Drama: 4m, 3f
Winner of the 2012 Pulitzer Prize
From the back cover:
Somewhere in Philadelphia, Elliot has returned from Iraq and is struggling to find his place in the world. Somewhere in a chat room, recovering addicts keep each other alive, hour by hour, day by day. The boundaries of family and community are stretched across continents and cyberspace as birth families splinter and online families collide. Water by the Spoonful is a heartfelt meditation on lives on the brink of redemption.
"A complete and satisfying work... A quartet of wounded yet fiercely bright characters who are trying to stay sober communicate over the internet. Those who feel the web is a cold connection may change their opinion after they see the very hot limbo in which these characters live and interact... This is a very funny, warm, and, yes, uplifting play with characters that are vivid, vital, and who stay with you long after the play is over." --The Hartford Courant
"All the characters in Quiara Alegría Hudes' compassionate follow-up to Elliot, A Soldier's Fugue (a Pulitzer finalist) are seeking a kind of visa - one that will allow them to make it to a safe haven in a messed-up world. Everyone in the play is living day-to-day - or spoonful by spoonful, to echo Hudes' poignant metaphor - enabled, hindered, and supported by an ever-interrelated reach of family and friends. The play is a combination poem, prayer and app on how to cope in an age of uncertainty, speed and chaos. When cyber meets the real world, anger gives way to forgiveness and resistance becomes redemption; the heart of the play opens up and the waters flow freely." --Variety