The Endless Search: A Memoir

This is a must read book for all of those who think about the journey to understanding called Life, especially untangling the effects on adulthood by childhood abuse. It is both clear and shimmering with brilliance and delight and clarity and, at the same time, shaded by darkness and despair. Life other outstanding literature, there are many scenes and conversations in this book that are unforgettable and linger on, popping up unexpectedly months after I finished it. Highly recommended for individuals and for book clubs.

Validating. That must have been said a million times about "Endless Search." Inspiring, brilliantly descriptive and as harrowing a read as I have ever experienced. How he survived, we'll never know, but that David Ray did and that he is such an outstanding human being is such a clear manifestation of grace that I can hardly stand it! Every adult should read this book! Every survivor of abuse should READ THIS BOOK!

Poet David Ray bares his soul to us in "The Endless Search." Readers will share his childhood, perhaps to recollect the pain of isolation, loss and disappointment each of us has had. Who would want to be a child again, to relive such burning moments for himself and his sister, as David Ray has described for us. "The Endless Search" has a luminous side, a love of life. The author's search for love, given and received, circles in frustration with absent and flawed parents. David Ray does not blame them; he tells the truth with just enough distance for the reader to feel the peace after the turmoil, the forgiveness and love that infuse "The Endless Search." The book provides illuminating scenes of poverty, family caretakers, orphanages, the Great Depression on Oklahoma farms and in small towns, a few prosperous relatives and the cousin who plays with a $50 toy electric train. There is the guardian trained in psychology who turns out to be both Swengali and a child abuser. A meeting with James Jones, author of "From Here to Eternity," leads to nightmare weeks in Louney Handy's Illinois writers colony. Her unpredicable praise-and-torment behavior is another example of a search that appears endless, that of the author seeking professional recognition and income. A gifted story teller and craftsman, writing in clear, easy languaage, David Ray illuminates the prose of "The Endless Search" with his poems. They, too, are clear, understandable, vivid. His poetry resonates with enjoyablee tones and rhythms reminiscent of Whitman and Frost. "The Endless Search" is a book to read and read again. It can serve as a guidebook to David Ray's other published poetry, a treasure of American literature.