Two-Way Traffic
Joel Lieber
Afterword by Jack O'Connell
Cover artwork by Milton Glaser
August 15, 2023
ISBN 9798218223137 / Paperback / 242 pages / $18.99

The first-ever paperback edition of Joel Lieber's posthumously published 1972 semi-autobiographical novel.

Two-Way Traffic is presented as a series of journal extracts chronicling a young writer's struggle to rebuild a life fractured by marital collapse, a bitter custody battle, crippling depression, anxiety, and a suicide attempt. Set against the backdrop of the late 1960s and early 1970s, the novel is a barely fictionalized account of Lieber's own last two years—an unflinching journey into the depths of the mind that balances unvarnished emotional truth with flashes of warmth, wit, and hard-won optimism.

"A frank, intensely personal work."
— Tulsa Daily World, January 23, 1972

"[A] fascinating chronicle of the depths of a man's mind."
— Auburn Journal, March 30, 1972

"Lieber writes lustily and with power."
— St. Louis Dispatch, August 13, 1972