1 comments about Mi Casa/my House (Somos Latinos / We Are Latinos).

1. My house is about the Rodriguez family and their home. I was excited to learn this family lives near my home. The pictures are wonderful. The author has taken much care when taking the photos.
   
   I enjoyed the dual language format. It allowed me to practice my knowledge of Spanish.

1 comments about Latino Sun, Rising.

1. I received this book still in the plastic and was very satisfied with my purchase.

5 comments about Freak.

1. John Said Himself That This Was Based On His Life And How He Really Exaggerated It For The Play And Then To The Book.I Have Seen Part Of The One-Man Show On HBO And I Thought It Was Really Funny.The Book Contains Some Pretty Funny And Weird Subject Matter.I Think That The Elaberation Of The "Characters" In The Book Were Really Funny And Had Some Cool Dialoge.One Part I Thought Was Grose-Out Funny Was His Father's Way Of Trying To Get The KFC Lady To Help John Became A Man.It Is Certinaly Not For Delicate Ears And Open For Open Minds.Hope You Like My Review...Feel Free To Look At My Others.Bye,Bye Now.....Have A Good Day



2. Like Augusten Burroughs' hysterical autobiography "Running With Scissors," Leguizano's family of loose screws made him a screwball, for better or for worse.
   
   At turns morose and gross, and gutbusting and bitingly real, you will transported by a family, though superficially unlike your own, eventually begins to resemble your childhood memories.



3. "Freak" is a fantastic piece of writing and an amazing performance by its writer, in his HBO one-man show. What I don't understand is why HBO wouldn't put it out on DVD. They've done it with Chris Rock's shows... If you can get your hands on a tape, watch it. It's funny and heartbreaking.



4. Freak was a one-man show in San Francisco and off-Broadway, then moved to
   Broadway, gathering Tony nominations. In October 1998 it was an HBO special. For most performers, comedians, it would be just another stand-up concert, a type of program common to HBO. But this is Leguizamo's "Semi-Demi-Quasi-Pseudo Autobiography" and he brings to it such intensity, such a variety of personalities -- as he remembers his family and friends -- that it transcends this description and becomes like, well, a Broadway play.
   
   John Leguizamo has had a remarkably varied career. Fans of the Spawn movie will recall his huge, even monstrous role there. His character and costume was very different in the oddly titled move To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything, Julie Newmar. He probably reached one of his largest audiences early in his career in the usually pasteurized television mass market, briefly enlivened, energized and diversified by his "Latino variety show" "House of Buggin'."
   
   This is a book based on the one man show and HBO special, edited to be
   read, so it of course differs from the performances, which would include some ad lib. One might have expected to save the experience of this show with a tape, or a spoken-word recording, but this paperback is an inexpensive, permanent way to revisit and savor Leguizamo's work again and again, at your pleasure and convenience.



5. This is supposed to be a quasi-autobiographic look back at John Leguizamo's past. I know it is not to be taken literally. I know humor is born of pain. Still, I thought that this funny, funny guy let it all hang out in an odd way. I know it was greatly exaggerated and all, but I felt like I was the only sober one in a bar at 2:30 a.m., and there was this crying drunk hanging all over me, telling me his tale of woe. I'm not against pathos, it just struck me as a kind of strange rendition of the celebrity confessional. Still love him, though, and even bought another one of his books, which I like much better.

No comments about The Plays of Josefina Niggli: Recovered Landmarks of Latino Literature.

1 comments about Gronk (A Ver).

1. In recent years, Chicano art has received some of the respect long denied it by museums, critics and educators.
   
   This did not happen without such diverse supporters as comedian Cheech Marin and Gary D. Keller, director of Bilingual Review/Press at Arizona State University. Through the publication of handsome, well-annotated books and the preparation of traveling exhibitions, they and others have encouraged this evolution of attitude and opinion.
   
   Such advocacy continues. In 2002, the UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center Press established the book project "A Ver: Revisioning Art History," billed as the only series on Chicano, Puerto Rican, Cuban, Dominican, and other U.S.-based Latino artists. The center's director, Chon Noriega, edits the series, which is distributed by the University of Minnesota Press.
   
   The first book in the series is "Gronk" ($24.95 paperback; $60 hardcover with documentary DVD), a biography of the artist of that name by Max Benavidez, a Los Angeles writer and scholar. Through Benavidez's well-researched text, generously illustrated by Gronk's art and photographs from the artist's life, we come to understand not only the importance of his art but also the personal and historical events that inform his artistic vision.
   
   Gronk was born in 1954 and grew up in East Los Angeles. Benavidez notes that this predominantly Mexican-American community was "a place literally and figuratively outside the mainstream." Residents suffered from government neglect, poverty, gang violence and drug abuse.
   
   In this setting, Gronk was further marginalized when his father abandoned the family. Gronk was often left unattended at a young age because his mother had to work.
   
   Eventually, he discovered the public library and spent countless hours there, reading book after book, moving alphabetically through the shelves. When a librarian learned of Gronk's reading plan, she sternly but wisely told him to "start with the Greeks and then work your way up to the present."
   
   In addition to books, Gronk fell in love with movies and television shows of all genres and quality.
   
   As Gronk moved into adolescence, he still felt like an outsider, in part because he was gay. Benavidez writes that during this period of self-discovery, Gronk became such a master of reinvention that questions still linger about his biographical details. While Gronk says his full name is Glugio Gronk Nicandro, Benavidez finds conflicting evidence regarding even this seemingly simple element of Gronk's identity.
   
   In due course, Gronk gravitated toward like-minded young people as he began to develop as a playwright, actor, filmmaker and artist. He helped form Asco, a group of "self-styled misfits and cultural radicals" that originally included Harry Gamboa Jr., Patssi Valdez and Willie Herrón III. The late artist Jerry Dreva also had a major influence on Gronk's work.
   
   Gronk eventually created his most famous image, the iconic "La Tormenta," who is always depicted facing away from the viewer. La Tormenta wears long black gloves and a matching gown that plunges in a deep "V" down her back. As Benavidez notes, La Tormenta can be seen as Gronk's "glamorously stylish alter ego" who is "central to his artistic arsenal, that serves as a symbolic counterpoint of an 'authentic,' stable sexual identity."
   
   The political turmoil of the times also influenced Gronk's work. For example, the powerful "Black and White Mural" (a collaboration with fellow Asco member Herrón) was inspired by the 1970 Chicano Moratorium, a national protest against the Vietnam War. One of the more potent images depicted in the mural is the infamous killing of reporter Rubén Salazar by a sheriff's deputy who needlessly fired two 10-inch tear-gas projectiles through a curtain into the Silver Dollar Café in East Los Angeles.
   
   Benavidez offers a riveting, clear-eyed and contextualized midcareer examination of Gronk's development not only as an artist but also as a person.
   
   For more information on this exciting and much-needed book series, visit [...].
   
   [This review first appeared in the El Paso Times.]

4 comments about Closest Companion: The Unknown Story of the Intimate Relationship Between Franklin Roosevelt and Margaret Suckley.

1. Having visited Ms. Suckley's home and the nearby Roosevelt home and library, I felt as though I were along for the ride as I read Daisy's accounts of their picnics and "tea dates" at various sites along the Hudson. In this day of "tell-all" books and seemingly unlimited voyeuristic snooping into Presidential private lives, this book was a pleasant departure from the norm. It also offered new insights into the life of a much-studied President, but one about whom there are still many unknowns. Margaret Suckley, even while preserving much of the account of her longstanding (but unknown to most contemporaries) relationship with FDR, took care to take the more private elements of their friendship to the grave.



2. This is the story of Franklin Roosevelt's friendship with a distant cousin Daisy Suckley, based on journals long kept from the public by Daisy herself. It is fascinating for that story, but more so for the information it gives of a time in our history, when the President could leave the country and only those closest to him would know it. As Daisy relates the daily comings and goings of her life, she give us an intimate look at how Franklin Roosevelt managed to travel to secret meetings with other world leaders. She also lets us see Rosevelt's failing health and how his determination to win the war kept him going.

   Geoffrey C. Ward's editing keeps the story moving. It may not be scholarly history, but it is a fascinating read for any history buff looking to understand the story behind the history.




3. A fascinating book. If you like history, particularly the Roosevelt era, it is the day-to-day letters and diaries between Franklin Roosevelt and his fourth cousin Margaret Suckley who was present at most of the major events during the Roosevelt presidency including his death. She traveled extensively with him throughout the United States. She lived down the road from him in Hyde Park and edited his papers at the White House with him during his presidency. This book an unknown treasure.



4. This book was recommended to me more than 10 years ago; I am sorry that I finally read it only within the past few weeks. Whether its excellence is owing more to Daisy Suckley and the FDR correspondence she kept hidden throughout her long (99-year) life, or to editor and compiler Geoffrey Ward (whose other Roosevelt books I am now dying to read), it should be required reading on the topic of FDR. Nothing else I have read shows us more about FDR's personal life. It is more revealing, for example, than the recent Franklin & Lucy (also worth reading, but not nearly so compelling). Roosevelt's letters to his neighbor and distant cousin Daisy are not direct transcriptions from his mind or heart---no one's are---but they may come as close as we can get. Besides this insight, we get Daisy's eyewitness account of many crucial moments in World War II and of FDR's last days. A valuable account of an extremely complicated man.

1 comments about Out of the Sea and Into the Fire: Latin American-U.S. Immigration in the Global Age.

1. ms. lydersen looks into the real effects of "globalization." and the real people being affected most directly by it. she lets what she finds speak for itself.
   
   she also lists web sites at the end of each chapter so the reader can continue exploring some off the issues she brings forth. definitely one of the most useful, "enjoyable," and well-written books i have come across in quite a while!
   
   kari lydersen is helping set the stage for global understanding and true justice. this book is an important piece of history.

No comments about Lo Que Vi / What I've Seen SPA: Experiencias de un periodista alrededor del mundo.

3 comments about Rimas.

1. Sencillamente es uno de los mejores (y para mí el mejor) libro de poesía que se ha escrito en español. Es maravilloso.



2. "Just when Spanish Romanticism was thought to have passed, arrived the True Romantic". This is the seminal work of Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer, The Prince Of Modern Spanish-Language Poets. As the Ancient Greeks, he sings to everything: from the supernatural and abstract description of inspiration, to the sad and thought-provoking poem on the loneliness of a dead child. Two Words: The Best! Look also for "Leyendas", the companion piece to "Rimas", they are usually sold together as one book.



3. "Just when Spanish Romanticism was thought to have passed, arrived the True Romantic". This is the seminal work of Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer, The Prince Of Modern Spanish-Language Poets. As the Ancient Greeks, he sings to everything: from the supernatural and abstract description of inspiration, to the sad and thought-provoking poem on the loneliness of a dead child. Two Words: The Best! Look also for "Leyendas", the companion piece to "Rimas", they are usually sold together as one book.

5 comments about Las Mamis.

1. When I first saw this book in the bookstore, I could not believe that someone finally put together a book about Latin mothers. As a person with a Mexican mother, I was hopeful that my unique experiences would finally be told. I was wrong. The writing in this book is dishonest and pretentious. I kept getting the feeling that the writers were trying to impress the readers with their clever writing and big words. It certainly did not help that the editors chose to exhaustively list all of the awards and accolades ever bestowed upon the writers. What does this have to do with writing about your mother? Even though some of the stories were potentially touching, I did not shed one tear because I simply could not get over the "look at me" writing. If someone wants to read a beautifully written book about a mother that made me cry and think about my own mother, please read Growing Up by Russell Baker. Russell Baker's mother did not have to be Mexican for me to be touched by her son's honesty and the beauty of his writing.



2. One has to bear in mind that writing about people one knows is very subjective, and this is the author's right. People simply are not objective about those close to them. The writers of this book have accomplished a creation that has resulted in a beautiful specimen of literature, rich in description and sentiment, both amusing and tragic.

   How can one not laugh when Jaime Manrique quotes the only comment his mother makes after she sees her son's pictures in a magazine spread for the first time: " You look fat, You'd better lay off those pies" and how can one not cry when he writes "The most wonderful tribute I can pay to my mother is to say that whereas most children automatically love their mothers, I've grown to love Soledad." But these quotes don't mean much without reading all that precedes them.

   And then, who will ever forget, once read, Alba Ambert's haunting search for a mother she has never known and how she consciously forms a life for herself based on this lack of knowledge?

   If you are looking for straight storytelling, you will find it here, but you will also find great sentiment and poetry within these pages. That in itself is worth the read. One no longer cares as one reads along if it is true or not; it still touches the soul.




3. IT IS A TREAT TO READ ABOUT DIFFERENT STORIES ABOUT VARIOUS MOTHERS. THIS BOOK REMINDS US HOW IMPORTANT OUR MOMS ARE.
   WE SHOULD ALWAYS GIVE THEM CREDIT FOR THIER GUTS ON BEING MOMS.



4. I LOVED this book! It has some great short stories from a variety of authors. Very tasty! Each story has its own flavor, and this makes for a great literary soup. It reaches across cultural boundaries to touch hearts and souls of us all.
   
   Seriously great reading!
   
   Marta Lomeli, author
   Cuentos From the House on West Connecticut Avenue



5. What can I say? Excellent book! Very interesting. You most buy it if you want to know more about these Mamis - Mothers of different Latinamerican writters are the inspiration in a way or another in their lives. Touching stories about reality with different backgrounds with one purpose: to show us how our Mamis influence in our lives. Beautiful stories put together.