Calcines pulls no punches in this intense account of a youth spent in 1960s Cuba. Portraying himself and his large extended family as victims of brutal, faceless, inept Communists, struggling to cope with “oppression, hunger, fear, poverty, and violence,” he nonetheless recalls being surrounded by loving adults who weathered adversity with a combination of strong character and unshakeable faith. Even while bearing witness to ugly incidents in his barrio and being subjected to harsh treatment in school after his father’s courageous decision to apply for an exit visa to the United States, he doesn’t forget the kindness of equally impoverished neighbors, the small adventures of growing up or adolescent banter—“Not even Communism will protect her from my manly powers,” he grandly announces to his amigos after hooking up with an attractive classmate, “watch and learn.” The author ends with poignant farewells after the long-awaited permission to emigrate arrives at the end of 1969 and a quick epilogue covering the past 40 years. Even after all that time, his outrage at the economic and social destruction wrought by Castro’s Revolution remains undimmed. (Memoir. 12-15)
Pub Date: April 3, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-374-34394-1
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2009
This oversized, handsome book is an excellent introduction to one of America’s great photographers and her work, which influenced generations of others who followed her craft. Rubin (Toilets, Toasters, and Telephones, 1998, etc.) covers Bourke- White’s life chronologically, from her youth, when she wanted nothing more than to be a herpetologist, through her college years, when she first took a photography class, to her subsequent struggle to find her place in a largely male-dominated profession, photojournalism. By the time she was 30, Bourke-White had made her mark, and was able to earn a handsome living as she traveled the world, not only consorting with presidents and princes, but photographing some of the planet’s most wretched places, including concentration camps. Some of her most powerful photographs illustrate the book, and also give an insight into era in which she earned her place as an artist. Rubin makes clear that Bourke-White’s reputation continues to grow, providing researchers and browsers alike with a warm, admiring glimpse of a woman and her times. (notes, bibliography, index) (Biography. 10-13)
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-8109-4381-6
Page Count: 96
Publisher: Abrams
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1999
This entry in the Oxford Portraits series is both very good and very useful. White presents a clear biography of the Supreme Court justice who served in the Civil War, studied law, and lived long in the shadow of his famous writer father of the same name. By the time he came to the Supreme Court, he was already 60 years old, but served for three decades more. White creates a vivid portrait of this scholarly and philosophical legal thinker while including rich details of his intellectual but reserved home life and his affectionate flirtations with many women. More than that, readers will absorb a history of the development of legal education, the growth of the Supreme Court, and how law unfolds as a study and a discipline. White is especially felicitous in explaining how the elegance of Holmes’s prose occasionally obscured the legal point he was making. Quotations from Holmes’s writing and picture captions with further details add to the story, and not the least of its accomplishments is to show a man who began the greatest of his career challenges when he was already perceived of as old. Excellent. (chronology, further reading, index) (Biography. 10-12)
Pub Date: Nov. 12, 1999
ISBN: 0-19-511667-4
Page Count: 152
Publisher: Oxford Univ.
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1999
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