A passionately unconventional, revealing yet fragmented account of an artist’s journey.
A Cuban artist, filmmaker, and actor recalls his life and travels in this memoir.
Blazquez was born in Cardenas, Cuba, in 1944. He began painting at an early age, using any materials he could lay his hands on—from house paint to bubblegum. When his mother decided to mail his abstract works to a Cuban celebrity painter, the reply came that the author was born with a gift and should be given “total freedom of creation.” As a child, Blazquez experienced recurring dreams of ancient Egypt, despite never having encountered imagery associated with the civilization. These dreams remained with him throughout his life and later influenced his art. Feeling as though he were at the mercy of a Communist state, the author sought freedom by leaving Cuba in 1965 to live in Montreal, Paris, Madrid, and then America. In 1974, the artist began producing “Egyptian sculptured paintings,” which later became known as “mummies.” Blazquez recalls feuds with difficult and exploitative gallery owners as he struggled to get his art exhibited. Four years later, in recognition of his work, he was invited to take a three-week tour of Egypt as an official guest of that nation’s government. Arranged in nonchronological order, the memoir frequently returns to this trip, providing commentary on everything from pyramid visits to the cleanliness of the hotels. The author also inserts dream sequences into the account that further inform how they influenced his art. Published posthumously, the book notes that Blazquez’s intention is to offer readers “a clear picture of why I am the way I am.”
Blazquez is a forthright author who is unafraid to deliver an intriguing perspective on issues that affected him personally, such as Communism: “The best defense the people of the world have against cancerous communism is to be well informed.” His dream sequences provide an eerily surreal window into his artistic invention: “The sarcophagus and its constraints are non-existing now. I am floating in space like in a mummy position with my arms crossed over my chest.” But the author’s use of language is wordy to the extent that meaning can become obscured: “He was kind of apprehensive and his only concern was if I mentioned the name of the gallery which I didn’t to two of them but the person who referred me in the first place knew, but it was between us only.” The memoir’s nonchronological form is intended to impart a sense of freedom, but the manner in which Blazquez meanders back and forth between subjects soon becomes repetitive and disorienting. Disputes with a gallery owner are drawn out unnecessarily and mundanely described: “He began calling me ‘Joselito’ and ‘Antonio.’ After a while he became nasty and he was shouting at me”; “While I was painting, the phone rang. It was the owner of the gallery calling me ‘Joselito’ and ‘Antonio’ so I knew he was already drunk, interrupting my work with more drunken nonsense.” Still, admirers of Blazquez’s work will find insights into how the artist’s life shaped his creative process and may well forgive the memoir’s chaotic nature.
A passionately unconventional, revealing yet fragmented account of an artist’s journey.Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2023
ISBN: 9781733117852
Page Count: 466
Publisher: Penny-a-Page Press
Review Posted Online: Sept. 28, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Not so deep, but a delightful tip of the hat to the pleasures—and power—of glamour.
A coffee-table book celebrates Michelle Obama’s sense of fashion.
Illustrated with hundreds of full-color photographs, Obama’s chatty latest book begins with some school portraits from the author’s childhood in Chicago and fond memories of back-to-school shopping at Sears, then jumps into the intricacies of clothing oneself as the spouse of a presidential candidate and as the first lady. “People looked forward to the outfits, and once I got their attention, they listened to what I had to say. This is the soft power of fashion,” she says. Obama is grateful and frank about all the help she got along the way, and the volume includes a long section written by her primary wardrobe stylist, Koop—28 years old when she first took the job—and shorter sections by makeup artists and several hair stylists, who worked with wigs and hair extensions as Obama transitioned back to her natural hair, and grew out her bangs, at the end of her husband’s second term. Many of the designers of the author’s gowns, notably Jason Wu, who designed several of her more striking outfits, also contribute appreciative memories. Besides candid and more formal photographs, the volume features many sketches of her gowns by their designers, closeups on details of those gowns, and magazine covers from Better Homes & Gardens to Vogue. The author writes that as a Black woman, “I was under a particularly white-hot glare, constantly appraised for whether my outfits were ‘acceptable’ and ‘appropriate,’ the color of my skin somehow inviting even more judgment than the color of my dresses.” Overall, though, this is generally a canny, upbeat volume, with little in the way of surprising revelations.
Not so deep, but a delightful tip of the hat to the pleasures—and power—of glamour.Pub Date: Nov. 4, 2025
ISBN: 9780593800706
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 7, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2026
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.
A former New York City dancer reflects on her zesty heyday in the 1970s.
Discovered on a Manhattan street in 2020 and introduced on Stanton’s Humans of New York Instagram page, Johnson, then 76, shares her dynamic history as a “fiercely independent” Black burlesque dancer who used the stage name Tanqueray and became a celebrated fixture in midtown adult theaters. “I was the only black girl making white girl money,” she boasts, telling a vibrant story about sex and struggle in a bygone era. Frank and unapologetic, Johnson vividly captures aspects of her former life as a stage seductress shimmying to blues tracks during 18-minute sets or sewing lingerie for plus-sized dancers. Though her work was far from the Broadway shows she dreamed about, it eventually became all about the nightly hustle to simply survive. Her anecdotes are humorous, heartfelt, and supremely captivating, recounted with the passion of a true survivor and the acerbic wit of a weathered, street-wise New Yorker. She shares stories of growing up in an abusive household in Albany in the 1940s, a teenage pregnancy, and prison time for robbery as nonchalantly as she recalls selling rhinestone G-strings to prostitutes to make them sparkle in the headlights of passing cars. Complemented by an array of revealing personal photographs, the narrative alternates between heartfelt nostalgia about the seedier side of Manhattan’s go-go scene and funny quips about her unconventional stage performances. Encounters with a variety of hardworking dancers, drag queens, and pimps, plus an account of the complexities of a first love with a drug-addled hustler, fill out the memoir with personality and candor. With a narrative assist from Stanton, the result is a consistently titillating and often moving story of human struggle as well as an insider glimpse into the days when Times Square was considered the Big Apple’s gloriously unpolished underbelly. The book also includes Yee’s lush watercolor illustrations.
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.Pub Date: July 12, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-250-27827-2
Page Count: 192
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: July 27, 2022
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