A PAGE-TURNING, BEAUTIFULLY-WRITTEN MEMOIR FOR FANS OF NETFLIX'S 'OUR FATHER'
'A wholly absorbing page-turner that everyone will want to read. You should probably buy two.' - Kirkus Starred Review
'By turns hilarious, wrenching, and achingly tender... Bilton writes beautifully, with sharp insight and a light touch, about her harrowing, astonishing journey into understanding her parents, her (very) extended family, and herself.' - Susan Orlean, New York Times bestselling author of On Animals and Rin Tin Tin
'A Normal Family had me absolutely riveted from beginning to end... an impeccable narrative about the explosion of love, betrayal, addiction, and menagerie of animals that made up her madcap and calamitous childhood.' - Stephanie Danler, author of Sweetbitter
For most of her life, Chrysta Bilton was one member of a small, if dysfunctional, family of four. There was her sister, Kaitlyn, her hedonistic, glamorous, gay mum Debra, and Jeffrey, who Debra hand-picked, in an LA hairdressers, to be the father of her children. During Chrysta's unstable childhood, Debra struggled to keep the family afloat and Jeffrey wandered in and out of their lives.
Then, in her twenties, Chrysta discovered that her father had secretly donated his sperm over 500 times - and that she had at least 35 other siblings.
A Normal Family is a captivating coming-of-age memoir about Chrysta's reckoning with the secrets both parents had carefully kept from her. Heartfelt, warm and funny, it's a story of embracing the family we have, in all the forms we find it.
'I thought my family was complicated until I read Chrysta Bilton's wonderful memoir about the unique collection of irresistible characters in her life. Bilton has a big heart, gentle wisdom, keen eye and lovely wit. She's a gifted writer with an astonishing story to tell.' - David Sheff, author of Beautiful Boy
It's hard to put into words the many ways this book spoke to me. A Normal Family reads like a thriller with its core mystery being the very meaning of life itself: vividly specific but also universal, with family as protagonist and antagonist, but always the hero. - Ry Russo-Young, filmmaker (Nuclear Family)
Chrysta Bilton's astonishing, wildly unpredictable memoir A Normal Family starts out as rollicking and suspenseful and only ramps up from there, becoming by turns frightening, riotously funny, and finally quite moving. -Robert Kolker, New York Times bestselling author of Hidden Valley Road
