Kathleen Stewart’s memoir is poetic, courageous, and shocking. She shows how children can be so badly treated, how women can be so badly treated, how the mentally ill can be so inadequately treated, that they can destroy themselves and others and the world continues on, oblivious.
Category: Non fiction reviews
A review of Girls Like Us: Carole King, Joni Mitchell and Carly Simon and the journey of a generation by Sheila Weller
As a longtime admirer of all three of these artists, I was rivetted by Weller’s narrative and impressed by her analysis of their lives and legacies. But this is not just a book strictly for the fans of the music – anyone who is interested in womens’ role in society and the period that saw the rise of feminism and the ‘gender wars’ will find much to mull over here.
A review of Composition by Linda Lavid
While you might need a few more reference books on your journey from a person who dreams of being an author to someone who has a book of his or her own to sign and sell, this is nevertheless a useful starting point and a reference you’ll find yourself going back to along the way.
Revelations: Notes on Music, Criticism, and Society; on Nelson George’s book Where Did Our Love Go? and Stanley Crouch’s book Considering Genius
George, someone whose work I used to read in Manhattan’s Village Voice, documents the beautiful and brutal reality that was Motown, a company and a creative period, the 1960s through the 1970s, that I think of as a highlight of African-American and American history, as important as (if not more important than) the Harlem Renaissance, giving us sounds and substance, giving us ideas, images, and individuals, of great value.
A review of Syncopations: Beats, New Yorkers, and Writers in the Dark by James Campbell
Campbell is very good on Capote and it is the slightly gossipy air of his writing that makes these studies especially interesting. He is even better on James Baldwin, subject of one of his books. He demonstrates how the FBI persecuted Baldwin, drove him into exile, and hampered his life so that after leaving the United States Baldwin’s best years as a writer were over. It would be pleasant to believe that such things are no longer possible, pleasant but, alas, unfortunately naive.
A review of Writers on the Job, Tales of the Non-Writing Life edited by Thomas E. Kennedy and Walter Cummins
This seems to be a recurring theme for these American writers. In a culture obsessed with money, that judges people’s worth, and even godliness, on their income and possessions, how can a serious writer survive psychologically and continue to produce while knowing those around them often perceive them to be layabouts and losers who should get ‘a proper job’?
A review of Gleaner or Gladiator: the struggle to create by Lyne Marshall
She lays her own journey out honestly, celebrating the successes and exploring those areas that didn’t work – struggling to create new meaning in both areas through the relationship between words and visual impressions. It isn’t always an easy thing to do, but Marshall has produced a work that is an important addition to the aesthetic canon, and a pleasurable read full of both heady insights and lovely images.
A review of Elmore Leonard’s 10 Rules of Writing
Overall, Elmore Leonard’s 10 Rules of Writing is a smart, generous, thought-provoking piece of work and is chockful of all of this writer’s insouciant integrity – but don’t come to it expecting to be spoon-fed. One would have liked more, for at a mere 89 pages in all, the book is somewhat slight.
A review of Send Yourself Roses by Kathleen Turner
Send Yourself Roses is not at all like these recent memoirs, but more like the kind of celebrity hagiography produced as a movie tie-in or short-term career booster. This represents a lost opportunity for Turner, one of whose purposes in releasing this memoir seems to be to garner more of the respect she has worked so hard for.
A review of Deceptively Delicious by Jessica Seinfeld
But even the fact that this book is all about making your family healthier without a hint of coercion isn’t the reason why I like it. I like it because the recipes are sensational. What Seinfeld doesn’t tell you is that the vegetables actually add significant subtle flavour, depth, and richness to your food. The chocolate cupcakes with avocado and cauliflower were the best tasting cupcakes I’ve ever made.