An affectionate, sharp-eyed memoir that, while it doesn't add anything groundbreaking to the rock-lit canon, will appeal to...
A visit to the magical, blood-spattered world of the Alice Cooper Group, courtesy of Dunaway, the band’s bassist, co-songwriter and “theatrical conceptionalist.”
Hard-rock fans of a certain generation think of Alice Cooper as the original shock rocker, a platinum-selling performance artist who took to the stage looking as if he stepped out of A Clockwork Orange, ranting and raving about billion-dollar babies and how school was out forever. Today, in comparison to the Marilyn Mansons of the world, Cooper's schtick seems almost quaint, but during his heydey, he was a frightening, formidable force in the rock world. A close friend from childhood on, Dunaway was with Cooper every step of the way, and he documents that story in this agreeable memoir. But does Cooper’s place in the rock world merit a memoir from his bassist, and is the bassist a good enough memoirist to overcome his own lack of notoriety? The answer to both questions is a qualified yes. Dunaway makes a solid case for Cooper’s place in the rock pantheon, continually pointing out not just the fact that he was an above-average singer, songwriter, and frontman, but also the role he played in incorporating theater into rock performance. To Dunaway’s credit, the book is more than just an homage to his old friend; it’s a love letter to an era. But it’s not all roses. Readers looking for the kind of lasciviousness they expect from an Alice Cooper confidant won’t be disappointed, as the author does plenty of sordid, albeit not-too-slimy dishing about the band’s backstage shenanigans. Dunaway has a terrific memory, which is both a positive and negative: though the book can get bogged down in minutiae, the author leaves no stone unturned.
An affectionate, sharp-eyed memoir that, while it doesn't add anything groundbreaking to the rock-lit canon, will appeal to Alice Cooper die-hards and fans of his brand of music.Pub Date: June 9, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-250-04808-0
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Dunne/St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: May 23, 2015
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
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular...
A neurosurgeon with a passion for literature tragically finds his perfect subject after his diagnosis of terminal lung cancer.
Writing isn’t brain surgery, but it’s rare when someone adept at the latter is also so accomplished at the former. Searching for meaning and purpose in his life, Kalanithi pursued a doctorate in literature and had felt certain that he wouldn’t enter the field of medicine, in which his father and other members of his family excelled. “But I couldn’t let go of the question,” he writes, after realizing that his goals “didn’t quite fit in an English department.” “Where did biology, morality, literature and philosophy intersect?” So he decided to set aside his doctoral dissertation and belatedly prepare for medical school, which “would allow me a chance to find answers that are not in books, to find a different sort of sublime, to forge relationships with the suffering, and to keep following the question of what makes human life meaningful, even in the face of death and decay.” The author’s empathy undoubtedly made him an exceptional doctor, and the precision of his prose—as well as the moral purpose underscoring it—suggests that he could have written a good book on any subject he chose. Part of what makes this book so essential is the fact that it was written under a death sentence following the diagnosis that upended his life, just as he was preparing to end his residency and attract offers at the top of his profession. Kalanithi learned he might have 10 years to live or perhaps five. Should he return to neurosurgery (he could and did), or should he write (he also did)? Should he and his wife have a baby? They did, eight months before he died, which was less than two years after the original diagnosis. “The fact of death is unsettling,” he understates. “Yet there is no other way to live.”
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular clarity.Pub Date: Jan. 19, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-8129-8840-6
Page Count: 248
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2015
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