An informative and often charming primer on a little-known—but vital—government post.
A memoir from the U.S. chief of protocol from 2009 to 2013.
Protocol, notes Marshall, who also served as social secretary for the Clintons for eight years, is a strategic tactic in diplomacy that can be just that element that seals the deal, “the structure that houses the dignitaries as they have the crucial conversations.” As the daughter of two immigrants—a Mexican mother and a Croatian father—raised in Cleveland, the author professes a passion for ways to “bridge cultural divides and influence the outcome of [clients’] engagements.” Unsurprisingly given her career, Marshall’s first book is sharply organized. She begins with some of the highlights from her high-level work—e.g., in 2012, when Barack Obama and Vladimir Putin met for the first time as presidents at the G20 economic summit in Los Cabos, Mexico. There, Marshall had to execute a “high-wire act” to help ensure her president’s most advantageous outcome: room, décor, seating arrangement, table setting, food, and interpreter. The scene worked perfectly then, though a year later, when the same two leaders met for the G8 summit in Northern Ireland, it was a “cold, unproductive reunion” and a logistical disaster: massive open tent, weak lighting, no food, and chair placement that offered “only a three-quarter view of the other’s face.” The author demonstrates the importance of the “twin engines of protocol: bridging and persuading,” and her many behind-the-scenes anecdotes are both instructive and entertaining. The meticulous care that goes into table setting, food presentation, and appropriate gifts all convey one’s identity and eagerness to negotiate. Within the rules of etiquette, the author writes, “lies a hidden world of communication and leverage” as well as “intention and feeling.” Marshall’s story is fascinating, but especially illuminating are the concluding chapters, “Negotiating While Female” and “What Would Capricia Do?: A Handbook of Protocol and Etiquette.”
An informative and often charming primer on a little-known—but vital—government post.Pub Date: June 23, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-06-284446-0
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Ecco/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: April 11, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2020
The book begins in Sri Lanka with the tsunami of 2004—a horror the author saw firsthand, and the aftermath of which he...
The latest from French writer/filmmaker Carrère (My Life as a Russian Novel, 2010, etc.) is an awkward but intermittently touching hybrid of novel and autobiography.
The book begins in Sri Lanka with the tsunami of 2004—a horror the author saw firsthand, and the aftermath of which he describes powerfully. Carrère and his partner, Hélène, then return to Paris—and do so with a mutual devotion that's been renewed and deepened by all they've witnessed. Back in France, Hélène's sister Juliette, a magistrate and mother of three small daughters, has suffered a recurrence of the cancer that crippled her in adolescence. After her death, Carrère decides to write an oblique tribute and an investigation into the ravages of grief. He focuses first on Juliette's colleague and intimate friend Étienne, himself an amputee and survivor of childhood cancer, and a man in whose talkativeness and strength Carrère sees parallels to himself ("He liked to talk about himself. It's my way, he said, of talking to and about others, and he remarked astutely that it was my way, too”). Étienne is a perceptive, dignified person and a loyal, loving friend, and Carrère's portrait of him—including an unexpectedly fascinating foray into Étienne and Juliette's chief professional accomplishment, which was to tap the new European courts for help in overturning longtime French precedents that advantaged credit-card companies over small borrowers—is impressive. Less successful is Carrère's account of Juliette's widower, Patrice, an unworldly cartoonist whom he admires for his fortitude but seems to consider something of a simpleton. Now and again, especially in the Étienne sections, Carrère's meditations pay off in fresh, pungent insights, and his account of Juliette's last days and of the aftermath (especially for her daughters) is quietly harrowing.Pub Date: Sept. 13, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-8050-9261-5
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Metropolitan/Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: Aug. 10, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2011
The heartbreaking story of an emotionally battered child delivered with captivating candor and grace.
The former iCarly star reflects on her difficult childhood.
In her debut memoir, titled after her 2020 one-woman show, singer and actor McCurdy (b. 1992) reveals the raw details of what she describes as years of emotional abuse at the hands of her demanding, emotionally unstable stage mom, Debra. Born in Los Angeles, the author, along with three older brothers, grew up in a home controlled by her mother. When McCurdy was 3, her mother was diagnosed with breast cancer. Though she initially survived, the disease’s recurrence would ultimately take her life when the author was 21. McCurdy candidly reconstructs those in-between years, showing how “my mom emotionally, mentally, and physically abused me in ways that will forever impact me.” Insistent on molding her only daughter into “Mommy’s little actress,” Debra shuffled her to auditions beginning at age 6. As she matured and starting booking acting gigs, McCurdy remained “desperate to impress Mom,” while Debra became increasingly obsessive about her daughter’s physical appearance. She tinted her daughter’s eyelashes, whitened her teeth, enforced a tightly monitored regimen of “calorie restriction,” and performed regular genital exams on her as a teenager. Eventually, the author grew understandably resentful and tried to distance herself from her mother. As a young celebrity, however, McCurdy became vulnerable to eating disorders, alcohol addiction, self-loathing, and unstable relationships. Throughout the book, she honestly portrays Debra’s cruel perfectionist personality and abusive behavior patterns, showing a woman who could get enraged by everything from crooked eyeliner to spilled milk. At the same time, McCurdy exhibits compassion for her deeply flawed mother. Late in the book, she shares a crushing secret her father revealed to her as an adult. While McCurdy didn’t emerge from her childhood unscathed, she’s managed to spin her harrowing experience into a sold-out stage act and achieve a form of catharsis that puts her mind, body, and acting career at peace.
The heartbreaking story of an emotionally battered child delivered with captivating candor and grace.Pub Date: Aug. 9, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-982185-82-4
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 30, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2022
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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