Dar­ing: My Pas­sages is the sto­ry of the uncon­ven­tion­al life of a writer who dared to walk New York City streets with hook­ers and pimps to expose vio­lent pros­ti­tu­tion; to march with civ­il rights pro­test­ers in North­ern Ire­land as British para­troop­ers opened fire; to seek out Egyp­t’s pres­i­dent Anwar Sadat when he was tar­get­ed for death after mak­ing peace with Israel.

Shee­hy reveals the obsta­cles and oppor­tu­ni­ties encoun­tered when she dared to blaze a trail in a ​“man’s world.” She reflects on desire and ambi­tion and lays bare her major life pas­sages: false starts and sur­prise suc­cess­es, the shock of fail­ures and inner crises; betray­al in a first mar­riage; life as a sin­gle moth­er; flings of an ardent, lib­er­at­ed young woman; her adop­tion of a sec­ond daugh­ter from a refugee camp; mar­riage to the love of her life and their ensu­ing years of hap­pi­ness, even in the shad­ow of ill­ness. Her fas­ci­nat­ing sto­ry is a tes­ta­ment to resilience, smarts, and dar­ing, and offers a bold per­spec­tive on all of life’s passages.