Eat, Pray, Make Money (No: Really About Mary Karr's Lit)

I've just finished reading Mary Karr's third memoir, Lit.  She rummages through her family life (defining the "dys" in dysfunctional), her college years, marriage (didn't go so well), motherhood, alcoholism, plunge toward suicide, and awakening religious faith.  Acerbic, to-the-point, wiltingly self-deprecating.  No pious or self satisfied triumphal illusions about faith.

I have two favorite quotes to share.  From the book itself, a moment of clarity about what prayer is, a standard I am now using, as she sinks to her knees on a hospital bathroom floor, alternately hurling insults and gratitude God-ward:

"Inside it: an idea.  The thread of a different perspective than any I've ever had.  It's a thought so counterintuitive, so unlike how I think, it feels as it it originates from outside me."

And from an interview in the back of the paperback edition:

"I do pray a lot, and I think everybody wants another Eat, Pray, Make Money, but the truth is I'm a neophyte at prayer."

I nearly rolled out of bed laughing last night as I read the middle clause of that sentence.