Who

Burroughs is the author of quirky childhood memoir Running with Scissors, which was made into a 2006 film with Gwyneth Paltrow.

Backstory

Augusten Xon Burroughs—born Christopher Robison in Pittsburgh—spent his teens living with an (allegedly) loopy psychiatrist's family in Northampton, Massachusetts, after his (allegedly) psychotic poet mother relinquished responsibility for him. Burroughs ended up dropping out of high school and getting his GED before going to work as a copywriter at Ogilvy & Mather. His first novel, Sellevision, came out in 2000 when he was 35, but it was his memoir about his teenage life, 2002's Running With Scissors, that made him a star, spending almost three years on the bestseller list. He's since published three more drawn-from-life books: Dry (2003), about his battles with alcoholism, his stay in an all-gay rehab facility, and his romance with a crack addict; Magical Thinking (2004); and Possible Side Effects (2006).

Of note

With Running with Scissors dominating the bestseller charts, Burroughs' adoptive family came out of the woodwork to dispute its veracity. In 2005, the Turcottes (called the Finches in the book) filed a $2 million lawsuit against Burroughs and his publisher, St. Martin's Press, for invasion of privacy and libel, claiming that he falsely portrayed them as an "unhygienic and mentally unstable cult engaged in bizarre, and, at times, criminal activity." Some of the alleged "fictions": that the house matriarch regularly ate dog food, that "Dr. Finch" had a specially designated "masturbatorium" and kept an electroshock machine under the stairs, and that the family encouraged 13-year-old Burroughs's liaisons with a 33-year-old pedophile. Although Burroughs has always insisted (and still insists) on the infallibility of his memories and the veracity of the book, in August 2007 he settled out of court for an undisclosed sum, agreeing that in future editions the author's note would use the word "book" rather than "memoir" and that the acknowledgments would describe the family's memories of events as "different from my own," and express regret for "any unintentional harm." Despite the legal woes—and the fact that the 2006 film adaptation, starring Gwyneth Paltrow and Alec Baldwin, bombed—Universal eagerly snapped up rights to Burroughs' latest book. A Wolf at the Table, a memoir about his relationship with his (allegedly) sociopathic late father, was published by St. Martins Press in April 2008.

Personal

Burroughs lives with his boyfriend, graphic designer Dennis Pilsits, on West End Avenue; they also have a home in Western Massachusetts, near Amherst. He has two French bulldogs, Bentley and The Cow.