An erudite, informative, and highly readable cycling account.
A debut memoir chronicles the adventures of a small band of cyclists nicknamed the Xtreme Dorks who set off for Tibet.
The prospect of riding some of the highest roads on Earth had long excited Hazenberg, who, as a child growing up in the 1970s in Thunder Bay, Ontario, was fascinated by maps of the great continents. In the book’s opening, the author describes how literature further opened his young mind to adventure, later leading him to take on a Ph.D., which he lost the motivation to finish. After successfully applying to be a contestant on the quiz show Jeopardy! he used his prize money to spend three years exploring the world. In 1998, he convinced his two sisters, Audie and Saakje, and their partners to cycle from Islamabad, Pakistan, to Tibet, their goal being Mount Kailash, an important Buddhist pilgrimage site. The journey was grueling, punctuated with thrills, spills, and eyebrow-raising encounters, from stone-throwing kids to benevolent gun runners. The author embroiders the odyssey with rich historical and factual details and, at the close of the memoir, reflects on the significant political shifts that have taken place since he completed his trip. Hazenberg’s affinity for literature is prominent throughout this sharply penned book. The author effortlessly transports readers using his concisely evocative, descriptive style: “A golden carpet of grain stalks shimmered in the sunlight. Apples and apricot grew in neat orchards, and pencil-thin Lombardy poplars provided windbreaks and fast-growing firewood on the edge of fields.” Hazenberg adds further layers of interest by including carefully researched historical tidbits: “We passed under Churchill’s Picket, a hilltop military post where a 22-year-old Winston Churchill saw action in 1897.” Such facts slide fluidly into the narrative and serve to further illuminate the passing landscape. Avoiding the pitfall of focusing too intently on the demands of the itinerary, the author is acutely aware of local customs and cultural differences: “The women were shocked by Saakje’s shaved head; we had by now learned that only women taken in adultery or being shamed as prostitutes had hair that short.” Far from presenting mundanely reworked field notes, as is sometimes common in this genre, this is a refreshingly intelligent, multifaceted memoir that will entertain and inspire cyclists of all abilities.
An erudite, informative, and highly readable cycling account. (maps, photographs)Pub Date: Feb. 26, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-77-759361-2
Page Count: 424
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: July 13, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Not so deep, but a delightful tip of the hat to the pleasures—and power—of glamour.
A coffee-table book celebrates Michelle Obama’s sense of fashion.
Illustrated with hundreds of full-color photographs, Obama’s chatty latest book begins with some school portraits from the author’s childhood in Chicago and fond memories of back-to-school shopping at Sears, then jumps into the intricacies of clothing oneself as the spouse of a presidential candidate and as the first lady. “People looked forward to the outfits, and once I got their attention, they listened to what I had to say. This is the soft power of fashion,” she says. Obama is grateful and frank about all the help she got along the way, and the volume includes a long section written by her primary wardrobe stylist, Koop—28 years old when she first took the job—and shorter sections by makeup artists and several hair stylists, who worked with wigs and hair extensions as Obama transitioned back to her natural hair, and grew out her bangs, at the end of her husband’s second term. Many of the designers of the author’s gowns, notably Jason Wu, who designed several of her more striking outfits, also contribute appreciative memories. Besides candid and more formal photographs, the volume features many sketches of her gowns by their designers, closeups on details of those gowns, and magazine covers from Better Homes & Gardens to Vogue. The author writes that as a Black woman, “I was under a particularly white-hot glare, constantly appraised for whether my outfits were ‘acceptable’ and ‘appropriate,’ the color of my skin somehow inviting even more judgment than the color of my dresses.” Overall, though, this is generally a canny, upbeat volume, with little in the way of surprising revelations.
Not so deep, but a delightful tip of the hat to the pleasures—and power—of glamour.Pub Date: Nov. 4, 2025
ISBN: 9780593800706
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 7, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2026
SEEN & HEARD
It’s not Shakespeare, not by a long shot. But at least it’s not James Franco.
A noted actor turns to verse: “Poems are a Saturday in the middle of the week.”
McConaughey, author of the gracefully written memoir Greenlights, has been writing poems since his teens, closing with one “written in an Australian bathtub” that reads just as a poem by an 18-year-old (Rimbaud excepted) should read: “Ignorant minds of the fortunate man / Blind of the fate shaping every land.” McConaughey is fearless in his commitment to the rhyme, no matter how slight the result (“Oops, took a quick peek at the sky before I got my glasses, / now I can’t see shit, sure hope this passes”). And, sad to say, the slight is what is most on display throughout, punctuated by some odd koanlike aperçus: “Eating all we can / at the all-we-can-eat buffet, / gives us a 3.8 education / and a 4.2 GPA.” “Never give up your right to do the next right thing. This is how we find our way home.” “Memory never forgets. Even though we do.” The prayer portion of the program is deeply felt, but it’s just as sentimental; only when he writes of life-changing events—a court appearance to file a restraining order against a stalker, his decision to quit smoking weed—do we catch a glimpse of the effortlessly fluent, effortlessly charming McConaughey as exemplified by the David Wooderson (“alright, alright, alright”) of Dazed and Confused. The rest is mostly a soufflé in verse. McConaughey’s heart is very clearly in the right place, but on the whole the book suggests an old saw: Don’t give up your day job.
It’s not Shakespeare, not by a long shot. But at least it’s not James Franco.Pub Date: Sept. 16, 2025
ISBN: 9781984862105
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Aug. 15, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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