An occasionally overwrought but often gripping portrayal of resilience and courage during wartime.
This second volume of Angelo’s two-book memoir covers her return to France and participation in the French Resistance during World War II.
The author was visiting her parents in Scotland when, on Sept. 3, 1939, U.K. Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain announced that England had declared war on Germany. She immediately packed her bags and set out to return to the boutique hotel she was running in Lille, France. She arrived to find empty streets, no taxis, and only two “old faithfuls”—housekeeper Marie-Louise, and handyman Jacques—still working at the hotel. Before long, British and French troops began moving into Lille. With no paying guests, Angelo agreed to allow the use of vacant rooms by military men. Her restlessness led her to volunteer as an ambulance driver, and her first mission nearly took her life. She’d arrived nine minutes early at a scheduled rendezvous with another ambulance returning from the front and decided to step out of her vehicle to stretch her legs. Then a plane, flying low, strafed the road and destroyed her ambulance. Shortly after surviving this episode, she was in an automobile accident that resulted in her meeting a mysterious British officer named Gerald; he wouldn’t give her his full name, but he would become the love of her life. In clear prose that ably reflects period terminology, Angelo’s memoir presents a riveting picture of life under the German occupation of Lille and the surrounding “Forbidden Zone.” Only when recounting her encounters with Gerald does her work slip into a melodramatic tone: “Somehow I don’t feel that you’re a stranger, Anne. I seem to have known you for years….” However, the pages overflow with hair-raising wartime drama, as when Angelo tells of hiding rescued British flyboys in a secret compartment of her house or of a life-threatening betrayal by a close friend. Still, the complete two-book memoir would likely have been stronger as a single volume. (A few uncredited black-and-white photos, mostly of locations mentioned in the text, are included.)
An occasionally overwrought but often gripping portrayal of resilience and courage during wartime.Pub Date: May 16, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-66988-841-3
Page Count: 268
Publisher: XlibrisAU
Review Posted Online: Nov. 13, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
A juicy story with some truly crazy moments, yet Anderson's good heart shines through.
The iconic model tells the story of her eventful life.
According to the acknowledgments, this memoir started as "a fifty-page poem and then grew into hundreds of pages of…more poetry." Readers will be glad that Anderson eventually turned to writing prose, since the well-told anecdotes and memorable character sketches are what make it a page-turner. The poetry (more accurately described as italicized notes-to-self with line breaks) remains strewn liberally through the pages, often summarizing the takeaway or the emotional impact of the events described: "I was / and still am / an exceptionally / easy target. / And, / I'm proud of that." This way of expressing herself is part of who she is, formed partly by her passion for Anaïs Nin and other writers; she is a serious maven of literature and the arts. The narrative gets off to a good start with Anderson’s nostalgic memories of her childhood in coastal Vancouver, raised by very young, very wild, and not very competent parents. Here and throughout the book, the author displays a remarkable lack of anger. She has faced abuse and mistreatment of many kinds over the decades, but she touches on the most appalling passages lightly—though not so lightly you don't feel the torment of the media attention on the events leading up to her divorce from Tommy Lee. Her trip to the pages of Playboy, which involved an escape from a violent fiance and sneaking across the border, is one of many jaw-dropping stories. In one interesting passage, Julian Assange's mother counsels Anderson to desexualize her image in order to be taken more seriously as an activist. She decided that “it was too late to turn back now”—that sexy is an inalienable part of who she is. Throughout her account of this kooky, messed-up, enviable, and often thrilling life, her humility (her sons "are true miracles, considering the gene pool") never fails her.
A juicy story with some truly crazy moments, yet Anderson's good heart shines through.Pub Date: Jan. 31, 2023
ISBN: 9780063226562
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Dey Street/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Dec. 5, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2023
SEEN & HEARD
An ebullient nature lover’s paean to birds.
A charming bird journey with the bestselling author.
In his introduction to Tan’s “nature journal,” David Allen Sibley, the acclaimed ornithologist, nails the spirit of this book: a “collection of delightfully quirky, thoughtful, and personal observations of birds in sketches and words.” For years, Tan has looked out on her California backyard “paradise”—oaks, periwinkle vines, birch, Japanese maple, fuchsia shrubs—observing more than 60 species of birds, and she fashions her findings into delightful and approachable journal excerpts, accompanied by her gorgeous color sketches. As the entries—“a record of my life”—move along, the author becomes more adept at identifying and capturing them with words and pencils. Her first entry is September 16, 2017: Shortly after putting up hummingbird feeders, one of the tiny, delicate creatures landed on her hand and fed. “We have a relationship,” she writes. “I am in love.” By August 2018, her backyard “has become a menagerie of fledglings…all learning to fly.” Day by day, she has continued to learn more about the birds, their activities, and how she should relate to them; she also admits mistakes when they occur. In December 2018, she was excited to observe a Townsend’s Warbler—“Omigod! It’s looking at me. Displeased expression.” Battling pesky squirrels, Tan deployed Hot Pepper Suet to keep them away, and she deterred crows by hanging a fake one upside down. The author also declared war on outdoor cats when she learned they kill more than 1 billion birds per year. In May 2019, she notes that she spends $250 per month on beetle larvae. In June 2019, she confesses “spending more hours a day staring at birds than writing. How can I not?” Her last entry, on December 15, 2022, celebrates when an eating bird pauses, “looks and acknowledges I am there.”
An ebullient nature lover’s paean to birds.Pub Date: April 23, 2024
ISBN: 9780593536131
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Jan. 19, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
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