In 1972, Joyce Maynard, an undergraduate at Yale, wrote an article for the 'New York Times Magazine' called 'An Eighteen Year Old Looks Back On Life'. Among the hundreds of letters she received as a result, one expressed deep affection for her writing, and concern at the exploitation that she might be subject to. The writer was J D Salinger, author of 'Catcher In The Rye'.
This book is not a sleazy tell-all memoir about the author's affair with a famous (and famously reclusive) man. It's an earnest autobiography that, in the course of tracing the author's coming of age, delineates her first serious love affair with maturity and emotional candour.
