Though this book doesn’t quite live up to the genius of Blanche’s beloved Bach, it certainly strikes some lovely chords.
Using music as metaphor, this loving biographical tribute offers advice on artistry and life.
Steinberg (The Social Work Student’s Research Handbook, 2004, etc.) had quite a mother: Blanche Moyse survived the Nazi occupation of France, poverty in Argentina and a legally treacherous journey to Vermont, where she led a chorale for years. Always close to Blanche, Steinberg cared for her mother in her twilight years, absorbing the wisdom and chutzpah of a woman who lived to be 100 years old but was adventurous enough to ride in a hot air balloon at 95. Steinberg applies her mother’s commentary on music and performance to everyday life, since “the wisdom shared with her artistic colleagues were the very same pearls she had shared with those who interacted with her intimately in everyday life. The metaphors were all musical,” Steinberg says, “but the sentiments were exactly the same.” Thus, each chapter’s theme is drawn from one of Blanche’s pearls of wisdom, such as: “I’m deaf, and you are (still) too loud.” Along with anecdotes from Blanche’s life, Steinberg describes ways we can all apply the musical lesson to everyday life, shortening the explanation to a single sentence or two, which she calls a “life lesson take-away.” Interspersed throughout are “intermezzos” (short lists of quotes from Blanche), “variations” (comments from Blanche to her chorale during her 40-year reign), photographs and captions. Though it’s immediately evident that Blanche was a remarkable woman with insightful commentary, this volume tends to be a bit scattered. At times, it resembles a family scrapbook instead of a narrative. The jumps back and forth between story and advice can be a bit jarring, which could be alleviated by separating the text into lengthier chunks and giving each tale a longer arc. Despite these organizational issues, Blanche shines through as a worthy central figure, and a second, more anecdotal biography about her long, rich life and career might also be a page-turner.
Though this book doesn’t quite live up to the genius of Blanche’s beloved Bach, it certainly strikes some lovely chords.Pub Date: July 14, 2013
ISBN: 978-1490425665
Page Count: 144
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Dec. 17, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2014
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A vivid sequel that strains credulity.
Fremont (After Long Silence, 1999) continues—and alters—her story of how memories of the Holocaust affected her family.
At the age of 44, the author learned that her father had disowned her, declaring her “predeceased”—or dead in his eyes—in his will. It was his final insult: Her parents had stopped speaking to her after she’d published After Long Silence, which exposed them as Jewish Holocaust survivors who had posed as Catholics in Europe and America in order to hide multilayered secrets. Here, Fremont delves further into her tortured family dynamics and shows how the rift developed. One thread centers on her life after her harrowing childhood: her education at Wellesley and Boston University, the loss of her virginity to a college boyfriend before accepting her lesbianism, her stint with the Peace Corps in Lesotho, and her decades of work as a lawyer in Boston. Another strand involves her fraught relationship with her sister, Lara, and how their difficulties relate to their father, a doctor embittered after years in the Siberian gulag; and their mother, deeply enmeshed with her own sister, Zosia, who had married an Italian count and stayed in Rome to raise a child. Fremont tells these stories with novelistic flair, ending with a surprising theory about why her parents hid their Judaism. Yet she often appears insensitive to the serious problems she says Lara once faced, including suicidal depression. “The whole point of suicide, I thought, was to succeed at it,” she writes. “My sister’s completion rate was pathetic.” Key facts also differ from those in her earlier work. After Long Silence says, for example, that the author grew up “in a small city in the Midwest” while she writes here that she grew up in “upstate New York,” changes Fremont says she made for “consistency” in the new book but that muddy its narrative waters. The discrepancies may not bother readers seeking psychological insights rather than factual accuracy, but others will wonder if this book should have been labeled a fictionalized autobiography rather than a memoir.
A vivid sequel that strains credulity.Pub Date: Feb. 11, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-982113-60-5
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Gallery Books/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Oct. 20, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
A straightforward tale of kindness and paying it forward in 1980s New York.
When advertising executive Schroff answered a child’s request for spare change by inviting him for lunch, she did not expect the encounter to grow into a friendship that would endure into his adulthood. The author recounts how she and Maurice, a promising boy from a drug-addicted family, learned to trust each other. Schroff acknowledges risks—including the possibility of her actions being misconstrued and the tension of crossing socio-economic divides—but does not dwell on the complexities of homelessness or the philosophical problems of altruism. She does not question whether public recognition is beneficial, or whether it is sufficient for the recipient to realize the extent of what has been done. With the assistance of People human-interest writer Tresniowski (Tiger Virtues, 2005, etc.), Schroff adheres to a personal narrative that traces her troubled relationship with her father, her meetings with Maurice and his background, all while avoiding direct parallels, noting that their childhoods differed in severity even if they shared similar emotional voids. With feel-good dramatizations, the story seldom transcends the message that reaching out makes a difference. It is framed in simple terms, from attributing the first meeting to “two people with complicated pasts and fragile dreams” that were “somehow meant to be friends” to the conclusion that love is a driving force. Admirably, Schroff notes that she did not seek a role as a “substitute parent,” and she does not judge Maurice’s mother for her lifestyle. That both main figures experience a few setbacks yet eventually survive is never in question; the story fittingly concludes with an epilogue by Maurice. For readers seeking an uplifting reminder that small gestures matter.
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-4516-4251-3
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Howard Books/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: July 26, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
bookshelf
