A tribute to an American icon that brims with love and hope.
A celebratory gathering of memories from Barbara Bush's friends and family, featuring her own quotes.
“You might question how someone who left this good earth two years ago could be the author of a new book,” writes Jean Becker, who worked for Bush for nearly 30 years. “Simple, really. It was her words—that made this book possible. It is indeed written in her voice and in her spirit.” Beginning with a who’s who glossary of the extended Bush family and their circle, which included statesmen, writers, and celebrities, Becker loosely groups Barbara’s advice on family, living well, and literacy, among other topics. A patchwork (some may say scattershot), round-table approach yields colorful reflections on a woman who was known as “The Enforcer,” Barb, and, to her grandchildren, Ganny. More than the first lady’s advice—which draws on sensible optimism: “You can like what you do OR you can dislike it. I choose to like it, and what fun I’ve had”—it’s everyday situations that lead to original, unscripted quips. Sometimes, frightened staff recall Bush's graceful way of handling the unexpected and of putting everyone at ease. Family who visited Kennebunkport recount her no-nonsense yet loving discipline, and friends who witnessed the Bush’s marriage depict the couple's mutual respect and banter. Such memories reveal a plainspoken individual who was prone to faux pas yet could laugh at herself. Writings from Bush's children mix gentle humor with awe, as when her son, Jeb, calls her parenting a "benevolent dictatorship." This is a fond retrospective that sometimes repeats biographical details and nuggets of wisdom. In the author’s note, Becker apologizes for the repetition, which dilutes the focus. Readers seeking insight on a dynastic political family will find a down-to-earth, humanizing portrait of a much-loved matriarch. Those hoping for novel wisdom will find unsurprising comments on gratitude, kindness, love, and living fully with joy.
A tribute to an American icon that brims with love and hope.Pub Date: March 3, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5387-3494-0
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Twelve
Review Posted Online: Nov. 23, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019
The Stoics did much better with the much shorter Enchiridion.
A follow-on to the author’s garbled but popular 48 Laws of Power, promising that readers will learn how to win friends and influence people, to say nothing of outfoxing all those “toxic types” out in the world.
Greene (Mastery, 2012, etc.) begins with a big sell, averring that his book “is designed to immerse you in all aspects of human behavior and illuminate its root causes.” To gauge by this fat compendium, human behavior is mostly rotten, a presumption that fits with the author’s neo-Machiavellian program of self-validation and eventual strategic supremacy. The author works to formula: First, state a “law,” such as “confront your dark side” or “know your limits,” the latter of which seems pale compared to the Delphic oracle’s “nothing in excess.” Next, elaborate on that law with what might seem to be as plain as day: “Losing contact with reality, we make irrational decisions. That is why our success often does not last.” One imagines there might be other reasons for the evanescence of glory, but there you go. Finally, spin out a long tutelary yarn, seemingly the longer the better, to shore up the truism—in this case, the cometary rise and fall of one-time Disney CEO Michael Eisner, with the warning, “his fate could easily be yours, albeit most likely on a smaller scale,” which ranks right up there with the fortuneteller’s “I sense that someone you know has died" in orders of probability. It’s enough to inspire a new law: Beware of those who spend too much time telling you what you already know, even when it’s dressed up in fresh-sounding terms. “Continually mix the visceral with the analytic” is the language of a consultant’s report, more important-sounding than “go with your gut but use your head, too.”
The Stoics did much better with the much shorter Enchiridion.Pub Date: Oct. 23, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-525-42814-5
Page Count: 580
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: July 30, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Readers unfamiliar with the anecdotal material Greene presents may find interesting avenues to pursue, but they should...
Greene (The 33 Strategies of War, 2007, etc.) believes that genius can be learned if we pay attention and reject social conformity.
The author suggests that our emergence as a species with stereoscopic, frontal vision and sophisticated hand-eye coordination gave us an advantage over earlier humans and primates because it allowed us to contemplate a situation and ponder alternatives for action. This, along with the advantages conferred by mirror neurons, which allow us to intuit what others may be thinking, contributed to our ability to learn, pass on inventions to future generations and improve our problem-solving ability. Throughout most of human history, we were hunter-gatherers, and our brains are engineered accordingly. The author has a jaundiced view of our modern technological society, which, he writes, encourages quick, rash judgments. We fail to spend the time needed to develop thorough mastery of a subject. Greene writes that every human is “born unique,” with specific potential that we can develop if we listen to our inner voice. He offers many interesting but tendentious examples to illustrate his theory, including Einstein, Darwin, Mozart and Temple Grandin. In the case of Darwin, Greene ignores the formative intellectual influences that shaped his thought, including the discovery of geological evolution with which he was familiar before his famous voyage. The author uses Grandin's struggle to overcome autistic social handicaps as a model for the necessity for everyone to create a deceptive social mask.
Readers unfamiliar with the anecdotal material Greene presents may find interesting avenues to pursue, but they should beware of the author's quirky, sometimes misleading brush-stroke characterizations.Pub Date: Nov. 13, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-670-02496-4
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Sept. 12, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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