eviewing a memoir feels risky - like, will anything you say be interpreted, for good or ill, as a comment on the actual person rather than the book that they wrote? I fretted about this for a day before sitting down to write this.

Lisicky has spent a lot of time in his life hating himself, or at best feeling inadequate, which is completely understandable, and it was important for him to write that out so that to one degree or another it could go away. Because I picked up this book due to the Mitchell connection, I sometimes felt impatient with that - like, Oh for heaven's sake you're perfectly good - can we talk more about Joni? The experience he and his partner have, traveling from the east coast to Vancouver to hear one of Mitchell's last live appearances, is compellingly recounted and I hope therapeutic for him.

I love Joni Mitchell's music too, but I am nowhere near as dedicated a fan as Lisicky. I think Court and Spark was the peak of my fandom. So the part of this book that talks about her evolving songs made me want to go back and listen again to the seemingly endless variety of the work, which is probably part of what Lisicky wanted to accomplish. I don't know how much research he did about her life so I don't know how close to her actual experience some of the sequences are, it did make me wonder.

This book works on two levels: a gay man's coming of age saga, and a life lived with a thread of Mitchell's music always running through it. You can read it either way but you will enjoy it most if you want to read it both ways. Lisicky is a graceful writer and Mitchell is one of the greatest popular musicians of the 20th century, so you really can't lose whichever way you come to the book. Just be prepared that it's not a book about Joni Mitchell, it's a book about Paul Lisicky.