Charles “Chaz” Holesworth of Willow Grove will be signing books and answering questions at Capricorn Books’ new location in Jenkintown on Saturday, July 25 from 12:00pm – 3:00pm.
Earlier this year, Holesworth published an autobiography titled “Life and How to Live It: Volume Two: Near Wild Heaven”. The book is the second installment in Holesworth’s multi-part memoir series. “Life and How to Live It: Volume One: Begin the Begin” was released in July 2024. More details here.
Holesworth, who works in Glenside, said he was inspired to write his life story after witnessing his sister die in hospice from an aggressive form of cancer in 2019. She was 45 years old.
“I’m really looking forward to meeting readers and friends. It’s a great chance to connect with the community about my books,” he said.
From the book’s description on Amazon.com:
In the gripping second volume of his memoir series, Chaz Holesworth steps out of the wreckage of his Philadelphia childhood and into a new wilderness: adolescence, longing, awakening, and the dangerous freedom of life beyond the rules that once defined him. Raised in a world where faith meant fear and obedience meant survival, Chaz enters his teenage years numb and isolated. Emotions are weakness. Questions are sin. Desire is the enemy. But when first love cracks open the cage, and forbidden music floods in, everything he has been taught about identity, God, and himself begins to unravel.
With every lyric he wasn’t allowed to hear, and every mile he runs from home, Chaz discovers pieces of a self he never knew he could claim. Friends become family. Music becomes prayer. And movement becomes the only escape from a growing storm of shame, confusion, and spiritual fallout he doesn’t yet have language for. Drugs, heartbreak, adventure, and raw curiosity collide as Chaz tries to live fast enough to stay ahead of his past. But survival has a cost, and reclaiming his voice means confronting everything silence once protected him from.
Lyrical, honest, and unflinchingly human, Life and How to Live It: Near Wild Heaven is a coming-of-age memoir about breaking indoctrination, surviving first love, and learning to choose life after years of enforced silence. Set against the pulse of mid-90s music and youth culture, it is a story for anyone who has ever tried to outrun their past, or finally stopped running.
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