{"product_id":"w-3-a-memoir","title":"W-3 A Memoir","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e‘\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003eDazzlingly and daringly written\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003e’\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003e Rachel Cooke, \u003ci\u003eObserver\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eW-3 is a small psychiatric ward in a large university hospital, a world of pills and passes dispensed by an all-powerful staff, a world of veteran patients with grab-bags of tricks, a world of dishevelled, moment-to-moment existence on the edge of permanence.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBette Howland was one of those patients. In 1968, Howland was thirty-one, a single mother of two young sons, struggling to support her family on the part-time salary of a librarian; and labouring day and night at her typewriter to be a writer. One afternoon, while staying at her friend Saul Bellow’s apartment, she swallowed a bottle of pills.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eW-3\u003c\/i\u003e is a vivid – and often surprisingly funny – portrait of the extraordinary community of Ward 3 and a record of a defining moment in a writer’s life. The book itself would be her salvation: she wrote herself out of the grave.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOriginally published in 1974 and rediscovered forty years later, this is the first edition of \u003ci\u003eW-3\u003c\/i\u003e to be published in the UK. With an original introduction by Yiyun Li, author of \u003ci\u003eWhere Reasons End\u003c\/i\u003e.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e‘\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eW-3\u003c\/i\u003e is one hell of a debut\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003e’ Lucy Scholes, \u003ci\u003eParis Review\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e‘\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003eHowland is finally getting the recognition that she deserves\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003e’\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003e Sarah Hughes, \u003ci\u003eiNews\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"MediaPlace","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57313195131262,"sku":"NW9781529035957","price":9.4,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0817\/1379\/1261\/files\/9781529035957.jpg?v=1778514806","url":"https:\/\/mediaplace.com\/products\/w-3-a-memoir","provider":"MediaPlace","version":"1.0","type":"link"}