“With surprising literary artistry, Carrie Fisher swims through relationship-infested waters, braves cocaine blizzards, glitz spills, sushi tsunami, and bon-mot attacks to show us what despair is like when it refuses to take itself seriously.”

—Tom Robbins

“Snappy dialogue, sensitive insights, and witty asides . . . Fisher . . . brings a real talent to bear on her depiction of Hollywood.”

—Publishers Weekly

“Tantalizing . . . funny.”

—Columbia State

“Surprising, hilarious, breathtaking, a wry and witty commentary on life in the fast lanes of Freewayland.”

—San Jose Mercury News

“A wonderfully funny, brash, and biting novel, the most startling literary debut since Jay McInerney’s Bright Lights, Big City. . . . This is a laugh-out-loud book.”

—Washington Post Book World

“Intelligent, original, focused, insightful. A serious piece of work.”

—Los Angeles Times Book Review

Also by Carrie Fisher

Also by Carrie Fisher

Postcards from the Edge

Surrender the Pink

Delusions of Grandma

The Best Awful

Wishful Drinking

Title page

Copyright page

First Simon & Schuster trade paperback edition published in the USA in 2010
This edition published in Great Britain in 2011 by Simon & Schuster UK Ltd
A CBS COMPANY

Copyright © 1987 by Carrie Fisher

The right of Carrie Fisher to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.

Simon & Schuster UK Ltd
1st Floor
222 Gray’s Inn Road
London
WC1X 8HB

Simon & Schuster Australia, Sydney
Simon & Schuster India, New Delhi

A CIP catalogue copy for this book is available from the British Library.

Paperback ISBN: 978-1-84983-364-6
eBook ISBN: 978-1-84983-365-3

Printed and bound by CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon, CR0 4YY

Dedication page

For my mother and my brother

Prologue

BROTHER THOMAS,

You know how I always seem to be struggling, even when the situation doesn’t call for it? Well, I finally found a place where my struggling fits right in: the sunny Middle East. Brooding and moping doesn’t seem overdramatic in Israel or Egypt or Turkey. Today I stood in a recently bombed-out train station. I looked at the charred, twisted metal and I thought, “Finally my outsides match my insides.” Maybe I should take a tour of the world’s trouble spots and really relax. See you soon.

Love,

Sister Suzanne

DEAR LUCY,

Okay, here’s what I think now. Ready? I have to establish an overall plan for my overboard life. When I cross the finish line of my twenties this fall and that thirty flag goes down, I’d like to be closing in on having some idea of whatever it is that my life is about.