From Scarsdale is an evocative and lyrical memoir of a haunted childhood in Scarsdale, NewYork. With a cancer diagnosis in his early forties, the author is compelled to revisit and resolvethe mystery of his family’s sadness. The fourth of six children in an Irish-American householddistinctly out-of-place in this affluent suburb of New York City, O’Brien grows up in aclaustrophobic milieu of secrecy, lies, and mental illness. The turning point in his maturation isan older brother’s attempted suicide — an event he witnesses firsthand. From Scarsdale traceswith sensitivity the complex histories and dynamics that lead to this trauma, as O’Brieninvestigates the psychologies of his parents, themselves the survivors of painful childhoods inScarsdale. Then, simultaneously disturbed and catalyzed by his brother’s depression, and hisown developing obsessive-compulsive disorder, the adolescent O’Brien discovers literature andthe theatre as an escape, though it will take years for an actual liberation to occur. In manyways this memoir is that liberation, as his ambition here has been to tell “the story of who I amand where I’m from, with honesty, insight, and something like forgiveness. To try to leave theold place behind.” With the specificity and aching affection of William Maxwell’s Ancestors, and theimpressionistic, mosaic-like structure of Michael Ondaatje’s Running in the Family, this book’ssubject is ultimately, like all memoir, the solace and the conundrum of memory. From Scarsdaleis a rare book, uniquely told, and a poignant example of the redemptive power of a true story.