Borderlines

Alternating between St. Louis and San Francisco, past and present, this memoir revisits a transformative period in my early twenties following the loss of my mother to cancer.

I remember when I received the news that Random House wanted to publish Borderlines. I was at my desk at Northwestern University, where I worked as an editor. Before that, I had worked at Encyclopedia Britannica in Chicago. And before that, as an editor in Berkeley, California. I was a film school graduate with big dreams, and time was flying as I kept taking off and landing, unsure of which branch would hold.

I was elated that my book had found a home. Buoyed by the sale, and with romantic visions of authorhood, I took flight again, returning to the Bay Area where many of the events in these pages took place.

In 2004, Borderlines was published, and for a few years I experienced the excitement of engaging with readers and having a book tour. As time passed, I followed a career in media production and the book fell out of print. In time, the rights returned to me, and I am working towards bringing out a new edition, testing out new cover art and writing an updated forward.

For now, I look back at my younger self and appreciate the battles and victories depicted in these pages. They have led to unexpected new paths and stories, presently finding their place in a second book, now underway.

- Caroline, May, 2026