Disguised as a plain, brown memoir, [THIS IS ] A VOLUPTUOUS EXPLORATION OF SEXUALITY, AGING, THE FAILURES OF MODERN MEDICINE, ATTEMPTS AT SELF-KNOWLEDGE AND THE MEANING OF PAIN. From the author of the acclaimed memoir Girl Interrupted, The Camera my Mother Gave Me is Susanna Kaysen's exploration of what happens when sexual pleasure is replaced by pain. "When Eros goes away", she writes, "it's as if I'm colorblind. The world is gray. " But is this a problem of the body, or the mind? And can clinicians tease out the difference between the two? Spare, frank and highly original, The Camera My Mother Gave Me is an extraordinary investigation into the role sex plays in perceptions and our notions of ourselves, and what happens when erotic impulse meets the world of medicine.

SUSANNA KAYSEN is the author of the novels Far Afield and Asa, As I Knew Him and the memoir Girl, Interrupted. She lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.