours later, I reread my words and it wasn’t in diary form or an account of the overdose. I’d created a character, Nicole, and she was the source of my hurt. Everything I was feeling, I took out on her. I had something here. I’d written the first chapter of a—novel? And so it began…

Allie: What was it like, taking on the life of Nicole… becoming her? Did you feel for her? Do you now?

Marni: In order to write for an addict, I had to become one. Before eyes start popping out of sockets, I didn’t become a heroin addict or try heroin, or live as a junkie. I mean I had to open my skin and allow Nicole to move in. Her story became my past. Her words swirled around in my head and my lips spoke them. Her life was messy, tumultuous, exhausting, and that’s exactly how I felt. Many nights I stared at the ceiling, too upset to close my eyes, because of the horrifying things she was experiencing. No one should have to go through what she did.

At first, I wanted to put my hands on her cheeks, stare into her eyes, and shout, “What the hell are you doing?” But as her story began to unfold, I realized she wasn’t intentionally hurting her readers. Just like the addicts in my life, they weren’t purposefully hurting me. Nicole had a disease. One that was making decisions for her, instigating her, persuading her to choose wrong instead of right. That’s the cycle of addiction. It’s devastating and painful to watch, and it was even harder to write.

I absolutely feel for her. I want to help and protect her. I want to hold her in my arms and tell her everything is going to be okay. That’s not realistic. You can’t help an addict until they’re ready to help themselves. Is Nicole ready? Does she get sober? You’ll have to read to find out.

Allie: What inspires you to write? Do you have a favorite book, author, a… dog?

Marni: When I watch the news, I can’t relate to the people holding that oversized check from the Florida lottery, showing some number with way too many zeros, or the guy who broke records by catching the biggest shark in the Gulf of Mexico. I’m inspired by the darkness that breathes along the edge of life, memoires too difficult to forget, experiences that have broken you, and how you overcome these tragedies.

When I read a book, I’m taken to a different place, introduced to characters I’ve never met, faces I’ve never seen, and stories I’ve never heard. Books maximize each of my senses, and when it becomes too much and I feel like I’m going to explode, it instantly becomes a favorite. At the same time, because each author has such a unique style, I can’t say I adore one over the other. I’m just in love with the written word.

I have two dogs and they’re sitting next to me as I type this. Bella, a yellow Lab, and Codi, a Maltese, and they’re pretty badass. I might be just a little biased.

Allie: What’s next for Marni Mann?

Marni: I’m writing the sequel, which I hope will be released by summer 2012. It’s untitled at the moment, but that’s because the book is only half written and I can’t give it a title until I know exactly where I’m taking the story.

Once the sequel is finished, it’s on to a fresh topic. I have another literary/mainstream novel that I’ve started outlining and it will also be dark and gritty. I don’t believe in fairytales and happy endings only happen during…

Thanks for hosting me, Allie. As always, it’s such a pleasure to be a part of your world.

 

The pleasure… is all mine.