5 comments about Cross Creek.

1. Rawlings explores the lives and interations of the odd assortment of people living in Cross Creek, Florida in the early 1900s. It is often assigned reading for teens, but I doubt that most of them can appreciate it. Her accounts of neighbors feuding and subsistance living gives us many lessons in human behavior.
   The lyrical descriptions of wildlife and the orange groves and wild landscape are very appealing. Your mouth waters as you read her essays on downhome foods like hush puppies. She turned those into a cookbook which I'll have to try out.
   Modern readers squirm uncomfortably at her use of the N----- word and her characterization of blacks as irresponsible, drunken, immoral, etc. It is probably a faithful representation of common thinking at the time it was written, so recognize it as a snapshot of the times. Then move past that to luxuriate in the beautiful passages in the book. (I deducted 1 star for this)
   The reader becomes absorbed in Rawlings' love of the land and the creation of a home. It gives much the same feelings as A Year in Provence or Under a Tuscan Sun.



2. Cross Creek is a series of entertaining if perhaps embellished anecdotes relating to Florida in the years preceding World War II told from the perspective of a educated emigré from the North. Some of the language, which was typical of the times, would no longer be considered politically correct and might be offensive to some. The book, however is totally delightful and gives some insight into life in rural Florida at the time. An excellent companion read is Tom Glisson's The Creek, which gives a native's view of the same time and area. Both books are a must read if you live or are interested in North Central FL.



3. Wonderful view of an isolated place in FL (near Gainesville) circa 1930 written by a brave, independent woman.



4. Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings always makes me cry. The other reviews of this book here describe it so eloquently and throughly that I don't feel the need to add to that aspect. The book has a strong emotional pull that made me cry and made long to go to Cross Creek and see it for myself. Rawlings is one of my all-time favorite writers, ever since my seventh-grade teacher read the newly published book The Yearling to her class, a chapter or two each day after lunch.



5. I bought this book for one story but it turned out all of the stories were great.

2 comments about Georges Seurat (Getting to Know the World's Greatest Artists).

1. I think that Mike Venezia has finally found a painter whose style he cannot imitate, but can still joke about. Georges-Pierre Seurat was a French painter and the founder of Neoimpressionism, best known for "Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte" (thanks to Ferris Bueller more than Stephen Sondheim, I am sure). If there is one word associated with Seurat's work it would be "pointillism," which has to do with the style he developed of using small dots of pure color juxtaposed together to create a fusion of colors in the mind's eye. So I was thinking that in his Getting to Know the World's Greatest Artists series that Venezia might working is some pointillism in some of his cartoons. But in case you were wondering, pointillism is hard work. So on the front cover of this book while Seurat is working on his famous painting some guy comes along and says "Hey, Seurat, dot's a pretty ice painting" (a joke that I am sure loses something in French). On the back cover cartoon Venezia works himself into Seurat's famous painting with all of the figures turning to look (and glare) at him for intruding on their pleasant afternoon with his lawn chair, loud music, chips, and drinks.
   
   This book provides the key biographical details of Seurat's life, but it is the development of his peculiar painting style that Venezia emphasize more. So the art history lesson here is what young readers will take away from reading this book. There are sixteen drawings and paintings representing the entire course of Seurat's career, along with three studies for "Une Baigndae, Asnieres" to go along with two studies and one detail from "Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte." Their is also a drawn portrait of Seurat by Ernest J. Laurent to go along with works by great artist from the past that Seurat studies at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris by Raphael, Eugene Delacroix, and Jean Auguste Dominique Ingeres, and those by the Impressionist artists Camille Pissarro, Claude Monet, and Pierre Auguste Renoir that inspired Seurat to do better. There are also five of Venezia's cartoons that talk about his artwork and the device Seurat's father made for the arm he lost in a hunting accident to attach knives and forks to the end of his arm.
   
   Venezia is a graduate of The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, which is where "Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte" is on display. The Getting to Know the World's Greatest Artists series is both educational and entertaining, and Venezia always makes good on his promise to use fun to introduce children to art and artists. The pointillism drawings and paintings are surely beyond the skill (and patience) of most of us, but young readers should appreciate the drawings Seurat made to explore the importance of shapes and form done with a smeary graphite-and-clay crayon on bumpy paper, and I think they can understand the basic principle of having tiny dots of different colors next to each other to create a different color when they are blended by the human eye. This is a fascinating series and I am always happy to discover there are volumes about artists that I have missed. Venezia has tackled not only Seurat but also Paul Dezanne, Edward Hopper, Monet, Picasso, Renoir, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Vincent Van Gogh and Grant Wood--and those are just the artists whose works at on display at the Art Institute of Chicago (which I am going to see again this week because that is what I do when I have occasion to drive through Chicago).



2. The fascinating facts of the artist's life are enhanced with comic book style illustrations as well as copies of the artists work. This author takes what could be a very dry subject and makes it entertaining and informative. This book, and the remainder of books in this series, are an obvious resource for an art teacher's library but would make a terrific "outside the box" addition to any classroom teacher's library.

5 comments about Too Many Songs by Tom Lehrer.

1. I bought the song book along with "The Remains of Tom Lehrer" (three CD's and a biographical book). A great purchase for us dead-hard Lehrer fans.
   
   I was delighted that I bought the song book as I can now sing (out of tune) and strum my guitar (rather badly) to many of his infamous songs and annoy the hell out of my children.



2. Hilarious and dark songs by the master of musical gallows humor. The song choices are extensive and well picked. Only complaint is that Lobachevsky and New Math don't have chords/scores for large portions, just the lyrics.



3. I grew up listening to Tom Lehrer's records (played on our Victrola). And, although I wasn't worldly enough to understand some of the more perverse lyrics, my sister and I would belt out his songs with great enthusiasm. The fact that, as a kindergartner, I stood up and sang one of his compositions during "show and tell" is a testimony to...uh...something...I'm not quite sure. However, I clearly remember my mother's horror at being called by my teacher about the content of my presentation. Years later we could both laugh. Thank God Mrs. Ernstein had a good sense of humor. Thank God too that CPS was not in existence in the early 60s.
   
   My point? Mr/Dr (never was sure of his academic title) Lehrer's ability to put into song politically incorrect "We don't talk about it" issues made me a fan for life. My own children have gotten a healthy dose of his humor, and compare him to Weird Al and others of their generation. Weird Al has a long way to go before he can hope to eclipse the senator of sarcasm.
   
   So, for those of you with a bit of a twisted sense of humor (and the ability to read music/play the piano), this is a great piece of musical history, psycho sing-along material, and a chance to keep one man's sense of the ridiculous alive.
   
   P.S. I was never called by any teacher regarding the contents of my children's musical presentations. Live and learn.



4. If you're a Tom Lehrer fan, this is the ultimate compilation. Tom Lehrer for president!!!



5. This book (songs from the Revue "Tom Foolery") includes all of the pieces featured in the Rhino Records 3-CD set. However granted, printed music could never fully reproduce the musicality or hone in on the complete and utter satire of Tom's own performances. That being said, having the printed music in front of one's self (especially when one is not of the species that can simply play by ear) is quite a treat - even more so when your undergraduate Adviser and Professor is also a Lehrer fan!
   ...the drawings (of which there are truly too few) are morbid and wonderful!

5 comments about Too Close to the Falls.

1. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and my only complaint is that it ended too soon. I am hoping that there will be a sequel. This is an unconventional memoir, a very unusual childhood and just so funny and also deeply moving, I couldn't put it down! Everyone I know who has read it loves it. This book will take you through every emotion. If you hate to cook, know a gifted child or were one yourself, had a Catholic school education, this book will be particularly amusing. Worth the read and make sure to pass it along to a friend or two!



2. I really liked this memoir..and I wish the author would continue where she left off. It ends well in this memoir but I was really sorry when it did end. I felt like I was experiencing the life of the author as a young girl into early adulthood--with all her adventures!



3. I'm not certain exactly which years Cathy attended "Hennepin Hall" in Lewiston -- but my memories definitely differ from hers! I did find many familiar characters and locations. Generally well written, and it really did make me a little homesick... they call it "Lewiston By The River" now as a way to draw tourist traffic, and this book took me back to a simpler time when Lewiston had exactly one blinking stoplight.
   
   Worth reading.



4. I found the book to be excellent. I am from the area and as I read I found myself at the locations in the book. It took me on a strange and wonderful tour of my "back yard." I would recommend this to anyone from the area. To those outside the area, you will get a feel for the wonderful little town of Lewiston, that hasn't changed much over the years.



5. I'm not sure that I would have loved this so much if I wasn't familiar with everything that the author was writing about. I grew up not far from her and it was fun reading about all of the local things, but I don't know if I would have been able to enjoy it as much as I did if I wasn't familiar with what she was talking about.

5 comments about Multitude: War and Democracy in the Age of Empire.

1. This book took me back to my schooldays in the old Soviet Empire (not a capitalist one, and yet in a perpetual state of war both internally and externally). More specifically, to my mandatory propaganda classes run by highly trained and experienced Soviet counter-intelligence officers. This book is so smartly written it would make them proud! Why? Let me quote from memory "To get people to see things your way and join your cause follow few basic but very important rules: Speak to their instincts and their hearts; not to their minds. Attempts to reason with your targets at the intellectual level are bound to trigger critical thinking, at which point you as good as lost them. So do not engage in discussions and do not state facts to advance your cause, i.e. do not follow "there is X and there is Y therefore this is A". This makes your targets focus on X and Y which they may question, they may add a Z, and challenge your arrival at A as manipulation of facts. Which it needs to be - only smarter. Therefore, present targets with statement A first and win over their hearts and instincts. Then present facts X and Y selectively "to illustrate". Trick is that by then your targets will have already bought A and will happily accept X and Y as "factual justification". Of course they are only self-rationalizing why they bought your A in the first place, but this is exactly what you need to make A stick. Always use short simple sentences, big numbers, bigh words, bright colors, make sweeping statements... It may be counter-intuitive, but your targets will always have a propensity to believe big lies than small facts. And once they belive, they will be able to explain away anything that does not fit into their belief. This is how you set in motion self-sustaining process and know that you have succeeded." And so it goes. And this is what this book does, and this is why it is so effective. Have fun reading it! And remember Fox Mulder - "I want to believe" :)



2. I read almost exclusively fiction and this book is an example of why, on those rare occasions when I summon the necessary moral fiber to read a non-fiction title, that I run scurrying back to stories about science fiction and detectives.
   
   Multitude is, what exactly? Large parts of it are socio-political mumbo jumbo filled with slippery abstractions and meaningless code words and phrases - the second quarter of the book is practically unreadable for this reason.
   
   At one point in this swill, Hardt and Negri examine Marxism as if it were the best idea in social organization to date instead of the colossal failure that it mutated into in the hands of Stalin and his ilk. It's difficult to take anyone seriously who's still willing to consider what I like to call "the tyranny of the bottom" as a valid governmental system.
   
   Thankfully, and just as one begins to think the book is a lost cause, the authors veer away from Marx and into a reasonably well-done analysis of the current state of global affairs vis-a-vis individual liberties and international relations. It's certainly not the stuff of the Bush administration and, for that at least, is an interesting perspective.
   
   Ultimately I found the authors' linchpin argument - the idea that labor is coalescing around some sort of supra-national set of shared knowledge the authors call "The Common" - unconvincing. Yes, non-tangible labor such as software and other service industries are "hot job markets" and yes, technology is working its way into even the most banal of industries, such as agriculture. But the notion that this provides intellectual, emotional or social-class links between farmers and technologists simply isn't the case, at least at this stage of integration (call me on that when I'm sent to Kansas to program Farmer Brown's John Deere to harvest 100,000 acres of wheat without an operator).
   
   The questions that Multitude tries to ask are: Are we governed in the optimal way and, if not, what would a more optimal system look like. Their conclusions are clear on the former - no - and vague on the latter. "We should have more democracy" is essentially what the authors message is but they don't provide a recipe for getting there.
   
   That is, of course, exactly what is needed in the world. How do we transition the U.S. away from big money politics to a more democractic system? What rules govern its operation? How do the people of Iran get to choose their own leaders in fact, as opposed to leaders in name only? Without answers to these questions, the rest is interesting but meaningless.



3. I found this book so obscurely written that I did not bother to finish reading it.



4. Key Terms
   
   Empire: "the new form of global sovereignty . . . [that] includes as its primary elements, or nodes, the dominant nation-states along with supranational institutions, major capitalist corporations, and other powers" (xii).
   
   Immaterial Labor: "labor that produces immaterial products, such as information, knowledges, ideas, images, relationships, and affects" (p. 65)
   
   Biopower: "a form of rule aimed not only at controlling the population but producing and reproducing all forms of social life" (p. 13)
   
   Biopolitical Production: "Biopower stands above society transcendent as a sovereign authority and imposes order its order. Biopolitical production, in contrast, is immanent to society and creates social relationships through collaborative forms of labor." (p. 94).
   
   Multitude: "an internally different, multiple social subject whose constitution and action is based not on identity or unity (or, much less, indifference) but on what it has in common. . . . The multitude is the only social subject capable of realizing democracy, that is, the rule of everyone by everyone." (p. 100)
   
   The Common: "an artificial result and constitutive basis . . . [that] configures the mobile and flexible substance of the multitude" (p. 349)
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   In Multitude, Political theorists Hardt and Negri theorize a new form of global democracy and a new revolutionary vanguard that can bring such change about. Beginning with Marx's assumption that the mode of production determines subjectivity, Hardt and Negri argue that Marx's economic paradigm has shifted from the production of goods to the production of life itself, a process they term biopolitical production. In this new postmodern era of neoliberal capitalism, ontological warfare, supranational sovereignty, corporate transnational despondency, and the hegemonies of immaterial and affective labors have imploded modernist/dialectical thinking and established the prerequisites for a new way of thinking about revolutionary agency. To flesh out this complicated thesis it is necessary to analyze these four historical conditions in more detail and then discuss the new agential framework that Hardt and Negri term the multitude.
   With the signing of the antiballistic missile treaty in 1972 and the subsequent collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, there is no longer any nation/state that poses a dialectical threat to America's exceptionalism, or its ability to intervene in the production of other societies. As a result, the United States, in tandem with other European superpowers, has launched a new form of warfare called biopower, a political strategy more concerned with producing global subjectivity and maintaining global hierarchy then fending off any sovereign foreign enemy. Abstract discourses (i.e., rhetoric) such as "the war on drugs" and "the war on terror" allow the United States to implement a regime of govermentality, or a strategy of policing subjects by managing their labor power and extracting from them surplus value (excess productive energies). The upshot of biopower is that war has achieved a new ontological character. No longer is warfare a temporal battle between sovereign nations, but instead an indefinite process of controlling, producing and expropriating life itself.
   Just as nuclear weapons and biopower have disrupted the modernist understanding of warfare, the emergences of supranational institutions such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank have challenged the modernist conceptualizing of nation/states. In the past, capitalist nation/states functioned as sovereign entities and had to promote their mode of production through force, coercion, or imperialism. With the rise of supranational institutions, however, the valorization of capitalism no longer depends on any unilateral or multilateral nations. Because supranational institutions stand outside of representational politics, it is difficult, if not impossible, to link the hegemony of capitalism to any centripetal source of power. The IMF's ability to loan money to developing nations and the World Bank's capability to build nations under the discourse of foreign aid, reify the ontological nature of capital and its ability to yoke together all social subjects under a common capitalist identity. Such institutions also demonstrate the pernicious consequences of biopower, ossifying the current (amorphous) global hierarchy by creating an indefinite state of debt and poverty.
   While supranational institutions have occluded the question of nation/states, multinational corporations have broken down the distinctions between public and private, appropriating all forms of life by transmuting material products into immaterial knowledges, ideas, and codes. Hardt and Negri discuss "the Green revolution," and other biological reforms, as a means of illustrating the way life forms can be owned by private corporations. With the ruling of two Supreme Court cases in the mid 1980s, for example, genetically altered life forms have been deemed patentable so long as they are a product of human ingenuity. What such a trend depicts for Hardt and Negri is that a new era neofeudalism is afoot. Seeds, water, and labor, materials that at one point were all part of the common (i.e., everyone), are now being expropriated by corporations and transformed into private knowledges and codes.
   The expropriation of life by transnational corporations provides a segway for discussing the final historical variables of Hardt and Negri's project: immaterial labor and affective labor respectively. Immaterial labor signifies how knowledge, communication, and ideas have become integral to the (re)thinking of labor and production in late capitalist society. The example of genetically modified seeds listed above, for example, demonstrates the way products produced through material labors are becoming interchangeable with immaterial codes. Not only have the products produced become immaterial, however, but the process of production itself has also become immaterial. The shift from the Fordism of the late 1920s to the postFordism of the 1980s has made networking, branding, and communication central to the laboring experience. In an international economy where products are created transnationally and in a climate where a label is as important as the product itself, networking and communication become integral to the distributing and producing of most commodities.
   As labor takes an immaterial turn, affective labor becomes exigent as well. Affective labor illustrates the way that labor in a late capitalist society increasingly relies on human mobility, emotion, and communication to achieve particular objectives. The service industry, for example, one of the more common occupations in the postmodern era, depends not so much on industrial labor as it does on the worker's ability to manipulate and solicit particular affects and emotions. Similarly, the instability of the labor market, caused by the perpetual outsourcing of jobs to foreign countries, has made participants in the labor market flexible and mobile, a shift that signals a new way of thinking about work and identity. Even the domain of consumption, a realm typically isolated from the arena of labor practices, is also becoming inseparable from labor when viewed from the perspective of affects. The consumption of movies, books, and television dramas, for example, cannot achieve their results without soliciting people's emotions and identities.
   What affective labor and immaterial labor point to specifically, is that labor can no longer be viewed dialectically, or as a tension between productive and unproductive labor. Under the logic of biopolitical production, the new economic paradigm of late capitalist society, all labor shares a common exploitative element. Every single laboring subject, whether consuming or producing, is exploited by the parasitic nature of capitalism and robed of their living labor so that empire, an amalgam of multinational corporations, aristocratic elites, and political regimes can generate surplus value.
   It is from this common starting point, this new era of biopolitical production, that Hardt and Negri propose an alternative strategy for rethinking revolutionary agency. Although ontological warfare, supranational sovereignty, corporate transnational despondency, and the hegemonies of immaterial and affective labors have created terrifying conditions for a vast majority of the world, they have also, for the first time in human civilization, have connected human beings in ways that were never previously possible.
   In the Hobbesian premodern era, hierarchical differences were central to the theorizing of society. All citizens obeyed the asymmetrical power of the monarch and disparities were visibly maintained and respected. In the Hegelian modern era, in contrast, unity became the dominant mode of theorizing about society. Consensuses and enlightenment were the teleologies of this time and transcending differences were central to such a perspective. In the postmodern era of biopolitical production, however, neither difference nor unity can adequately describe the current state of thinking. Instead, only a new metaphor of simultaneous unity and difference (see also Hall, 1985) can offer a framework for (re)theorizing revolutionary agency. This reality, for Hardt and Negri, means that dialectical models of agency, such as Aune's (1994) distinction between structure and struggle, are no longer tenable. At the same time, however, it also means that associating Hardt and Negri's project with the relativistic premodern era is not a tenable practice either (p. 37) (see also, Cloud, Aune, & Macek, 2006).
   What the postmodern era teaches Hardt and Negri is that all models of theorizing instrumental agency (whether dialectical, hierarchical, or aesthetic) are no longer relevant. The exploitation of everyone by late capitalist society (i.e., empire) means that "the multitude . . . is not only a model for political decision making but also tends itself to become political decision making" (p. 339). The becoming common of exploitation and communication, in other words, means that revolution and antagonism are immanent. "From this perspective, the crisis of capitalism is now, not in some unspecified future awaiting the revolutionary plans of the party" (Greene, 2006, p. 88).
   Yet while agency in the postmodern era must be fundamentally reconceptualized so too must one's definition of warfare. In the age of nuclear weapons and global capitalism, dialectical warfare is no longer a valid option. Instead, the multitude must wage a war against war, or a battle that takes place more in the form an exodus (a refusal to partake in capitalism). The project of the multitude, then, becomes not one of forming instrumental class based oppositional blocs, but awaking the revolutionary agency that is dormant in all of us. Perhaps Marx's dream of escaping the alienation of labor is still an actual possibility.



5. The argument here is simple and fantastic. The democracies in the world are not 'real' democracies, they are dictatorships of capital. But the world needs democracy. Of course it is the typical cirle. Everything you see is fake, but everything that you think you see should be real. The Communist Manifesto led directly to some 30 million deaths and the enslavement of 1.5 billion people, hopefully this manifesto will not wreak any havoc whatsoever, the world has tired of thse fake pseudo-intelletual 'we will solve the world's problems' ideas.
   
   The 'fake' democracy the authors of this book so abore is ironically the very one that allows them to write it and it is the capitalism this book hates so much that gives it a market.
   
   Seth J. Frantzman

2 comments about Unbroken: A Memoir.

1. I received inspiration and comfort from reading Tracy's story. It is told well, and is a story of triumph and healing. The only issue I had was her insulting view of what she called 'metaphysical' or 'new age' spirituality she encountered in her rehabilitation program. I am not saying all 'new age' philosophies are healthy, just as not all 'Christian' churches preach healthy spirituality. But, what I guess is called 'metaphysical' spirituality (for a lack of a better label or term) is what I embrace and follow and what has been profoundly loving, uplifting, empowering, and healing for me. Also, Jesus and metaphysical spirituality are not mutually exclusive. I do not think Jesus is only the domain of contemporary Christians, or those who call themselves Christians, and go to a conventional Christian church. To me this is spiritually insulting and all to often becomes a form of possessiveness, religious greed, and sometimes even spiritual abuse. Jesus belongs to everyone and he is very important in my life. When I was reading some of Ms. Elliott's views of Jesus and the Bible, etc, I felt disconnected from her story and I had to work to remind myself we are both on a spiritual path that is healing to us and I have to honor that her expression of a spiritual path is different than mine. That is ok, as she herself discovered in her in-patient rehabilitation program that was so healing for her. But, despite this obstacle, there is much wisdom, inspiration and insight to be gained from this story. I recommend it.



2. Tracy Elliott's beautiful smile as the winner of the 2006 Mrs. Texas pageant hides a secret past, which she boldly reveals in her new memoir.
   
   Co-authored with Jenna Glatzer, the narrative reads like a novel. Orphaned at age six when her mother died of alcoholism, Tracey grew up in the projects in small-town Georgia, raised by her grandmother.
   
   Also living in the house were several drunken, violent uncles who verbally and sexually abused Tracy, breaking everything in the house except a lone wooden china cabinet, which survived intact, like she did.
   
   Now married and the mother of two sons, Tracy credits her early faith in Jesus for bringing her through years of trauma, which later included living as a stripper and drug addict.
   
   Even after being married to a wonderful man, Tracy struggled with perfectionism as a mom, wanting to give her husband and sons everything she never had.
   
   The author's honest, real faith is captivating to readers, proclaiming the truth that Jesus has the power to heal anyone from a stained past. This is a beautiful book, with a message the world desperately needs to hear: just because you had a bad childhood doesn't mean your life can never be whole again.
   
   --Christian Women Online Book Buzz

5 comments about Waking: A Memoir of Trauma and Transcendence.

1. Waking: A Memoir of Trauma and Transcendence is a life story that makes demands on the reader not unlike a yoga or rehabilitation stretch. Just when you think that it is too much to bear, there is a moment of breakthrough, of grace, that makes it possible to perverere. I devoured this book in less than a day because of its style and conviction--and because the therapeutic presence of Matthew Sanford on the page is palpable. Waking will resonate with readers who have sustained a physical loss, who have been traumatized, and/or who are open to the possibility of a different type of healing. I also believe it could help health care workers understand from the inside-out what it is like to live in a body altered by the unexpected. I found this book by accident while googling the phrase "trauma and transcendence." The subtitle precisely sums up the book's theme. My only complaint is its brevity (241 pages). It could have easily been double that length, sharing greater details of Sanford's life with paralysis and the yoga practice that echoes his own deep well of wisdom and courage.



2. Incredible story. So sad and yet the dominant feeling is truly one of transcendence and the inner strength of Matt and his family. It certainly puts life in perspective and insires us to focus on the wholeness of our lives as he does, not what we sometimes perceive as lacking. It's a quick read and one that every yoga student should read.



3. I have read this book now three times over. It is one of the best books I have ever read. It is one of those books that makes you stop and take a look at your life and make changes. The book is extremely well written. The way Matt tells his tragic story and adds his insight makes you admire him greatly. The way he worries about his family in the midst of his own tragedy makes you fall in love with him. The way the story turns out and the way he lives his life presently makes you want to meet him and tell him how much his story has touched you.



4. This memoir was a very fast read for me. I got very interested in the many directions that the authors life went. It awakened something in me as well. I will look up the authors website..to learn even more. This memoir was also very touching.



5. Matt Sanford is my hero!!! He has tremendous courage and wisdom despite being dealt some really tough blows in his young life. Somehow, he has managed through a lot of hard work to use what he's learned and share it through words that speak volumes to me about what's really important in life. I read a ton of books; this one is in my top 5 book ever. It made me cringe, wince, laugh, remember, cry, hurt, and most of all cherish my life in a deeper way than I ever knew possible.
   
   Even if you think that you don't want to read anything that would make you "hurt or wince", this is one of those books that also reminds us to appreciate our connection both to our inner selves and others.
   
   Thank you Matt. . . you're too awesome for words!

5 comments about The Beatles: The Biography.

1. As a Beatles fan since age 5,(1970)I've read quite a bit of, viewed a lot of footage of and listened to a lot of The Beatles.
   
   The point of view this book seems to mostly focus on, is the Beatles as seen by the closest people around them. I used to think Lennon was being overly sensitive that he felt like he was "selling out", but after reading this I realize The Beatles were worked like dogs.(12 albums in 7 years) They were metaphorically in a boat during a hurricane, not having a lot of control with chaos all around them. It's amazing they lasted as long as they did.
   
   As far as errors are concerned, Spitz addresses the fact in the beginning that it was suprising how hard it was to verify stories and facts. He often footnotes or includes other peoples recollections that differ. There were a lot of drugs being taken by The Beatles and those around them. There were damage control lies and supressed stories. There were even reports that Mal Evans and Derek Taylor would give phone interviews as one of The Beatles when they weren't available. So how do you know the actual source of a quote from a 1967 newspaper article given in a phone interview was one of The Beatles? I will give Spitz a break here. I think the effort was genuine to substantiate what he could.
   
   The book is more about them as people, the hard work in the early days, the bitter feelings, relationships within and outside the group, egos and bad and good business deals. I enjoyed it and would recommend it.



2. The Anthology was great: it was huge; loaded with photos; lots to read from the words of each individual Beatle. Of course, it was all from their point of view and in the rose-colored glass shading of fallible human memory with who knows how much self editing. Still I was very happy to have it, and I thought that I had read (after some 20-odd bios) everything there was to be read about the Beatles.
   Then came along "The Beatles: The Biography" by Bob Spitz, and I couldn't believe how enthralled I was. It was like really, freshly, rediscovering the Beatles. Such details that one can easily imagine how painstakingly arduous the research and background work must have been. Amazingly, new textures appeared, and onion layers long thought to have been peeled were removed on four fascinating (still, very much so) personalities.
   If you're just now getting into the Beatles, this is an excellent place to start - add perhaps, "Here, There and Everywhere: My Life Recording the Music of the Beatles" by Geoff Emeryck, for some excellent technical detail. If you're a Beatles-nut and you don't have this - what the hell is wrong with you? If you already have the hard copy version, perhaps a nice paperback edition to dog-ear, and maybe even scribble notes on.



3. I loved this book - at first I could not believe I would read over 800 pages on the Beatles! But after just 40 pages on John's early life, I was hooked. Our family watched The Beatles Anthology and played "albums" during my read, so I could hear/see what the book was describing. I liked the fact that the author did not dwell on the private lives - especially women - of the guys after they were popular. I liked the fact that the author described the varied influences on the Beatles. Reading about the messages behind the songs was fascinating. The book was not as interesting or descriptive in the last 100 pages or so - it seemed that the editor told the author to cut something - so the descriptions of the last years as a band was too brief. My best friend and brother (both of whom thought I was nuts to send them an 800 page book on the Beatles) also loved the book. Enjoy!



4. Although I've counted myself a serious Beatles fan for nearly 40 years, I had never actually read up on them. I picked this book as a starting point. I don't think I'd recommend it for that purpose: it's too long by half, focuses more on gossip (especially of the sexual variety), and, as many others have noted here, not nearly enough on the music. What I found more objectionable was the deep-seated bias -- so it appears to me -- against John Lennon. Granted that John was a difficult customer, with a vicious wit and by far the most self-destructive tendendencies of the four; but Spitz doesn't miss an opportunity to cast him in the worst light possible. (Of course, this may reflect my own bias; after the breakup, I found John's music more appealing than the solo efforts of the others. I realize that great artists can also be lunatics and monsters; but surely there was more to John than this book allows.)



5. Excellent book on the Boys! Really goes indepth about where they came from, their family and backgrounds, and how day by day the alliance was formed leading to the greatest band in musical history! Well done!!

5 comments about Ronald Reagan: How an Ordinary Man Became an Extraordinary Leader.

1. D'Souza does a decent job in his biography on the character of Reagan. My biggest complaint with this book is that it does not actually tell us anything about Reagan and his presidency. So much times is spent on the character that by the time you are done understanding Reagan's moral values the book is over and I felt I learned nothing about what Reagan did and how these values played out. For those who have really studied Reagan it is a great addition but if you are looking for only one book try Richard Reeves.



2. Very informative. This book will give you a new appreciation for our recent history.



3. Most biographers who attempt to write about Ronald Reagan typically get frustrated at some point in their effort and throw up their hands saying, "I can't get to know this man!" Indeed, the man that some many of us felt close to without ever having met him was apparently a very tough nut to crack if you wanted to get close to him in person.
   
   As a result, many biographies supposedly about Reagan offer very little insight into the man and what made him succeed and fail. They talk about his life and history, his advisers and their ideas, but they don't capture anything about the man that you wanted to learn about when you picked up the book in the first place - D'Souza does and that's what makes this book different and better from the rest.
   
   D'Souza was a young aid in the Reagan White House and maybe that gives him a bit of an advantage in capturing the essence of Reagan, but I think most of the credit has to go to something far more fundamental; D'Souza hasn't lost the ability to see Reagan the way most Americans saw him, he hasn't lost sight of what America was like before Reagan compared to what it's like now. That gives D'Souza a perspective on Reagan that most academics (which D'Souza is) neglect. It makes all the difference in this book.
   
   D'Souza really captures a man guided by a vision and a philosophy rather than by polls, a real leader rather than someone who went whichever way popular sentiment carried him. Reagan's ideas about America and its relationship to the rest of the world were positive, contrary to popular thoughts and, as it turns out, right.
   
   If you like Reagan, you will love the way D'Souza articulates how the man accomplished everything he did. If you don't like Reagan, D'Souza's look at Reagan offers the best argument I've encountered that you'll have to counter in order to sway his supporters to your way of thinking.
   
   Highly recommended. A great book about a great President.



4. In a way, I always thought that authors who write about Reagan have it easy. How hard could it be to write interesting and inspiring words about a man who was both?
   
   However, the author of this book has taken a bit of a different approach with this book by focusing as much on the "Reagan movenment" as he does Reagan himself.
   
   History is going to be very good to Reagan and it will be because of the movement he created - it spite of the spineless Republicans of today.
   
   I really enjoyed reading the book. It flows easily through the Reagan years and, if you are a Reagan fan, you will close this book, sigh, and say, "God I miss Ronald Reagan!"



5. Watch Video Here: http://www.amazon.com/review/R3KMX3LR39IF00 This is an oldie but a goody indeed. How McCain makes us long for Ronald Reagan the Great!

No comments about Science Lessons: What the Business of Biotech Taught Me About Management.