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Published Jul 2016
272 pages
Genre: Biography/Memoir
Publication Information
Trying to Float is a seventeen-year-old's darkly funny, big-hearted memoir about growing up in New York City's legendary Chelsea Hotel.
New York's Chelsea Hotel may no longer be home to its most famous denizens - Andy Warhol, Leonard Cohen, Patti Smith, to name a few - but the eccentric spirit of the Chelsea is alive and well. Meet the family Rips: father Michael, a lawyer turned writer with a penchant for fine tailoring; mother Sheila, a former model and renowned artist who matches her welding outfits with couture; and daughter Nicolaia, a precocious high school junior at work on a record of her peculiar seventeen years.
Nicolaia is a perpetual outsider who has struggled to find her place in public schools populated by cliquish girls and loudmouthed boys. But at the Chelsea, Nicolaia need not look far to find her tribe. There's her neighbor Stormé, a tall woman who keeps a pink handgun strapped to her ankle; her babysitter, Jade, who may or may not have a second career as an escort; her friend Artie, former proprietor of New York's most famous nightclubs. The kids at school might never understand her, but as Nicolaia endeavors to fit in she begins to understand that the Chelsea's motley crew could hold the key to surviving the perils of a Manhattan childhood.
Not since Holden Caulfield has there been such a fabulously compelling teen guide to New York City: Nicolaia Rips's debut is a disarming, humble, heartfelt, and wise tale of coming-of-age amid the contradictions, complexities, and shifting identities of life in New York City. A bohemian Eloise for our times, Trying to Float is a triumphant parable for the power of embracing difference in all its forms.
"Starred Review. An engaging story with a big heart, written by a young adult whose sharply tuned and often witty observations will appeal to adults and teens alike." - Kirkus
"This heartfelt memoir balances pathos and humor, proving that Rips, still only a senior in high school, is a promising writer who is wise beyond her years. " - Publishers Weekly
"Trying to Float is hysterically droll, touching, elegant, and wise - a coming-of-age story from someone who possibly came of age before her parents." - Patricia Marx New Yorker staff writer and author of Let's Be Less Stupid and Him Her Him Again The End of Hi
"These little tales about little rascals in New York City are charming, strange, and inspiring. What a very funny, improbably truthful book about childhood this is." - Joseph O'Neill, author of Netherland and The Dog
"As a former resident of the Chelsea Hotel, I came at this book with trepidation. What could an 17-year-old have to say about the last Dionysian castle in New York City? My skepticism ended with the prologue. Nicolaia Rips writes with wit, discipline, and grace. Her voice is real. With this book she is announcing herself as a force in the next generation of artists." - Ethan Hawke
This information about Trying to Float was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Nicolaia Rips attends LaGuardia High School for the Performing Arts in New York City (class of 2016), where she is an active member of LaGuardia's literary magazine, LaGuardia Magazine. She has lived at the Chelsea Hotel for her entire life. In her spare time, she studies vocal music, participates in team sports, reads avidly, and tolerates her parents. Trying to Float is her first book.
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