In this otherworldly memoir of
extraordinary power, Mark Richard, an award-winning author, tells his
story of growing up in the American South with a heady Gothic mix of
racial tension and religious fervor.
Called a
“special child,” Southern social code for mentally—and
physically—challenged children, Richard was crippled by deformed hips
and was told he would spend his adult life in a wheelchair. During his
early years in charity hospitals, Richard observed the drama of other
broken boys’ lives, children from impoverished Appalachia, tobacco
country lowlands, and Richmond’s poorest neighborhoods. The son of a
solitary alcoholic father whose hair-trigger temper terrorized his
family, and of a mother who sought inner peace through fasting, prayer,
and scripture, Richard spent his bedridden childhood withdrawn into the
company of books.
As a young man, Richard, defying both his doctors and parents, set out to experience as much of the world as he could—as a disc jockey, fishing trawler deckhand, house painter, naval correspondent, aerial photographer, private investigator, foreign journalist, bartender and unsuccessful seminarian—before his hips failed him. While digging irrigation ditches in east Texas, he discovered that a teacher had sent a story of his to the Atlantic, where it was named a winner in the magazine’s national fiction contest launching a career much in the mold of Jack London and Mark Twain.
A superbly written and irresistible blend of history, travelogue, and personal reflection, House of Prayer No. 2 is a remarkable portrait of a writer’s struggle with his faith, the evolution of his art, and of recognizing one’s singularity in the face of painful disability. Written with humor and a poetic force, this memoir is destined to become a modern classic.
MARK RICHARD is the author of two award-winning short story collections, The Ice at the Bottom of the World and Charity, and the novel Fishboy. His short stories and journalism have appeared in the New York Times, The New Yorker, Harper’s, Esquire, Vogue, and GQ. He is the recipient of the PEN/Hemingway Award, a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship, and a Whiting Foundation Writer’s Award. He lives in Los Angeles with his wife and their three sons.