The Perpetual Motion Machine

A memoir exploring a young woman’s troubled childhood, her bond with her older brother, and the toll of drugs and alcohol on their lives. Inspired by a brother’s high school science project—a perpetual motion machine that could save the world— The Perpetual Motion Machine is a memoir in essays that attempts to save a sibling by depicting the visceral pain that accompanies longing for some past impossibility. The collection has been a science project in its study of memory, in the calculation and