THE BLAIRS AND THEIR COURT

Name: THE BLAIRS AND THEIR COURT
Author: Francis Beckett
ISBN: 1-84513-024-3

by Francis Beckett & David Hencke ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 1, 2005

It is also, however, so unrelentingly negative about Blair, Booth, and many of their cohorts as to become exhausting and...

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Two British journalists collaborate on an exposé of Labour Party Prime Minister Tony Blair and his wife, Cherie Booth—without the cooperation of either subject.

Beckett (biographer of Clement Attlee and Aneurin Bevan) teams with Guardian investigative journalist Hencke in an attempt to demonstrate that Blair and Booth are poseurs and liars who have used their political power wisely from time to time but should not be trusted by any voter anywhere in the UK. An in-depth biography of a sitting prime minister is by definition timely; the timeliness is only enhanced by the alliance that has developed between Blair and US President George W. Bush. Both men proclaim themselves devout Christians who are guided by their religious faith. Although something of a rebel through his university years, Blair, born in 1953, began to kowtow to Labour Party kingmakers, big-business political donors, and celebrities during his unlikely rise to the prime ministership, which he achieved in 1997. Engaged to Booth in 1977 and married to her in 1980, Blair relied on her wiliness and savvy in many of the ways that Bill Clinton relied on wife Hillary; it is probably no coincidence that Blair and Booth, Bill and Hillary, are all lawyers. Especially fascinating to celebrity worshippers among American readers will be the chapters on the relationship of Blair and Booth with Princess Diana before her death. Blair’s popularity during his first year as prime minister shot up astronomically, simply because he seemed sympathetic to Diana and her loved ones after the fatal accident, at least when contrasted with the iciness of her former husband, Prince Charles, and the remainder of the Royal family. Although the authors reveal little new about how Blair came to back Bush’s invasion of Iraq after Sept. 11, 2001, the account is filled with compelling details and told with verve.

It is also, however, so unrelentingly negative about Blair, Booth, and many of their cohorts as to become exhausting and exhaustive.

Pub Date: March 1, 2005

ISBN: 1-84513-024-3

Page Count: 288

Publisher: Aurum/Trafalgar

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2005

Categories:

BIOGRAPHY & MEMOIR | POLITICAL & ROYALTY | GENERAL BIOGRAPHY & MEMOIR

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THE PURSUIT OF HAPPYNESS

FROM MEAN STREETS TO WALL STREET

by Chris Gardner with Quincy Troupe ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 1, 2006

Well-told and admonitory.

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Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.

Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.

Well-told and admonitory.

Pub Date: June 1, 2006

ISBN: 0-06-074486-3

Page Count: 320

Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006

Categories:

GENERAL BIOGRAPHY & MEMOIR | BIOGRAPHY & MEMOIR | BUSINESS

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INTO THE WILD

by Jon Krakauer ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 1, 1996

A wonderful page-turner written with humility, immediacy, and great style. Nothing came cheap and easy to McCandless, nor...

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The excruciating story of a young man on a quest for knowledge and experience, a search that eventually cooked his goose, told with the flair of a seasoned investigative reporter by Outside magazine contributing editor Krakauer (Eiger Dreams, 1990).

Chris McCandless loved the road, the unadorned life, the Tolstoyan call to asceticism. After graduating college, he took off on another of his long destinationless journeys, this time cutting all contact with his family and changing his name to Alex Supertramp. He was a gent of strong opinions, and he shared them with those he met: "You must lose your inclination for monotonous security and adopt a helter-skelter style of life''; "be nomadic.'' Ultimately, in 1992, his terms got him into mortal trouble when he ran up against something—the Alaskan wild—that didn't give a hoot about Supertramp's worldview; his decomposed corpse was found 16 weeks after he entered the bush. Many people felt McCandless was just a hubris-laden jerk with a death wish (he had discarded his map before going into the wild and brought no food but a bag of rice). Krakauer thought not. Admitting an interest that bordered on obsession, he dug deep into McCandless's life. He found a willful, reckless, moody boyhood; an ugly little secret that sundered the relationship between father and son; a moral absolutism that agitated the young man's soul and drove him to extremes; but he was no more a nutcase than other pilgrims. Writing in supple, electric prose, Krakauer tries to make sense of McCandless (while scrupulously avoiding off-the-rack psychoanalysis): his risky behavior and the rites associated with it, his asceticism, his love of wide open spaces, the flights of his soul.

A wonderful page-turner written with humility, immediacy, and great style. Nothing came cheap and easy to McCandless, nor will it to readers of Krakauer's narrative. (4 maps) (First printing of 35,000; author tour)