2024 Living Now Book Awards Bronze Medalist in Memoir – Female
Make a Home Out of You
A Memoir
Description
For readers of Drinking: A Love Story by Caroline Knapp comes an unflinching coming-of-age addiction memoir about one woman’s journey to overcome her destructive roots to discover her road to recovery.
Born to an abusive mother and a drug-dealer father, Ginelle Testa is not exactly set up for success—and her early years are just as troubled as one might expect. By the end of her thirteenth year, she’s started experimenting with alcohol and drugs, has fallen prey to anorexia, and has been sexually assaulted. And that’s only the beginning of her spiral down into addiction and disordered eating.
As Ginelle progresses into young adulthood, she hits several substance-related bottoms. In her senior year of college, after blacking out and ending up naked in her dorm’s community shower, she goes to Alcoholics Anonymous and gets sober. But steering clear of drugs and alcohol, she discovers, is not a cure-all—she still has a long way to go before she can truly heal.
Raw, relatable, and powerful, Testa’s is a riveting tale of climbing up from rock bottom—and learning to make a home in oneself instead of in substances and other people.
Reviews
“Raw and uncompromisingly honest, Ginelle Testa’s memoir takes readers on a whirlwind journey through her story of addiction, recovery, and the search for her soul. Like me, you’ll cry at her failures and rejoice in her triumphs. I guarantee you won’t be able to put down this beautifully crafted memoir.” —Susen Edwards, author of What a Trip: A Novel
“Testa’s intimate memoir is a harrowing and ultimately triumphant tale of her decades-long odyssey of self-destructive addiction. From the first page, as each painful episode of her obsessive compulsive behaviors plays out, we are hooked. With superhuman courage and conviction, Testa transcends a life of setbacks and despair to emerge as a powerful, purposeful woman. So many will be inspired by her brave story.” —Shary Hauer, author of Insatiable: A Memoir of Love Addiction
“A raw and honest portrait of unhealed trauma and its ripple effect on a young life. With an intense yearning for things, people, and vices, the author earned a heap of battle scars on the journey to self-love and acceptance. This story reminds us that love starts at home, and that home resides within.” —Suzanne Simonetti, USA Today best-selling author of The Sound of Wings
