The right side of Lucy's jaw is removed in an operation. She meets Derek at the hospital and he becomes her partner in mischievous adventures around the hospital. She is diagnosed with Ewing's sarcoma, however, no one describes it to her as cancer until further in the disease which makes her not assimilate the diagnosis as she should. She returns to the hospital and undergoes multiple tests, including a bone marrow examination. Six months after her operation, “a bony knob” had appeared at the tip of her jaw. The memoir thoroughly describes her operation and her experience with anesthesia and says that back to school she felt like a warrior for experiencing something the other kids had not.

After an injury at school, she is diagnosed with a fractured jaw and requires emergency surgery. Being a tomboyish girl, she played with boys and participate in dares. Lucy brings the reader back with flashbacks of fourth grade. She describes the stares that she received from children, noting that she was not sure if they were better or worse than the hidden looks from adults.

Through this first narration, Lucy introduces her family's emotional and financial situation. She describes her work at the stable Diamond D, which was her first job after finishing chemotherapy. The prologue introduces the reader to Lucy's struggle with self-image. In 2004 following Grealy's death, her close friend Ann Patchett wrote the memoir Truth & Beauty which documents the writing of Grealy's memoir and her life after the book found success. The book was first published in 1994, and a British edition was released in 1995 under the name In the Mind's Eyes. Prior to its publication in the anthology Grealy sold the essay to Harper's Magazine where it attracted enough attention to secure her an agent and a book deal. The memoir first began as an essay, entitled Mirrorings, she was commissioned to write for an anthology. When interviewed about the memoir in 1994 by Charley Rose, the author explained that the book's principal theme was identity. In this memoir, she narrates the consequences of the disease in her emotional life as well as the physical implications that it had on her face, which resulted in a lifetime of self-consciousness. The memoir describes her life from the age of nine to adulthood. ( June 2019) ( Learn how and when to remove this template message)Īutobiography of a Face is a memoir by Lucy Grealy in which she narrates her life before and after being diagnosed with Ewing's sarcoma. Please help to improve this article by introducing more precise citations. This article includes a list of general references, but it lacks sufficient corresponding inline citations.

Autobiography of a face by lucy grealy