Anthony Swofford's new memoir, Hotels, Hospitals, and Jails, chronicles how in the years after the success of his book Jarhead, he went on a binge of self-destructive excess. He lost almost everything and everyone that mattered to him.

Swofford pulled himself out of his near-deadly slump by reconnecting with his estranged and dying father, a philandering, hard-drinking Vietnam veteran. The two stubborn men took off on a series of RV trips where they frequently butted heads while slowly learning to understand one another.

Co-sponsored by the Writers at Work Roundtable and the UMKC English Department; organized by Kansas City author Whitney Terrell.