How a scattered young woman's ambition to do something with her life opened the world for her, led to a legendary book, and gave her man, an artist, a second life.

AISE FOR "ART"Forged at the collision point of true art and real life, this brutally honest book is an engrossing journey across the hard countries of love and loss and redemption. It inspires the belief that love can overcome all obstacles and that creative talent knows no bounds. It was impossible for me to put it down.—Michael Connelly, Author of the Harry Bosch series of novels“I was no angel,” Laurie Pepper advises at the start of this stingingly candid memoir, and in truth she is a wonderfully devilish writer, her pen a razor dipped in sulfur, her memory a lead-lined cave from which nothing escapes or goes unexamined. Everyone who knows the skillful craftsmanship she brought to Straight Life, the masterpiece she made of Art Pepper’s life, will find it here again, in service to her own story, which would be reason enough to celebrate this gripping book. But there is another: a wittingly different perspective on Art’s tale­—this good wife was every inch his match.—Gary Giddins, Author of Bing Crosby: A Pocketful of Dreams and Celebrating BirdMusic, love, gossip—along with mania and addiction, pain and calamity: Laurie Pepper writes with grace and candor about all of it. Joining Straight Life as one of the best jazz lives, and telling the story behind that great story, her new book deserves all the meanings of “Art” in its title.—Robert Pinsky, Poet