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How to Write a Suicide Note: serial essays that saved a woman's life | 
 enlarge | Author: Sherry Quan Lee
Publisher: Modern History Press
Category: Book
List Price: $16.95
Buy New: $10.68
You Save: $6.27 (37%)
New (11) Used (4) from $10.68
Avg. Customer Rating:  2 reviews
Sales Rank: 2289233
Media: Perfect Paperback
Edition: First
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 100
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2
Dimensions (in): 9.4 x 6.5 x 0.4
ISBN: 1932690638
Dewey Decimal Number: 811
EAN: 9781932690637
ASIN: 1932690638
Publication Date: June 6, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
How to Write a Suicide Note examines the life of a Chinese/Black woman who grew up passing for white, who grew up poor, who loves women but has always married white men. Writing has saved her life. It has allowed her to name the historical trauma--the racist, sexist, classist experiences that have kept her from being fully alive, that have screamed at her loudly and consistently that she was no good, and would never be any good-and that no one could love her. Writing has given her the creative power to name the experiences that dictated who she was, even before she was born, and write notes to them, suicide notes.
Sherry Quan Lee believes writing saves lives; writing has saved her life.
Acclaim for How to Write a Suicide Note
"How to Write a Suicide Note is a haunting portrait of the daughter of an African mother and a Chinese father. Sherry dares to be who she isn't supposed to be, feel what she isn't supposed to feel, and destroys racial and gender myths as she integrates her bi-racial identity into all that she is. Through her raw honesty and vulnerability, Sherry captures a range of emotions most people are afraid to confront, or even share. Her work is a gift to the mental health community."
--Beth Kyong Lo, M.A., Psychotherapist
"Sherry Quan Lee offers us, in How to Write a Suicide Note, a deep breathing meditation on how love is under continuous revision. And like all the best Blues singers, Quan Lee voices the lowdown, dirty paces that living puts us through, but without regret or surrender."
Wesley Brown, author of Darktown Strutters and Tragic Magic
"I love the female aspects, the sex, and the strong voice Sherry Quan Lee uses to share her private life in How To Write A Suicide Note. I love the wit, the tongue-in-cheek, the trippiness of it all. I love the metaphors, especially the lover and suicide ones. I love the free-associations, the 'raving, ravenous, relentless' back and forth. Quan Lee breaks the rules and finds her genius. How to Write a Suicide Note is a passionate, risk-taking, outrageous, life-affirming book and love letter."
Sharon Doubiago, author of Body and Soul, Hard Country; and other works
Learn more about the author at www.SherryQuanLee.com
Book #2 in the Reflections of History Series from Modern History Press www.ModernHistoryPress.com
Modern History Press is an imprint of Loving Healing Press
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| Customer Reviews:
 An excellent reading choice for readers, especially women with multicultural backgrounds July 10, 2008
Reviewed by Paige Lovitt for Reader Views (6/08)
"How to Write a Suicide Note," is the second book in the Reflections of America Series. The author Sherry Quan Lee took six years to complete her story. The book consists of a series of poignant essays. Ms. Lee is a Chinese/Black woman. Her father was Chinese and her mother was Black. She developed an identity crisis because she was told to pass herself off as white and if she couldn't do that then she should say she is Chinese. This was to help her be better accepted into society. How sad that was because her Chinese father left the family when she was five, so she wasn't raised as a part of his culture. Her strong mother, who was left to raise five children by herself, did not want her to accept the Black side of her culture. I felt this must have been very damaging because her mother deserved to have her culture acknowledged by her children. This taught Ms. Lee to feel invisible.
She writes that her attempts at suicide were cries to be heard. It also seemed like she was making the attempts to kill parts of herself. When she started writing, she discovered that writing saves lives. It was healing for her to tell her story through her poetry. It is also healing for the people who read Lee's works. The people that can relate to her experiences will find healing in knowing that they are not alone.
"How to Write a Suicide Note" is an excellent reading choice for readers, especially women with multicultural backgrounds. I have friends of multicultural backgrounds who had difficulties with their upbringings and how they were accepted by others. Sometimes they felt unaccepted by anybody. One of them, a woman in her 30s, relates that even today she is not sure what box to check under "race." I think that she will really be able to relate to Ms. Lee's story. I also think that women of all races will find the essays moving. No matter what, we all want the same thing that Ms. Lee did, at our core; that is to be loved and accepted.
 One woman's emotional journey June 30, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Reviewed by Kam Aures for RebeccasReads (6/08)
"How to Write a Suicide Note- Serial Essays That Saved a Woman's Life" is Book #2 in the "Reflections of America Series" that "highlights autobiography, fiction, and poetry which express the quest to discover one's context within modern society." Sherry Quan Lee grew up poor, the daughter of a Chinese father and a Black mother. Although of mixed race, she has usually passed for white, which based on the author's photo on the back of the book, I can completely see happening. She also has always married white men, even though she loves women.
It took the author six years to complete the book as she did not follow any hard, fast writing rules. She started out attempting to write in prose form but the writing was not flowing as she had wished, so she transformed her notes into poetry instead. The writings in this book are a form of therapy for her. Expressing her feelings on paper allows her "to name the racist, sexist, classist experiences" that kept pulling her down and made her feel worthless and unloved. She then proceeds to squash these issues out in the form of suicide notes.
Sherry Quan Lee believes that writing is what saved her life. In the past, she has attempted suicide in an effort to be acknowledged and loved, but now she writes to live. Writing about the trauma in her life allows her to examine it, be angry about it, and then, finally, to let it go. Getting these past events written down allows new doors to open for her and allows her a fresh start.
In some ways in reading "How to Write a Suicide Note- Serial Essays That Saved a Woman's Life," I almost felt as if I was intruding into a person's private thoughts and space. However, I applaud Quan Lee's intimate, risk-taking venture in writing this book of poetry. She is a very honest person and does not hold anything back. Her work is very original and I have never read anything quite like it before. For these reasons I recommend this book to anyone who enjoys poetry and/or memoirs.
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