Blake Bailey has written notable biographies of authors John Cheever and Richard Yates, both difficult and brilliant men. While he was sifting through their lives, he was also reflecting on his own. The Splendid Things We Planned is the resulting portrait, a story of mental illness and addiction and the difficult orbits they force upon the healthy. It’s also a tribute to one family’s best efforts and inevitable failings.

Bailey’s older brother, Scott, was born while his parents were still in college. Re-established in Vinita, Oklahoma, their father parlayed his law school education into ever-increasing job responsibility while their mother followed her intellectual bliss and turned their home into a mini-salon for foreign exchange students and witty gay men. Young Blake took in scenes of infidelity and drug use, but his attention was generally on Scott, a handsome bully whose seemingly limitless potential gradually collapsed under relentless drug use and delusional thinking.

Bailey tells a difficult story with spare language that allows for some dry humor. His father remarries a woman who despises both sons equally, so he largely checks out where they’re concerned for several years. His mother dotes on her oldest boy, ever faithful that he’d turn back into the son she knew. “She missed Scott and wanted to talk about him, simple as that—to speculate about his motives, to retrace our steps to the exact point in time when everything went blooey.” Anyone who has lived with someone similarly ill will find this book painfully accurate when it comes to the mental gymnastics and survivor’s guilt involved.

The family as a whole is an eccentric bunch, and Marlies, Scott’s mother, keeps her dignity and a sense of humor while buying a pistol to defend herself against her son. If The Splendid Things We Planned is a damning portrait of mental illness, it’s also an unforgettable look at a family doing its best in the most trying of circumstances, those where no good outcome exists.

In her memoir, The Ogallala Road, Julene Bair chronicles the last days of her family’s Kansas farm, as well as the bittersweet love affair that feeds her hope of saving the place her folks called home. She makes the case that modern farming practices are inexorably eroding the vast resources her ancestors took for granted, and she mourns the unraveling of the tapestry that once bound together her family, their history and the land they shared.

Twice divorced and worried about her teenage son, Jake, Bair returns to her family’s farm for a visit and meets Ward, a rancher from nearby Smoky Valley. Lonely in middle age, she is thrilled to have a man in her life again, as well as a role model for Jake. Together she and Ward dream about building a life together and working the land Bair has inherited from her parents. From the beginning, however, Bair knows that Ward does not share her passion for land preservation. She begins to wrestle with her family’s part in draining the Ogallala Aquifer, which provides the only source of water for the Western Plains. Eventually, she supports more sustainable use of this precious water source—even as she realizes that her actions will drive a wedge between her and Ward.

Bair’s memoir is a moving and honest account of a woman trying to reconcile parts of herself that seem irreconcilable—daughter, mother, lover, landowner, environmental advocate. In searching for unity within herself, she discovers what she truly values.

One of those guys seemingly born to wear a tux, Robert Wagner proves an expert tour guide in the sometimes dishy, always perceptive You Must Remember This: Life and Style in Hollywood’s Golden Age.

In recent years, Wagner has come to be known for small screen roles on “Two and a Half Men” and “NCIS”—as well as deadpan appearances in the “Austin Powers” film franchise. He was married to the luminous Natalie Wood (for the second time) at the time of her still-puzzling 1981 death. But Wagner also enjoyed movie stardom in the ’50s and early ’60s. And he has long mingled with the rich and famous, having grown up in swanky Bel Air.

And so, with historian-critic Scott Eyman, R.J., as he’s known, has written what he calls “a mosaic of memory.”

The book was inspired, in part, by the wacky 2002 wedding of Liza Minnelli and David Gest. Though “not exactly a Fellini movie, it was close,” Wagner says, recounting how Liz Taylor kept a church filled with guests waiting, because she didn’t like her shoes; when the ceremony at last concluded, Gest “tried to suck the lips off Liza’s face.” (“Ewww, gross,” whispered actress Jill St. John, Wagner’s wife since 1990.)

To document a lifestyle “that has vanished as surely as birch bark canoes,” Wagner gives us a mix of history and I-was-there recollections. Like the dinner party at Clifton Webb’s home, where guest Judy Garland gave an impromptu serenade at the piano—for nearly an hour—as 15 other attendees gathered ’round. Once a caddy for Fred Astaire, Wagner went on to become a regular golfing buddy; he played softball with John Ford’s “group,” which included Duke Wayne and Ward Bond; and he spent New Year’s Eves at Frank Sinatra’s famed Palm Springs digs.

Wagner tells us about favorite decorators (the gay Billy Haines ruled), fashion trendsetters (the Duke of Windsor), the liveliest and even most unlikely night spots (including how Don the Beachcomber’s came to be), all the while dropping yummy nuggets. (Sinatra’s aftershave was witch hazel, or Yardley’s English Lavender.)

Wagner does it all with grace—never taking overt shots at today’s Hollywood, but making one thing clear: The so-called golden age was no cinematic fantasy.

At first, Carol Wall’s memoir, Mr. Owita’s Guide to Gardening, sounds like a book you might have read before: An unlikely friendship develops between two people who appear to have nothing in common. Giles Owita is an immigrant from Kenya who works part-time as a gardener. Wall is a high school English teacher and writer whose work has graced the pages of magazines like Southern Living. But things are not as they seem. In time, Wall will regard Owita as the greatest professor she has ever had. And you will be convinced she is right.

Their relationship begins predictably. Wall asks Owita to help her reclaim her lawn, an eyesore that is becoming the worst looking yard on the block. He helps her plant a few beds, tend to the grass and (memorably) prune a tree. But soon the relationship veers off script. We see some of the depth that is to come in a letter Owita sends to Wall shortly after viewing her lawn. “I took the liberty of stopping by your compound today, even though your vehicle was not in the driveway. . . . You have a lovely yard. Of particular beauty are the azaleas.” His eloquence impresses the English teacher in Wall, who muses, “Compound. It sounded elegant. Exotic.” It is the beginning of a rich conversation.

Despite their differences in race and background, both Owita and Wall carry family and health burdens that will be lightened by sharing them. Through their friendship, both truly help each other—in real tangible ways that change each other and their community.

I couldn’t put this book down. I found myself liking the principal characters from the opening pages, and my affection for them never wavered. If you enjoy inspirational memoirs or gardening books (or both), this moving account of a life-changing friendship is for you.

ALSO IN BOOKPAGE: Read our Q&A with Carol Wall for Mister Owita's Guide to Gardening.

Cheryl Strayed wrote about how the death of her mother changed her life in the best-selling Wild. In a similar and yet very different vein, Kelly Corrigan writes about the effects of her mom’s presence in a wonderful new memoir, Glitter and Glue.

In an earlier book, The Middle Place, Corrigan paid tribute to her larger-than-life father, “Greenie.” In contrast to her optimistic cheerleader of a father, Corrigan’s mother has always been a practical, worrying realist. As this steadfast woman once explained to her daughter, “Your father’s the glitter but I’m the glue.”

Corrigan remembers as a child longing for a more lively, upbeat mom, but over the years, she’s come to realize what an essential and anchoring influence this glue has been, especially now that she’s a mother herself.

Corrigan first began truly appreciating her mother in 1992, when she ran out of money during an after-college backpacking trip around the world. She ended up as a nanny for John Tanner, an Australian widower with two children: 7-year-old Milly and 5-year-old Martin. There was also a handsome stepson in his early 20s named Evan, who adds a romantic interest to Corrigan’s Down Under adventure.

As Corrigan takes on a motherly role for the Tanner children, she constantly thinks about their late mother, a cancer victim, as she gains new insight into the challenges her own mother faced raising Corrigan and her two brothers. As she eloquently explains: “God knows, every day I spend with the Tanners, I feel like I’m opening a tiny flap on one of those advent calendars we used to hang in the kitchen every December 1, except instead of revealing Mary and Joseph and baby Jesus, it’s my mother. I can’t see all of her yet, but window by window, she is emerging.”

Young Corrigan set out on her journey in search of adventure, but along the way learned that many of life’s greatest rewards occur during everyday moments at home. And while this is indeed a “quiet” book in contrast to Strayed’s wild exploits, Glitter and Glue is both riveting and highly readable. Framed by a tight structure and compelling writing, this memoir is refreshingly non-dysfunctional.

Leah Vincent is a good girl who loves her rabbi father. In her Yeshivish community—a sect within ultra-Orthodox Judaism—she’s a girl “who would never sneak a kosher candy bar that did not carry the extra strict cholov Yisroel certification.”

Vincent yearns for little more than to live devotedly the only life available to her: Follow Jewish laws strictly, marry the right man and have his children. When she leaves her home in Pittsburgh to attend high school in Manchester, England, she meets her best friend’s brother, Naftali. It’s not long before she’s not only aching with lust and love for him, but also beginning to question her religious teachings. She writes letters to Naftali filled with theological questions. When her aunt in Manchester discovers the letters, Vincent’s life spirals out of control, as her parents turn their backs on her because of her “immoral” action of writing letters to a boy. Overnight, she is on her own without any financial or emotional support. 

In Cut Me Loose, Vincent details her harrowing journey as she wanders through harmful relationships and destructive actions, such as cutting her body. As she hits bottom, Vincent realizes that the “life she is trying to craft is doomed to failure.” Although she eventually achieves a measure of redemption, she learns that too much freedom, like too much restriction, has its pitfalls.

Vincent’s compulsively readable memoir draws us into her fears, her few joys and her complete aloneness as she struggles to navigate the course of a new life.

David R. Dow has spent his life dealing with death. He is an attorney who specializes in death penalty issues as a professor at the University of Houston Law Center. He also founded the Texas Innocence Network, which has represented more than 100 death row inmates. Dow picked a good place to practice: Texas has long been the top state for executions.

When you spend your time filing court appeals and clemency petitions for death row inmates—and almost always losing—you learn to embrace life. Things I’ve Learned From Dying, Dow’s latest book, is a guidebook for living life to the fullest. Dow likes to drink, smoke cigars and kayak when the Gulf Coast waves kick up in Galveston. He also embraces the love of his wife, Katya, his son, Lincoln, and their dog, Winona.

Witnessing the execution of a steady stream of clients also has a way of hardening you to death, Dow writes. But the author’s perspective on death suddenly changes when his father-in-law, Peter, is diagnosed with cancer. Meanwhile, Winona, a dog that has been at Dow’s side for almost 13 years, suddenly becomes ill. At the same time, Dow is filing appeals to stop the execution of Eddie Waterman, who was convicted of shooting a man during a home burglary.

Dow lends his perspective on these three lives, and death suddenly evolves from being purely professional to profoundly personal. Dow is fond of his father-in-law, Peter, with whom he has spent countless hours kayaking and hiking. And the sorrow experienced by Dow’s wife makes Peter’s deteriorating condition even more painful. Dow admits that Winona’s declining health is even more heart-wrenching because she has always been at his side, and she is protective of his son. The sadness experienced by 8-year-old Lincoln makes Winona’s downslide more difficult. Conversely, Dow feels little sympathy toward the death row inmate. Ironically, the convict’s fate is the only one that Dow has any opportunity to change.

Things I’ve Learned From Dying would seem like a depressing book to read. But Dow’s sardonic, yet humorous writing softens the edges. And Dow is a gifted author, writing in short, staccato sentences that keep the prose moving with rhythm and pace. Indeed, Things I’ve Learned From Dying really is a book about life, and how one man who deals with death learns to appreciate living.

When Ingrid Ricks' parents divorced, her devout Mormon mother married an abusive creep who made home the last place Ingrid would ever want to be. Her father was a traveling salesman, always chasing down a dream, and when he invited Ingrid to join him on the road for the summer, she jumped at the chance. When their summer plans went sideways, Ingrid was forced to rely on herself for stability and grow up before she finished high school. Hippie Boy chronicles her abbreviated childhood among adults who had their own share of growing up to do.

Hippie Boy—the title was an affectionate nickname bestowed by Ricks' father, on account of her long, tangled hair—was a best-selling self-published eBook, and deservedly so. Ricks is tough but fair when it comes to describing her family, and her frank honesty lets readers see past any failures to the love that ultimately unites them. Her mother endures a terrible second marriage because she simply doesn't want to be the one in charge of things, but flourishes in every way once she finally throws the bum out. Her father bends the truth when it suits him (“Dad was special that way. He could talk his way out of anything.”) and is flaky and inconsistent, but keeps his word to Ingrid in one crucial instance that shows his good heart clearly. And stepfather Earl? Well, let's just say it's a relief when he gets his walking papers.

Hippie Boy juxtaposes the stifling confines of an abusive and oppressively religious home with the thrill of the open road and its anonymous motels and rest stops. It's a story of family unity and a declaration of independence in one, and a keen, clear-eyed take on both. Fans of Haven Kimmel and Mary Karr should welcome Ricks warmly as a new, distinct voice in memoirs.

Diane Johnson’s wry new memoir, Flyover Lives, is an absorbing exploration of the people and places that have shaped her. The book begins and ends in France, where the acclaimed novelist (Le Divorce) lives with her husband John half the year. In between, her stories take us to Illinois, California, New York and London, and also back in time, when the footsteps of her ancestors led them to the Midwest.

“No one writes much about the center part of our country, sometimes called the Flyover, or about the modest pioneers who cleared and peopled this region. Yet their Midwestern stories tell us a lot about American history,” Johnson writes in the foreword. “Migration patterns, wars, the larger movements, are after all made up of individual human beings experiencing and sometimes recording their lives.”

In this memoir, Johnson records her own growing up in Moline, Illinois, part of a close family. Her childhood was one that some might call idyllic; she describes it as “lacking in drama.”

Her story becomes more dramatic as she gets older and moves away from Moline—marrying and divorcing young, moving to London under false pretenses, writing for Stanley Kubrick. However, her recent past is just part of the book.

Johnson’s curiosity about her forebears led her to research and discover some of the traces they left behind—letters, journals and photographs, tales handed down over the years. Telling their stories of life in the Midwest makes up a good chunk of this memoir. Johnson relates her family history honestly and compassionately. Some of the stories are funny, others heartbreaking. She dwells mainly on her grandmothers’ experience: getting married, moving to the center of a young country, setting up house, having children and sometimes, as in the case of her grandmother Catharine, burying their children. Catharine buried her three daughters in the space of one week after they died of scarlet fever.

By investigating the lives of her ancestors, Johnson finds that there are no “flyover” lives, and that every person has a story worth telling.

Near the end of his entrancing and unsparing memoir, Gary Shteyngart —author of three exuberant, award-winning novels—writes, “On so many occasions in my novels I have approached a certain truth only to turn away from it, only to point my finger and laugh at it and then scurry back to safety. In this book, I promised myself I would not point the finger. My laughter would be intermittent. There would be no safety.”

Shteyngart—being Shteyngart—cannot not be funny. In one example drawn at random from Little Failure, he introduces his Grandmother Polya, with whom he is parked after school every day while his parents work (and whose TV he hopes will provide him with new story ideas for entertaining his classmates, who would otherwise despise the slight, poorly dressed Russian immigrant boy): “Behind every great Russian child, there is a Russian grandmother who acts as chef de cuisine, bodyguard, personal shopper, and PR agent.” He begins another chapter: “The next year I get the present every boy wants. A circumcision.”

But the flip side of this sharp sense of humor—an inheritance from his traumatized Russian Jewish family, he says—is rage. A sweet, sickly, incredibly bright only child born in Leningrad in 1972, Shteyngart became a “kind of tuning fork for my parents’ fears, disappointments, and alienation.” Those fears and disappointments ripened when the family left Russia and came eventually to Queens, New York. Shteyngart’s vividly recounted immigrant’s tale tells a parallel story of family dysfunction and a growing self-hatred that, during his years at Oberlin College, manifested in out-of-control behavior that earned him the nickname Scary Gary and, later, led him to regrettable cruelties visited upon people who tried to help him.

Little Failure is also an account of Shteyngart’s growth as a writer. At important junctures in his life, his ability to write helped him overcome his social awkwardness to gain appreciative attention from his peers. “There is nothing as joyful as writing, even when the writing is twisted and full of . . . the self-hate that makes writing not only possible but necessary,” he says at one point. His need to succeed as a writer led Shteyngart at long last to enter psychotherapy, and the result, as the final chapters show, was transformative. Few writers have written about the soul-scorching experiences of their lives with such wit and ferocity as Shteyngart does in Little Failure. There is certainly no scurrying to safety here.

ALSO IN BOOKPAGE: Read our Q&A with Shteyngart for Little Failure.