Sell The Monkey

"Sell The Monkey is a captivating story of family, love, and abandonment, and man’s search for his identity. The story is told in clear and powerful prose, and the reader is pulled in from the very beginning by the ruthless honesty with which the narrator looks at his life. It’s a story that answers the question: What does it take to feel at home with one’s self? I enjoyed the way the protagonist was developed throughout the narrative and how he grows from a victim to someone who can live life on his own terms, embracing art and determining how his work can be appreciated. There is grittiness as well as a powerful sense of pathos that makes this memoir a gripping story. I found it to be as riveting as it is psychologically deep."   Romuald Dzemo, Seattle Book Review

"An incredible journey. One cannot be too prepared to be swept away. Deeply stilling and resonant, Galen’s writing, like his brushstrokes, is a work of extraordinary meditation. Remarkably restrained and sublime, it is writing that emboldens the enormity of story with a cast of characters, each one bigger than life itself.”  Nirupa Umapathy.

Growing up in the South during the 40s and 50s, coming of age and ‘coming out’ in the Alaskan Arctic during the 60s, maturing as an artist in the Pacific Northwest during the 70s and 80s, Galen Garwood’s SELL THE MONKEY is a fascinating memoir, one of humor and poignancy, swimming through generations of racism, homophobia, alcoholism, and uncertainty. It is an engaging chronicle of living and surviving in Ida’s World, his glamorous and talented mother, who played ragtime piano at Alaska’s legendary Malamute Saloon; it is a tale of monkeys, snakes, pigs, elephants, and insects; a story full of eccentric characters—Keoga the Snake Man, Dirty Earl, Greasy John, Mad Irene.
It’s about poets and painters, friends and lovers, art and sex, loss and discovery, and a life blessed by imagination.

“In the initial pages of Sell the Monkey, Galen Garwood is being urged to take a chance in life. This is just a microcosm of his life story… Sell The Monkey is not your average autobiography. The title alone proves that, but don’t let that fool you. The narrative is strong, the retelling of a tough past done beautifully. The reader will be glad to be a passenger on a voyage of self-discovery and growth. An excellent autobiography and all around great read!”    Philip Zozzaro, San Francisco Book Review