In this provocative collection of memoirs, eight acclaimed writers go about the risky business of telling their own secrets. Collectively, they provide what amounts to a psychic map of American life, from the streets of New York's East Village-where Peter Trachtenberg's affair with a fragile ex-prostitute becomes entwined with scenes from an imaginary film noir, to the trailer parks of southern California-where, in a last-ditch bid for affection,...