Hunger Makes Me a Modern Girl

An Amazon Best Book of November 2015: Hunger Made Me a Modern Girl isn't the stately, studio-oriented music memoir that we've seen in the wake of Keith Richards's epic Life--Townshend, Costello, and others--but perhaps most closely resembles Chrissie Hynde's Reckless, at least in spirit, if not content: both are relatively short, intensely personal, and less concerned with chord progressions than personal progression (Hynde’s being particularly gritty). Moving through her childhood in the Seattle suburbs, we see the proto-performer searching for her personal stage while navigating tumultuous family dynamics. And when she finds her voice with the pioneering punk band, Sleater-Kinney, we’re in the van and on stage with her, lugging amps and filthy mattresses until road-stress compels her to end it (the first time, anyway; they’re back). It's not a tell-all; Brownstein is selective about what she shares, but what she does give us hits hard. Her memoir resembles her songs: taut, thoughtful, and honest. –Jon Foro