If Only You People Could Follow Directions is a spellbinding debut that reimagines the memoir in Jessica Hendry Nelson's thoroughly original voice. In these linked essays, Nelson's fearless writing and hypnotic storytelling centers on the story of three people: Nelson's mother susan, her brother eric, and Jessica herself. These three characters are deeply bound to one another, not just by the usual ties of blood and family, but also by a mother's drive to keep her children safe in the midst of chaos. The book begins with Nelson's childhood in the suburbs of philadelphia and chronicles...

A fresh and ferocious memoir-in-essays that maps the boundaries of love, language, and creative urgency. When Nelson's father dies from an accident caused by complications from alcoholism, she knows immediately she has inherited his love - that it left his body, traveled through the air, and entered her own. And so, she needs a place to put it.