GET OFF

Set against a backdrop of New York City in the grungy, glittering 1980s, GET OFF is a memoir about desperate living, hidden promise, double lives, and the danger of getting too much too soon. This eloquent, entertaining, sometimes absurdly hilarious book is a rollicking tale of how an anxious theater nerd from Long Island created and ultimately emerged from a hell of his own making. Tossed out of two colleges his freshman year, Scott Alderman was a drug-addled coke dealer with no future and no aspirations, until he found a mentor and discovered untapped talents. A swift rise in the music business seemed as exhilarating, frightening, and out of control as the secret life he led trawling gay bathhouses and Times Square pick-up spots for sex and drugs. And just as his career took off, he started using heroin, kicking off an odyssey of rehabs, mental hospitals, busts, and disastrous jazz tours. A caustic gay drug counselor and a critical edition of On the Road finally broke through, and showed him a path to living honestly and without fear. Written as a testament for his young son, Scott Alderman's account of his wasted youth and hard-earned manhood will resonate with and inspire anyone who has been lost and struggled to find their way back.