An often bracing reflection on racial discrimination and bias.
Debut author Douglas reflects on a life of extraordinary academic and professional achievement and on the obstacles that prejudice put in his path.
The author was born in 1943 in Guyana, where he was a “questioning, innocent, poor kid from a colonial country fighting for its independence.” Despite suffering under the weight of poverty—an adult and three children, including himself, lived in his single-room home—he excelled academically and eventually earned a scholarship to New York City’s Queens College and then a Fulbright scholarship to Lehigh University in Pennsylvania. His scholastic achievement and his faith in God—he was a “boy preacher” in an Evangelical church—helped him to navigate his way out of a country that promised more political unrest than opportunity. The author devoted himself zealously to the study of physical chemistry and would go on to earn not only a bachelor’s degree from Lehigh, but also a doctorate from Cornell University before advancing to medical school. But despite his accomplishments, he says, he encountered bigotry everywhere. To Douglas’ great dismay, he even discovered racial prejudice among church members who preached about loving inclusion—an experience that first made him doubt his faithful commitments and then compelled him to break with religion entirely. It was a difficult decision, and he discusses it with thoughtfulness and subtlety in these pages. Overall, Douglas’ story is an inspiring one, and readers will find it remarkable how he continually was able to persevere in the face of daunting challenges. Also, he provides a candid, general anatomy of racism in the United States based on his own experience. However, the author’s recollection is too granularly detailed at times; for example, he lingers too long on specifics about classes he took and the minutiae of office politics, which has a tendency to overshadow his treatment of broader themes.
An often bracing reflection on racial discrimination and bias.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: 978-1-948828-70-3
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Frank Douglas Books
Review Posted Online: Feb. 14, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.
The legendary booze-addled metal rocker turned reality-TV star comes clean in his tell-all autobiography.
Although brought up in the bleak British factory town of Aston, John “Ozzy” Osbourne’s tragicomic rags-to-riches tale is somehow quintessentially American. It’s an epic dream/nightmare that takes him from Winson Green prison in 1966 to a presidential dinner with George W. Bush in 2004. Tracing his adult life from petty thief and slaughterhouse worker to rock star, Osbourne’s first-person slang-and-expletive-driven style comes off like he’s casually relating his story while knocking back pints at the pub. “What you read here,” he writes, “is what dribbled out of the jelly I call my brain when I asked it for my life story.” During the late 1960s his transformation from inept shoplifter to notorious Black Sabbath frontman was unlikely enough. In fact, the band got its first paying gigs by waiting outside concert venues hoping the regularly scheduled act wouldn’t show. After a few years, Osbourne and his bandmates were touring America and becoming millionaires from their riff-heavy doom music. As expected, with success came personal excess and inevitable alienation from the other members of the group. But as a solo performer, Osbourne’s predilection for guns, drink, drugs, near-death experiences, cruelty to animals and relieving himself in public soon became the stuff of legend. His most infamous exploits—biting the head off a bat and accidentally urinating on the Alamo—are addressed, but they seem tame compared to other dark moments of his checkered past: nearly killing his wife Sharon during an alcohol-induced blackout, waking up after a bender in the middle of a busy highway, burning down his backyard, etc. Osbourne is confessional to a fault, jeopardizing his demonic-rocker reputation with glib remarks about his love for Paul McCartney and Robin Williams. The most distinguishing feature of the book is the staggering chapter-by-chapter accumulation of drunken mishaps, bodily dysfunctions and drug-induced mayhem over a 40-plus-year career—a résumé of anti-social atrocities comparable to any of rock ’n’ roll’s most reckless outlaws.
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.Pub Date: Jan. 25, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-446-56989-7
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2009
BOOK REVIEW
IN THE NEWS
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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