Nineteen

For fans of Cheryl Strayed’s Wild and Greg Buenzli’s And Then We Hit a Rock comes Leslie Johansen Nack’s emotional follow-up memoir about her battle with addiction following a traumatic childhood—and her inspiring journey toward healing and happiness.

“This is a memoir that will stay with readers long after the final page, not because of its trauma alone, but because of its honesty, grace, and refusal to look away.”—Seattle Book Review, 5 stars

In the mid-1970s, after sailing to French Polynesia with her sisters and father, Leslie Nack returned to the US with her family. In Southern California, she began the integration process back into American life, which meant being tossed back and forth between an alcoholic, mentally ill mother and an abusive, overbearing father who took her to deliver sailboats, sent her on a wilderness survival course, and recovered a stolen boat for an insurance company in the Virgin Islands. During all of that, she and her sisters attempted to free their mentally ill mother from confinement. Life couldn’t be more unpredictable.

At nineteen, her larger-than-life father dies suddenly in a plane crash in Mexico. In the wake of his death, she descends into addiction—caught in a downward spiral, her only solace is her next fix. Ultimately, however, Leslie’s story is one of resilience: she chooses sobriety and happiness, builds a healthy marriage, and raises two children.

At its heart, Nineteen affirms that acquiring new skills and investing in oneself are essential to breaking free from the destructive lessons of childhood. Raw and intense but ultimately hopeful, this sequel to the popular memoir Fourteen tells the rest of Leslie’s turbulent—and incredible—story.