In a series of essays entitled "Not for Nothing: Glimpses into a Jersey," author Kathy Curto recounts her Italian American girlhood on the Jersey Shore in the ‘70s & ‘80s. Some constant pivotal realities are ever-present in this coming of age memoir: the fallout from her parents’ stormy marriage, the physical and emotional residue from dirty, undervalued work and the effects of infidelity and addiction.
The daily dramas in her curious imagination, in the kitchen of their house on Regency Court and at Fred’s Texaco, the family business, guided her developing understanding of the world. This book is as much about people as it is about place, language, and chaotic family love.
Kathy Curto teaches at Montclair State University and the Writing Institute at Sarah Lawrence College.
