12 best-selling memoir books like Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years by Heidi Julavits

Cover of Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years by Heidi Julavits

Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

By: Heidi Julavits

3.74

Format: 304 pages, Hardcover

A sharply observed memoir of motherhood and the self, and a love letter to Maine, by a writer Eula …

If you liked the memoir plot in Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years by Heidi Julavits , here is a list of 12 books like this:

Cover of A Life of One's Own: Nine Women Writers Begin Again by Joanna Biggs

1. A Life of One's Own: Nine Women Writers Begin Again

By: Joanna Biggs

4.01

Format: 272 pages, Hardcover

Named a Most Anticipated Book of 2023 by the New York Times , The Week , Vulture , Elle, and The Mi… read more

Similar categories in Joanna Biggs's A Life of One's Own: Nine Women Writers Begin Again book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • biography memoir
  • nonfiction
  • biography
  • memoir
"The wound my unsuspecting heart formerly received is not healed,"

-Joanna Biggs, A Life of One's Own: Nine Women Writers Begin Again

Cover of Thin Skin: Essays by Jenn Shapland

2. Thin Skin: Essays

By: Jenn Shapland

4.02

Format: 289 pages, Kindle Edition

From a National Book Award finalist and a powerful literary mind, an incisive new work examining ca… read more

Similar categories in Jenn Shapland's Thin Skin: Essays book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • biography memoir
  • nonfiction
  • memoir
  • audiobook
Cover of Splinters by Leslie Jamison

3. Splinters

By: Leslie Jamison

3.86

Format: 272 pages, Hardcover

From the New York Times bestselling author of The Recovering and The Empathy Exams comes the riveti… read more

Similar categories in Leslie Jamison's Splinters book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • parenting
  • biography
  • memoir
  • biography memoir
  • nonfiction
  • audiobook
Cover of Monsters: A Fan's Dilemma by Claire Dederer

4. Monsters: A Fan's Dilemma

By: Claire Dederer

3.79

Format: 257 pages, Hardcover

From the author of the New York Times best seller Poser and the acclaimed memoir Love and Trouble, … read more

Similar categories in Claire Dederer's Monsters: A Fan's Dilemma book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • nonfiction
  • memoir
  • audiobook
"Biography used to be something you sought out, yearned for, actively pursued. Now it falls on your head all day long."

-Claire Dederer, Monsters: A Fan's Dilemma

Cover of Grief Is for People by Sloane Crosley

5. Grief Is for People

By: Sloane Crosley

3.91

Format: 208 pages, Hardcover

Following the death of her closest friend, Sloane Crosley explores multiple kinds of loss in this d… read more

Similar categories in Sloane Crosley's Grief Is for People book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • biography
  • memoir
  • biography memoir
  • nonfiction
  • audiobook
"Grief is for people, not things."

-Sloane Crosley, Grief Is for People

"Suicide is a tax on human consciousness."

-Sloane Crosley, Grief Is for People

"How will he know you loved him," she asks, "unless you try to destroy yourself?"

-Sloane Crosley, Grief Is for People

"Pictures should be of what you see, not of what the world sees when it sees you."

-Sloane Crosley, Grief Is for People

Cover of All Fours by Miranda July

6. All Fours

By: Miranda July

3.81

Format: 336 pages, Hardcover

The New York Times–bestselling author of The First Bad Man returns with an irreverently sexy, tende… read more

Similar categories in Miranda July's All Fours book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • audiobook
"But maybe the road split between: a life spent longing vs. a life that was continually surprising"

-Miranda July, All Fours

"Maybe we shouldn't do that," Jordi said. "Flatten ourselves like that. Erratic doesn't have to mean crazy or irresponsible. Shouldn't we be normalizing change?"

-Miranda July, All Fours

"I guess any calling, no mater what it is, is a kind of unresolved ache," I said, giving in to knowing more than him. "It's a problem that you can't fix, but there is some relief in knowing you will c…"

-Miranda July, All Fours

"For me lying created just the right amount of problems and what you saw was just one of my four or five faces- each real, each with different needs. The only dangerous lie was one that asked me to co…"

-Miranda July, All Fours

Cover of I Am Homeless If This Is Not My Home by Lorrie Moore

7. I Am Homeless If This Is Not My Home

By: Lorrie Moore

3.31

Format: 193 pages, Hardcover

Lorrie Moore's first novel since A Gate at the Stairs--a daring, meditative exploration of love and… read more

Similar categories in Lorrie Moore's I Am Homeless If This Is Not My Home book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • audiobook
"I've become. An object of dismay. I guess."

-Lorrie Moore, I Am Homeless If This Is Not My Home

"Do I jar you?" he asks with his sly charm. "No," I say. “I am braced at every turn for disenchantment."

-Lorrie Moore, I Am Homeless If This Is Not My Home

Cover of Roman Stories by Jhumpa Lahiri

8. Roman Stories

By: Jhumpa Lahiri

3.80

Format: 224 pages, Hardcover

Rome—metropolis and monument, suspended between past and future, multi-faceted and metaphysical—is … read more

Similar categories in Jhumpa Lahiri's Roman Stories book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • audiobook
Cover of North Woods by Daniel       Mason

9. North Woods

By: Daniel Mason

4.15

Format: 372 pages, Hardcover

A sweeping novel about a single house in the woods of New England, told through the lives of those … read more

Similar categories in Daniel Mason's North Woods book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • audiobook
Cover of Wellness by Nathan  Hill

10. Wellness

By: Nathan Hill

4.00

Format: 611 pages, Hardcover

The New York Times best-selling author of The Nix is back with a poignant and witty novel about mar… read more

Similar categories in Nathan Hill's Wellness book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • audiobook
"It's an altogether manic and ceaseless conversation, a conversation that feels sometimes like falling down stairs, barely keeping upright, taken by gravity, skipping, grasping, and then somehow landi…"

-Nathan Hill, Wellness

"Behind curtains, this, he thinks, is what lovers do—they are alchemists and architects; pioneers and fabulists; they make one thing another; they invent the world around them. So he says, ‘Yes I beli…"

-Nathan Hill, Wellness

Cover of Terrace Story by Hilary Leichter

11. Terrace Story

By: Hilary Leichter

3.58

Format: 208 pages, Hardcover

From the author of the acclaimed novel Temporary, an intimate exploration of time, a fable about lo… read more

Similar categories in Hilary Leichter's Terrace Story book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • audiobook
"Of course, I know the details. I just reject your premise," the woman said. "What premise?" "The premise that there is no love when a person is alone."

-Hilary Leichter, Terrace Story

Cover of The Vaster Wilds by Lauren Groff

12. The Vaster Wilds

By: Lauren Groff

3.77

Format: 272 pages, Hardcover

A taut and electrifying novel from celebrated bestselling author Lauren Groff, about one spirited g… read more

Similar categories in Lauren Groff's The Vaster Wilds book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • audiobook
"For what is a girl but a vessel made to hold the desires of men."

-Lauren Groff, The Vaster Wilds

"O put the memory away, girl, she told herself sternly. For the sorrow could eat you entire."

-Lauren Groff, The Vaster Wilds

"And humans were not made to be always alone; humans survive only in the company of other humans."

-Lauren Groff, The Vaster Wilds

"Against the resistance of other minds, one's thoughts are pulled out of their comfortable shapes, and true thinking begins."

-Lauren Groff, The Vaster Wilds

Cover of The Vulnerables by Sigrid Nunez

13. The Vulnerables

By: Sigrid Nunez

3.61

Format: 256 pages, Hardcover

The New York Times –bestselling, National Book Award–winning author of The Friend and What Are You … read more

Similar categories in Sigrid Nunez's The Vulnerables book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • audiobook
"Only when I was young did I believe that it was important to remember what happened in every novel I read. Now I know the truth: what matters is what you experience while reading, the states of feeli…"

-Sigrid Nunez, The Vulnerables

Cover of Parade by Rachel Cusk

14. Parade

By: Rachel Cusk

3.70

Format: 198 pages, Hardcover

From the exhilarating mind of Rachel Cusk, author of the Outline trilogy, Parade disturbs and defin… read more

Similar categories in Rachel Cusk's Parade book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • audiobook
"He knew that [his work] embodied change, and he wasn’t interested in change. He was interested in the fragments that change leaves behind in its storming passage toward the future."

-Rachel Cusk, Parade

"Not to be understood is effectively to be silenced, but not understanding can in its turn legitimise that silence, can illuminate one’s own unknowability. Art is the pact of individuals denying socie…"

-Rachel Cusk, Parade

"Sanity and insanity were not opposites but rather were the two faces of inanimate matter, the point at which the existence of consciousness can get no further in breaking down the existence of substa…"

-Rachel Cusk, Parade

"The impulse to have a child is very often a response to the woman’s own childhood, as though her childhood has left her incomplete, or has taken a part of her that she is driven to find again. The st…"

-Rachel Cusk, Parade

Cover of You Could Make This Place Beautiful by Maggie  Smith

15. You Could Make This Place Beautiful

By: Maggie Smith

4.08

Format: 320 pages, Hardcover

In her memoir You Could Make This Place Beautiful, poet Maggie Smith explores the disintegration of… read more

Similar categories in Maggie Smith's You Could Make This Place Beautiful book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • biography
  • memoir
  • biography memoir
  • nonfiction
  • audiobook
"At our wedding, our college creative writing professor read a poem—John Ciardi’s “Most Like an Arch This Marriage."

-Maggie Smith, You Could Make This Place Beautiful

"How I picture it: We are all nesting dolls, carrying the earlier iterations of ourselves inside. We carry the past inside us. We take ourselves–all of our selves–wherever we go. Inside forty-somethin…"

-Maggie Smith, You Could Make This Place Beautiful

Cover of Unshrinking: How to Face Fatphobia by Kate Manne

16. Unshrinking: How to Face Fatphobia

By: Kate Manne

4.25

Format: 297 pages, Hardcover

The definitive takedown of fatphobia, drawing on personal experience as well as rigorous research t… read more

Similar categories in Kate Manne's Unshrinking: How to Face Fatphobia book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • nonfiction
  • audiobook
Cover of Witness: Stories by Jamel Brinkley

17. Witness: Stories

By: Jamel Brinkley

3.81

Format: 240 pages, Hardcover

From a National Book Award finalist, Witness is an elegant, insistent narrative of actions taken an… read more

Similar categories in Jamel Brinkley's Witness: Stories book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • audiobook
"According to the terms of her personal lexicon, a woman was a lady only if she was fascinating and ungovernable, and my mother considered herself nothing if not a lady."

-Jamel Brinkley, Witness: Stories

Cover of Tremor by Teju Cole

18. Tremor

By: Teju Cole

3.69

Format: 229 pages, Hardcover

A powerful, intimate novel that masterfully explores what constitutes a meaningful life in a violen… read more

Similar categories in Teju Cole's Tremor book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • audiobook
"I had not noticed before how every stretch of this route contains personal memories, how the city is like one of those movies shot in a single take from the window of a moving car."

-Teju Cole, Tremor

Cover of Pete and Alice in Maine by Caitlin Shetterly

19. Pete and Alice in Maine

By: Caitlin Shetterly

3.38

Format: 256 pages, Hardcover

Reeling from a painful betrayal in her marriage as the COVID-19 pandemic takes hold in New York Cit… read more

Similar categories in Caitlin Shetterly's Pete and Alice in Maine book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • audiobook
Cover of Alphabetical Diaries by Sheila Heti

20. Alphabetical Diaries

By: Sheila Heti

4.02

Format: 224 pages, Hardcover

A thrilling confessional from the award-winning, beloved author of Pure Colour. Sheila Heti kept a… read more

Similar categories in Sheila Heti's Alphabetical Diaries book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • biography
  • memoir
  • biography memoir
  • nonfiction
  • audiobook
Cover of Time's Mouth by Edan Lepucki

21. Time's Mouth

By: Edan Lepucki

3.84

Format: 416 pages, Hardcover

From New York Times bestselling author Edan Lepucki comes an enthralling saga about family secrets … read more

Similar categories in Edan Lepucki's Time's Mouth book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • audiobook
Cover of Everything/Nothing/Someone by Alice Carrière

22. Everything/Nothing/Someone

By: Alice Carrière

4.02

Format: 277 pages, Hardcover

A powerful literary debut that tells of a young woman’s coming-of-age in the bohemian ’90s, as her … read more

Similar categories in Alice Carrière's Everything/Nothing/Someone book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • biography
  • memoir
  • biography memoir
  • nonfiction
  • audiobook
Cover of To Name the Bigger Lie: A Memoir in Two Stories by Sarah Viren

23. To Name the Bigger Lie: A Memoir in Two Stories

By: Sarah Viren

3.52

Format: 304 pages, Hardcover

Part coming-of-age story, part psychological thriller, part philosophical investigation, this unfor… read more

Similar categories in Sarah Viren's To Name the Bigger Lie: A Memoir in Two Stories book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • biography
  • memoir
  • biography memoir
  • nonfiction
  • audiobook
Cover of Through the Groves: A Memoir by Anne Hull

24. Through the Groves: A Memoir

By: Anne Hull

3.86

Format: 224 pages, Hardcover

A richly evocative coming-of-age memoir set in the Florida orange groves of the 1960s by a Pulitzer… read more

Similar categories in Anne Hull's Through the Groves: A Memoir book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • biography
  • memoir
  • biography memoir
  • nonfiction
  • audiobook
Cover of Reunion by Elise Juska

25. Reunion

By: Elise Juska

3.39

Format: 304 pages, Hardcover

From the beloved author of the “uniquely poignant” (Entertainment Weekly) novel The Blessings comes… read more

Similar categories in Elise Juska's Reunion book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • audiobook
Cover of Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years by Heidi Julavits

26. Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

By: Heidi Julavits

3.74

Format: 304 pages, Hardcover

A sharply observed memoir of motherhood and the self, and a love letter to Maine, by a writer Eula … read more

Similar categories in Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • parenting
  • biography
  • memoir
  • biography memoir
  • nonfiction
  • audiobook
Cover of Daughter by Claudia Dey

27. Daughter

By: Claudia Dey

3.95

Format: 272 pages, Hardcover

In Claudia Dey’s Daughter, a woman long caught in her father's web strives to make a life—and art—o… read more

Similar categories in Claudia Dey's Daughter book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • audiobook
Cover of Liars by Sarah Manguso

28. Liars

By: Sarah Manguso

3.89

Format: 272 pages, Hardcover

A searing novel about being a wife, a mother, and an artist, and how marriage makes liars out of us… read more

Similar categories in Sarah Manguso's Liars book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • audiobook
"I was in charge of everything and in control of nothing."

-Sarah Manguso, Liars

"I needed my suffering to be acknowledged. After that, maybe I’d think about getting through it."

-Sarah Manguso, Liars

Cover of The Light Room by Kate Zambreno

29. The Light Room

By: Kate Zambreno

3.60

Format: 256 pages, Hardcover

“Kate Zambreno has invented a new form. It is a kind of absolute present, real life captured in clo… read more

Similar categories in Kate Zambreno's The Light Room book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • parenting
  • biography
  • memoir
  • biography memoir
  • nonfiction
Cover of Catalina by Karla Cornejo Villavicencio

30. Catalina

By: Karla Cornejo Villavicencio

3.65

Format: 224 pages, Hardcover

A year in the life of the unforgettable Catalina Ituralde, a wickedly wry and heartbreakingly vulne… read more

Similar categories in Karla Cornejo Villavicencio's Catalina book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

  • audiobook
Cover of The Coin by Yasmin Zaher

31. The Coin

By: Yasmin Zaher

3.55

Format: 240 pages, Hardcover

A bold and unabashed novel about a young Palestinian woman's unraveling, far from home, as she gets… read more

Similar categories in Yasmin Zaher's The Coin book and Heidi Julavits's Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years

"And the poet, he asked, who was it again? Aisha didn't know him, neither did Matthew. But, of course, Gregory did. He asked if he was the 9/11 denier. No, definitely not a denier, but very vocal when…"

-Yasmin Zaher, The Coin

28 must-read audiobook books like Directions to Myself: A Memoir of Four Years by Heidi Julavits

Transform Your Habits

Thin Skin: Essays

Jenn Shapland

4.02

Transform Your Habits

Splinters

Leslie Jamison

3.86

Transform Your Habits

Monsters: A Fan's Dilemma

Claire Dederer

3.79

Transform Your Habits

Grief Is for People

Sloane Crosley

3.91

View all the books

20 must-read fiction books like The Coin by Yasmin Zaher

Transform Your Habits

All Fours

Miranda July

3.81

Transform Your Habits

Exhibit

R.O. Kwon

3.24

Transform Your Habits

Worry

Alexandra Tanner

3.36

Transform Your Habits

Headshot

Rita Bullwinkel

3.63

View all the books

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