It’s better to walk the plank than to try to get through this one.
The life of a pirate’s wife who died one of the wealthiest women in Britain’s North American Colonies.
Sarah Kidd (circa 1665-circa 1744) is no stranger to history. Neither is William Kidd, the sometime privateer, sometime pirate who roamed the seas relieving others of whatever goodies they were carrying onboard. Geanacopoulos draws on the tropes of bodice-rippers and historical fiction to get inside Sarah’s head. “As she thought back over her life, not all of her memories were fond ones, especially the time when she was a pirate’s wife,” writes the author. “But now the memory of the hardships and heartbreak had softened and Sarah wouldn’t have traded it for anything. She felt proud, very proud, to have been a pirate’s wife and she wore the title as a badge of honor.” During that time, Sarah, who finally became “a mother in her early twenties with her third husband,” watched as her husband committed various acts of mayhem. “Special and mature beyond her years,” she harbored many secrets, and the author throws red meat to buried-treasure fans by suggesting that after Kidd was executed for his crimes in 1701, Sarah took the location of the treasure to her grave. While the matter of that execution involved the complex mechanics of British politics, Geanacopoulos reduces it to yet more guesswork: Of Kidd’s being measured for chains before being strung up on the gibbet, she writes, “This experience must have been terrifying and deeply depressing for him.” Yes, so one would think, though the execution of her husband did clear the decks for Sarah to marry her fourth husband, a merchant who “quickly learned that beneath her hardened core and keen survival instincts she was lovely.” In any event, writes the author, “the idea of becoming a stepfather to the children of a famous pirate was appealing.” Unfortunately, most of the narrative is ham-fisted, and the prose is pedestrian.
It’s better to walk the plank than to try to get through this one.Pub Date: Nov. 8, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-335-42984-1
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Hanover Square Press
Review Posted Online: Oct. 5, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2022
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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