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Lot Six
Lot Six: A Memoir | David Adjmi
7 posts | 2 read | 10 to read
David Adjmi has written one of the great American memoirs, a heartbreaking, hilarious story of what it means to make things up, including yourself. A wild tale of lack and lies, galling humiliations and majestic reinventions, this touching, coruscating joy of a book is an answer to that perennial question: how should a person be? Olivia Laing, author of Crudo and The Lonely City In a world where everyone is inventing a self, curating a feed and performing a fantasy of life, what does it mean to be a person? In his grandly entertaining debut memoir, playwright David Adjmi explores how human beings create themselves, and how artists make their lives into art. Brooklyn, 1970s. Born into the ruins of a Syrian Jewish family that once had it all, David is painfully displaced. Trapped in an insular religious community that excludes him and a family coming apart at the seams, he is plunged into suicidal depression. Through adolescence, David tries to suppress his homosexual feelings and fit in, but when pushed to the breaking point, he makes the bold decision to cut off his family, erase his past, and leave everything he knows behind. There's only one problem: who should he be? Bouncing between identities he steals from the pages of fashion magazines, tomes of philosophy, sitcoms and foreign films, and practically everyone he meetsfrom Rastafarians to French preppiesDavid begins to piece together an entirely new adult self. But is this the foundation for a life, or just a kind of quicksand? Moving from the glamour and dysfunction of 1970s Brooklyn, to the sybaritic materialism of Reagans 1980s to post-9/11 New York, Lot Six offers a quintessentially American tale of an outsider striving to reshape himself in the funhouse mirror of American culture. Adjmis memoir is a genre bending Knstlerroman in the spirit of Charles Dickens and Alison Bechdel, a portrait of the artist in the throes of a life and death crisis of identity. Raw and lyrical, and written in gleaming prose that veers effortlessly between hilarity and heartbreak, Lot Six charts Adjmis search for belonging, identity, and what it takes to be an artist in America.
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Cinfhen
Lot Six: A Memoir | David Adjmi
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Pickpick

You know that expression ; a natural born entertainer, well David Adjmi was definitely destined to entertain. His memoir of growing up in an Orthodox Jewish Syrian community was full of hilarious observations and uncomfortable truths. David is a child of the eighties, so I delighted in his tales & memories of all things 80‘s. This book had me laughing & crying probably because the narration was 💯 on point!! I listened via #Scribd 🎧

squirrelbrain I so wanted to read this - but it‘s not on Scribd in the UK ☹️ 3y
Cinfhen Bummer @squirrelbrain maybe they‘ll add it 🤞🏼🤞🏼 3y
TrishB It‘s also really expensive here- hardback nearly (d2 or audio Cd for over (e0!! 3y
Cinfhen It‘s definitely not worth that kind of investment @TrishB ....hopefully it‘ll be a #UKKindleDeal 😁❤️ 3y
TrishB You know I love keeping my eye out for those! 3y
71 likes1 stack add5 comments
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Cinfhen
Lot Six: A Memoir | David Adjmi
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Really enjoying this bittersweet memoir about coming out and shedding your religion ( I‘ll admit, as a very firm believer of Judaism, David‘s antagonistic view is difficult to hear)

TrishB Always a challenge when people‘s views are so opposite our own! 3y
Cinfhen It just made me sad @TrishB but I respect his POV and belief system 3y
77 likes2 comments
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Cinfhen
Lot Six: A Memoir | David Adjmi
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This memoir is whacky pants!!!! I‘m just gobsmacked 🤭I‘m not sure if this book will have universal appeal but I‘m transfixed.

emilyhaldi Sounds fascinating! 3y
71 likes4 stack adds1 comment
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Cinfhen
Lot Six: A Memoir | David Adjmi
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I totally get why my brother recommended this memoir to me... it‘s a throwback to the early 1980‘s Jewish community in Brooklyn. With references to Dallas, Ton Sur Ton clothing,Against All Odds and Wham, I‘m having major nostalgia. I‘m also thinking of a classmate named LeaAnne Lavender (yup, that really was her name) who was my direct link to Flatbush & Deal, NJ. If you‘re looking for a #JewishMC #Booked2021 this one is 😍

squirrelbrain Sounds great - stacked. 3y
emilyhaldi I wanna know more about LeaAnne Lavender 💜 3y
Cinfhen Hahaha...whatever image the name conjures @emilyhaldi is pretty much all you need to know 😉 I need to find my HS yearbook....photos would be epic 😊 it‘s really bringing out my inner 80‘s girl @squirrelbrain 🥰 3y
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Reviewsbylola Lol our cousin went to school in the 1980s with a girl whose first name was Cigarette. 😬😅 3y
Cinfhen Oh God...that‘s bad!!!! @Reviewsbylola 😐 3y
Reviewsbylola She‘s embraced it apparently. Even now, on FB, she goes by Cigarette. 😦 3y
61 likes1 stack add6 comments
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Cinfhen
Lot Six: A Memoir | David Adjmi
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My brother recommended this one to me/ let‘s see...

Cathythoughts Striking post 3y
54 likes2 stack adds2 comments
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sakeriver
Lot Six: A Memoir | David Adjmi
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I wasn‘t expected to relate to this book as much as I did, but there‘s something about the way Adjmi writes about his younger self that felt very familiar to me, in a way that felt both validating and sometimes too close for comfort. It‘s a story of longing—for a sense of self, for knowing how or even whether one fits into the world—and of what it means to invent a self. I thought it was quite well done.

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sakeriver
Lot Six: A Memoir | David Adjmi
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