Fairyland

A Memoir of My Father

By: Alysia Abbott

Narrated by: Alysia Abbott

A beautiful, vibrant memoir about growing up motherless in 1970s and 80s San Francisco with an openly gay father. After his wife dies in a car accident, bisexual writer and activist Steve Abbott moves with his two-year-old daughter to San Francisco. There they discover a city in the midst of revolution, bustling with gay men in search of liberation - few of whom are raising a child. Steve throws himself into San Francisco's vibrant cultural scene. He takes Alysia to raucous parties, pushes her in front of the microphone at poetry readings, and introduces her to a world of artists, thinkers, and writers. But the pair live like nomads, moving from apartment to apartment, with a revolving cast of roommates and little structure.

As a child Alysia views her father as a loving playmate who can transform the ordinary into magic, but as she gets older Alysia wants more than anything to fit in. The world, she learns, is hostile to difference. In Alysia's teens, Steve's friends - several of whom she has befriended - fall ill as AIDS starts its rampage through their community. While Alysia is studying in New York and then in France, her father tells her it's time to come home; he's sick with AIDS. Alysia must choose whether to take on the responsibility of caring for her father or continue the independent life she has worked so hard to create. Reconstructing their life together from a remarkable cache of her father's journals, letters, and writings, Alysia Abbott gives us an unforgettable portrait of a tumultuous, historic time in San Francisco as well as an exquisitely moving account of a father's legacy and a daughter's love.

©2013 Alysia Abbott (P)2013 Audible, Inc.

Really wanted to like it, but couldn't finish it.

What about Alysia Abbott’s performance did you like?

I loved her cadence. She has a great voice.

Any additional comments?

This book had some interesting parts, but it seemed to drag on and on. I was disappointed. I really wanted to love it.

If you loved The Glass Castle listen to this!!!!

Such a great life story also filled with actual historical events. Alysia's story has you from the beginning. I fell in love with her writing and narration. LOVE.

A real and heartfelt memoir

Beautifully and honestly told memoir of a most unusual childhood. Loved the writing and the author’s voice; she was not a perfect human, but her open heart and desire to be better make for a truly compelling experience.

Wonderful but long

Rooted very much for narrator and her father and learned a lot of San Francisco history that I appreciated as a former resident. Thought the author also did a great job with the reading. But the length and overall story didn’t make me rush to want to finish the way my favorite audiobooks do.

A top 5 for me

I did all but ugly cry at this end of this story.

Because I’m a daughter who had parents, because I am a mother who has filled both parental rolls, because I am a product of being raised In Close-mindedness, because I was still part of our world through this historical time in America, because I was and am able to form my own opinions,because I have paved my own road albeit the rough one, because I’ve lost someone important to me.... because I am goddam human.