Christa Parravani

Her: A Memoir

First books that receive rave reviews are rare; even rarer is the first book that receives such notices before it is even released.  Alumna Christa Parravani’s Her: A Memoir (Henry Holt, March 2013) is such a work, a poignant memoir about the tragic life and death of her twin sister, Cara. Reviews praising the book have already been published in the March 2013  issues of Cosmopolitan; Vanity Fair; Marie Claire; O, the Oprah magazine; and Real Simple magazine.

Parravani (MFA in Creative Writing, 2011) began writing poems about her sister while struggling to climb back from her despair and the self-destructive behavior triggered by her painful loss.  After beginning her MFA at Rutgers-Newark, she began shaping those poems into a memoir. Parravani credits the program and its supportive faculty with helping her complete the book.   The book allowed her to reconnect with her lost sister, who died of a drug overdose after a long slide into depression caused by a violent rape.

Hear Parravani read from her memoir

Read more:  MFA Graduate Explores Twin Sister’s Death in New Memoir,  FOCUS September 2012; http://magazine.rutgers.edu/winter-2013