An enjoyable book from start to finish, filled with historical events and personal reflections.
A debut memoir examines a life in motion: planes, trains, and automobiles.
In this work, Boyd looks back at a remarkable life dedicated to service and innovation. The author is perhaps best known for his appointment as the first secretary of the newly formed Department of Transportation during the Johnson administration. That achievement alone makes his memoir noteworthy, considering his presence at Cabinet meetings during that turbulent time. But there is much more to tell before and after that watershed moment. As with many of the members of his generation, the Pearl Harbor attack altered the course of his life. The most riveting chapters focus on his military service as a pilot during World War II and as a flight instructor during the Korean War. Even before Boyd reports for aviation training, there are harrowing experiences to narrate, encapsulated in this revealing passage: “Heading for Muskogee, I thought about my journey to become a cadet. I’d been struck by lightning, hunted as a deserter, hospitalized with pleurisy, and hit by a hurricane. I figured things couldn’t get worse.” The governmental and corporate intrigue that follows his military career may not be as thrilling as war stories, but he successfully maintains readers’ interest by disclosing the inner workings of various parts of the transportation sector. While he identifies as a “liberal Democrat” and sustains a strong belief in government as an agent of positive change, he also retains a healthy skepticism when colleagues fail to address technological developments adequately. As he succinctly writes: “I did not view the role of government regulation as rigid and immutable, but rather as one that should adjust to the changing demands of the transportation industry.” Overall, the text is suffused with impressive details as well as a cheerful sense of wonder and gratitude despite some challenging moments and professional disappointments. In the epilogue, he lists the core values that he shared with Flavil, his wife of 64 years. Boyd asserts that the true test of a relationship is hanging wallpaper together, a test that he and Flavil clearly passed. Thus, this memoir also serves as a testament to their steady partnership.
An enjoyable book from start to finish, filled with historical events and personal reflections.Pub Date: Aug. 6, 2016
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 246
Publisher: Artisan Island Press
Review Posted Online: May 21, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
The author's youthfulness helps to assure the inevitable comparison with the Anne Frank diary although over and above the...
Elie Wiesel spent his early years in a small Transylvanian town as one of four children.
He was the only one of the family to survive what Francois Maurois, in his introduction, calls the "human holocaust" of the persecution of the Jews, which began with the restrictions, the singularization of the yellow star, the enclosure within the ghetto, and went on to the mass deportations to the ovens of Auschwitz and Buchenwald. There are unforgettable and horrifying scenes here in this spare and sombre memoir of this experience of the hanging of a child, of his first farewell with his father who leaves him an inheritance of a knife and a spoon, and of his last goodbye at Buchenwald his father's corpse is already cold let alone the long months of survival under unconscionable conditions.
Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2006
ISBN: 0374500010
Page Count: 120
Publisher: Hill & Wang
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2006
Well-told and admonitory.
Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.
Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.
Well-told and admonitory.Pub Date: June 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-074486-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
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