A somewhat flawed, yet largely enthralling, story about life on the front lines of journalism.
Veteran broadcast journalist Dobbs tells the behind-the-scenes story of his profession in some of the most dangerous places in the world.
The author tells readers in his introduction about the nature of his book–these are “war stories,” he says, or if they prefer, “bar stories” or even “letters home from the field.” Dobbs paints a clear picture of how a news team operates in these places, sometimes courageously, sometimes stupidly, sometimes both. However, at times, when Dobbs is a bit too in love with his jokes and marks a real knee-slapper with an exclamation point, it might seem like this is more the made-up autobiography of a character, like Tom Grunick, William Hurt’s character from Broadcast News. There are times when Dobbs overexplains simple ideas, taking an entire paragraph to describe the fairly familiar geography of England and Ireland. He makes no effort to hide the adrenaline-junkie instinct that may seem stereotypical of journalists covering dangerous situations–that these professionals sometimes jump in where bullets are flying not necessarily because it’s a story that needs telling, but simply because it’s exciting. At other times, Dobbs seems nothing less than an expert in his field, combining historical knowledge with practical experience about surviving in some of the world’s worst places. Taken as a whole, the faults and triumphs paint an honest portrait of someone trying to adjust to the rigors of his profession just like anyone else, except those rigors involve navigating battle-torn streets in Europe and the Middle East, interviewing gun-runners and trying to convince the girlfriend of a convicted killer to give you an on-camera exclusive.
A somewhat flawed, yet largely enthralling, story about life on the front lines of journalism.Pub Date: Aug. 18, 2009
ISBN: 978-1-4401-5276-4
Page Count: -
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 23, 2010
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
The author's youthfulness helps to assure the inevitable comparison with the Anne Frank diary although over and above the...
Elie Wiesel spent his early years in a small Transylvanian town as one of four children.
He was the only one of the family to survive what Francois Maurois, in his introduction, calls the "human holocaust" of the persecution of the Jews, which began with the restrictions, the singularization of the yellow star, the enclosure within the ghetto, and went on to the mass deportations to the ovens of Auschwitz and Buchenwald. There are unforgettable and horrifying scenes here in this spare and sombre memoir of this experience of the hanging of a child, of his first farewell with his father who leaves him an inheritance of a knife and a spoon, and of his last goodbye at Buchenwald his father's corpse is already cold let alone the long months of survival under unconscionable conditions.
Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2006
ISBN: 0374500010
Page Count: 120
Publisher: Hill & Wang
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2006
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular...
A neurosurgeon with a passion for literature tragically finds his perfect subject after his diagnosis of terminal lung cancer.
Writing isn’t brain surgery, but it’s rare when someone adept at the latter is also so accomplished at the former. Searching for meaning and purpose in his life, Kalanithi pursued a doctorate in literature and had felt certain that he wouldn’t enter the field of medicine, in which his father and other members of his family excelled. “But I couldn’t let go of the question,” he writes, after realizing that his goals “didn’t quite fit in an English department.” “Where did biology, morality, literature and philosophy intersect?” So he decided to set aside his doctoral dissertation and belatedly prepare for medical school, which “would allow me a chance to find answers that are not in books, to find a different sort of sublime, to forge relationships with the suffering, and to keep following the question of what makes human life meaningful, even in the face of death and decay.” The author’s empathy undoubtedly made him an exceptional doctor, and the precision of his prose—as well as the moral purpose underscoring it—suggests that he could have written a good book on any subject he chose. Part of what makes this book so essential is the fact that it was written under a death sentence following the diagnosis that upended his life, just as he was preparing to end his residency and attract offers at the top of his profession. Kalanithi learned he might have 10 years to live or perhaps five. Should he return to neurosurgery (he could and did), or should he write (he also did)? Should he and his wife have a baby? They did, eight months before he died, which was less than two years after the original diagnosis. “The fact of death is unsettling,” he understates. “Yet there is no other way to live.”
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular clarity.Pub Date: Jan. 19, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-8129-8840-6
Page Count: 248
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2015
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