Laurie Pepper's memoir delves into her tumultuous marriage with a drug-addicted yet brilliant jazz musician. With relentless energy and dedication, she charted their complex relationship, which she describes as a mutual rescue. Her writing is characterized by raw honesty and deep insight into the dynamics of a partnership where love intertwined with challenges, and both partners discovered and developed their own gifts. Pepperová rejects simplistic narratives, revealing the intricate reality of their shared life.
Art Pepper (1925–1982) was called the greatest alto saxophonist of the post-Charlie Parker generation. But his autobiography, Straight Life, is much more than a jazz book—it is one of the most explosive, yet one of the most lyrical, of all autobiographies. This edition is updated with an extensive afterword by Laurie Pepper covering Art Pepper’s last years, and a complete and up-to-date discography by Todd Selbert.