But her faith was not the airy convent-school brand Mary McCarthy described in "Memories of a Catholic Girlhood."

Again this is confessional writing of an intense order, and one is reminded here of the real confessionals that figured in her earlier book "Memories of a Catholic Girlhood."

To understand where all the moisture went, I find it useful to read "Memories of a Catholic Girlhood" alongside "How I Grew."

When Mary McCarthy wrote "Memoirs of a Catholic Girlhood" in 1957, she felt obliged to clarify how she recreated dialogue.

McCarthy explores the complex events of her early life in Minneapolis and her coming of age in Seattle in her memoir, Memories of a Catholic Girlhood.

Memories of a Catholic Girlhood (1957), Harvest/HBJ, 1972 reprint:ISBN 0-15-658650-9 (autobiography)

Memories of a Catholic Girlhood is the autobiography of Mary McCarthy that was published in 1957.

At 75 years old, she has 19 books behind her, including such novels as "The Group" and the memoir "Memories of a Catholic Girlhood."

There were her memoirs: "Memories of a Catholic Girlhood" (1957), the beautifully observed portrait of her painful youth, and the later, more workmanlike "How I Grew," published in 1987.

But a friend tipped him off that Mary McCarthy had already done something similar in her book "Memories of a Catholic Girlhood."