title: Life Interrupted: The Unfinished Monologue
author:  Spalding Gray 
description: Perhaps best known for his first theatrical monologue, 1985's <i>Swimming to Cambodia</i> (which later became a surprisingly successful film, directed by Jonathan Demme), Gray followed <i>Cambodia</i> with many more autobiographical performances, including <i>Monster in a Box</i> and <i>Slippery Slope</i> (and many film appearances) until his suicide at age 62 in spring 2004. A traumatic automobile accident in 2001 had left him severely depressed;this, and the hospital stay that followed, is the subject of the unfinished monologue that makes up only a short part of this memorial volume. Introduced by novelist Francine Prose in a graceful essay citing Gray's "unlikely and hilarious pilgrim's progress," the book includes short eulogies by some of Gray's many friends in memorial services at Lincoln Center and in Sag Harbor, his home. Many are from figures in the world of books and publishing;his agent, Suzanne Gluck; novelist A.M. Homes; essayist Roger Rosenblatt;others from show biz, like Laurie Anderson, John Perry Barlow, Eric Bogosian, Eric Stoltz and many more. This is an unusual book to put out as a trade edition and indicates the affection and esteem Gray commanded. <i>(Oct.)</i> <br />Copyright  Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
zlib_text: > **Replay**
  
  > Ken Grimwood
  
    
  
  >  _For my mother and father_
  
   ****
  
  **ONE**
  
  Jeff Winston was on the phone with his wife when he died.
  
  “We need—” she’d said, and he never heard her say just what it was they
  needed, because something heavy seemed to slam against his chest, crushing the
  breath out of him. The phone fell from his hand and cracked the glass
  paperweight on his desk.
  
  Just the week before, she’d said something similar, had said, “Do you know
  what we need, Jeff?” and there’d been a pause—not infinite, not final, like
  this mortal pause, but a palpable interim nonetheless.
  
  He’d been sitting at the kitchen table, in what Linda liked to call the
  “breakfast nook,” although it wasn’t really a separate space at all, just a
  little formica table with two chairs placed awkwardly between the left side of
  the refrigerator and the front of the clothes drier. Linda had been chopping
  onions at the counter when she said it, and maybe the tears at the corner of
  her eyes were what had se