Notes to John

An extraordinary work from the author of The Year of Magical Thinking and Blue Nights In November 1999,Joan Didion began seeing a psychiatrist becauseas she wrote to a friendher family had had ΓÇ£a rough few years.ΓÇ¥ She described the sessions in a journal she created for her husbandJohn Gregory Dunne. For several monthsDidion recorded conversations with the psychiatrist in meticulous detail. The initial sessions focused on alcoholismadoptiondepressionanxietyguiltand the heartbreaking complexities of her relationship with her daughterQuintana. The subjects evolved to include her workwhich she was finding difficult to maintain for sustained periods. There were discussions about her own childhoodΓÇömisunderstandings and lack of communication with her mother and fatherher early tendency to anticipate catastropheΓÇöand the question of legacyoras she put itΓÇ£what itΓÇÖs been worth.ΓÇ¥ The analysis would continue for more than a decade. DidionΓÇÖs journal was crafted with the singular intelligenceprecisionand elegance that characterize all of her writing. It is an unprecedently intimate account that reveals sides of her that were unknownbut the voice is unmistakably hersΓÇöquestioningcourageousand clear in the face of a wrenchingly painful journey.