Laurie Markvart

Laurie Markvart relays her life story in a fast-moving yet descriptive way. Her burning passion for music informed many of her choices; anything that would get her closer to the stage, fellow musicians, creating and performing. I was with her all along the ride—from small-town Wisconsin to Minneapolis to Austin to NYC to LA. Her writing conjures the feeling, the look, and the sounds of those places in a very vivid way.

After a heartbreaking and devastating experience that would flatten many a person, she picks herself up and yet again tries to make it to the big stage. Resilience should be Laurie's middle name, and I think one comes away from this memoir with admiration for her grit and honesty. And an appreciation for realizing that one's dreams don't always take shape the way we envisioned them at a younger age—but for artistically-oriented people, the thing is to just keep at it and on it.