Leaving Dirty Jersey: A Crystal Meth Memoir

At the age of eighteen, after one too many run-ins with the cops for drug possession, he left his upper-middle-class home in Princeton, New Jersey, for a stint at a rehab facility in Riverside, California. Instead of getting clean, he spent his year there shooting crystal meth and living as a petty criminal among not-so-petty ones until a near psychotic episode (among other things) convinced him to clean up.

In stark prose infused with heartbreaking insight, wicked humor, and complete veracity, Salant provides graphic descriptions of life on crystal meth -- the incredible sex drive, the paranoia, the cravings. He details the slang, the scams, and the psychoses, and weaves them into a narrative that is breathtakingly honest and authentic. Salant grapples with his attraction to the thuggish life, eschewing easy answers -- his parents, both therapists, were loving and supportive, and his family's subtle dysfunctions typical of almost any American family.

Exploring the allure and effects of the least understood drug of our time, Leaving Dirty Jersey is that rarity among memoirs -- a compulsively readable, superbly told story that is shocking precisely because it could happen to almost anyone.

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All Customer Reviews
Average Customer Review:
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:

Disturbingly real, 2009-01-03
This book is a gut wrenching and real account of how meth and heroin takes over a life and grinds it into the pavement. If you know anyone who has ever been addicted to drugs you will relate to this story, how the drugs take over your body, mind and soul and how that affects the people around you and that love you. The stealing, the crime, the sex, the crazy and obsessive behavior. It is all here. If you don't know anyone addicted to drugs, once you read this book you will have a better understanding of why they act the way they do. Understanding is half the battle.


0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:

Hard to put down, 2008-11-11
This was a great book. Very informative. If you closed your eyes it was like you were sitting next to the author of the book. It was hard to put the book down.


1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

Best memoir I've ever read, couldn't put it down!, 2008-07-28
This was for sure one of the best memoirs I've read, and the best addiction books out there. It stays with you after. I've read A LOT of addiction books to try to understand a friend I had that was an addict. I can't believe how the author got out alive and how honest he is! The things he encounters are not pretty and shamfeful and embarrassing, yet he eloquently describes his experiences without holding back.

This book is well written, a page turner, and extremely graphic and real. He's so young to have gone through so much and I liked at the end how he told the readers how hard it was for his family and gf to read it. Very compelling and a vdifferent from the self pity addiction books like "Blackout Girl" that I've been reading lately.


0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:

incredible read, 2008-04-28
i was blown away by how interesting and inspiring a book about the life of guy on drugs could be. He was so detailed in his writing that you can tell that he has a gift as a writer and an amazing story to go along with it. It was a very hard book to put down and there was never any moments in the book that i just wanted to skip ahead because i was being bored with unnecessary details. I would definitely recommend this book to anyone looking for a good read!


0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:

The Downward Spiral....., 2008-04-17
Bored, tired of reading books with facts and statistics? Yes, so was I.

This book is a great, fun read. The main character Jim (the author James Salant) keeps you on the edge of your seat.

James doesnt waste your time trying to give you statistics on drugs, drug use or even how meth is produced.

This is his story of addiction, from beginning to end. Its not a pretty journey through the countryside, but rather a long walk down a dirty, dangerous back alley.

Meth use is a disgusting, but growing problem in the U.S. This book gives you one mans glimpse of what it was like being hooked on it!!!

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