DREAMTIME ALICE: A Memoir

New York, NY, U.S.A.: Ballantine Books, 1998. First Edition, First Printing 1st Printing. Hardcover. As New/Fine. 8vo - over 7¾" - 9¾" tall. In this vivid, seductive, gorgeously written memoir, Mandy Sayer recounts the fascinating years she spent performing on the streets of New York and New Orleans with her father. Gerry Sayer was a jazz drummer, a beguiling Irish charmer with a million stories and an insatiable love for jam sessions and all-night parties. When her siblings failed her father by rejecting the bohemian performing life, Mandy saw her chance to become a character in his stories, part of the only life he really loved. So she learned to tap dance, and they set off together to satisfy their grand ambitions on the toughest stage in the world--New York. They became part of the thrilling, precarious world of street performers--jugglers, magicians, fire-eaters, dancers--who eked out their livings at the mercy of the elements, the cops, complaining neighbors, and lurking thieves. Entwined with this singular story of a busker's life is the deeper, more intimate story of Mandy's transformation from a girl searching for her father's love into a woman who could invent her own language and find her own voice. DREAMTIME ALICE is a triumphant record of a young woman's self-discovery, the discovery that she could create her own story at last. As new, in fine, mylar-protected dust jacket. A75