‘Sirens: A Memoir,’ by Joshua Mohr

No one had ever heard the song and lived, but Odysseus figured that if he got his men to bind him with rope to the ship’s mast, he’d be safe.

Where addiction memoirs are often written from a place of safety, “Sirens” is not.

In his mind, sober or not, Mohr is still bound to the mast, fighting.

On the printed page, self-destruction and relapse are literal inches away.

“Drugs and drink and strokes and heart surgery,” he says to his wife.

In a restaurant, for example, when Mohr interviews another writer, he blurts out that he wants a scotch and soda.

Chaotic inner conflict about the drink is stylized with line-breaks and combinationsofwords.

On the tape all he hears is 45 minutes of “two writers talking shop, bulls—ing about books.”

There’s a sadistic stepfather, and a mother who leaves her son at home with pizza money and boxed wine.

[...] the hole is big enough to let blood clots travel through to his brain, causing potentially fatal strokes.

Forsmann, in real life, invented the cardiac procedure that would eventually plug the hole in Mohr’s heart.

“Sirens” gives a picture of Mohr’s life as a balancing act with real danger and consequences.

There’s nothing at all calcified or fossilized here, and Mohr makes himself likable and compelling and charming, with a real ear for fast-moving unsentimental language.