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DREAMTIME ALICE
By Mandy Sayer
Ballantine Books, 333 pages, $24.95
Too many contemporary memoirs read like therapy logs rather than textured reflections on past events. Australian writer Mandy Sayer skillfully avoids this pitfall, however, by focusing on vivid scenes in her unconventional past–in her early 20s, she performed as a tap dancer on the streets of New York and New Orleans while her alcoholic father accompanied her on drums and a jazz tape played. There is no room for self-pity here, as readers are swept up with the music of Count Basie, Duke Ellington and the relentless rhythm of Sayer’s days.