An impassioned, inspiring motivational manifesto.
An African-American man shares his evolution from drug dealer to college-graduate professional, social analysis, and empowerment tips in this debut motivational memoir.
Barlow describes his narrative, aimed particularly at minority youth, as a “semi- autobiographical/motivational book based on the premise that no one is born a failure…period.” Instead, “minorities must contend with a plethora of obstacles which are mainly a result of the disparate treatment they have endured for generations.” After providing supporting statistics, Barlow segues into his life story. Born in Harlem in 1971, he was abandoned by his mother at an early age and primarily raised by his father and grandmother. His father encouraged him to be a critical thinker and held a regular job, but had money-management issues, having “been a hustler for most of his life…used to fast money.” At age 13, Barlow became a drug dealer’s lookout and then a pusher himself, dropping out of high school at 16. At 18, after almost getting arrested a second time, which would have meant significant jail time, Barlow moved back with his grandmother, finished high school at night while working regular jobs, and then attended and graduated from college. Now “a senior legal assistant, easily grossing six figures,” Barlow is proud that “my relationship with my daughters is the testament of a misguided teenager who evolved into a well-rounded man and exemplary father.” Close to this volume’s midpoint, the author offers his “blueprint for success,” focused on how to become an “intellectual gangsta” (with a helpful reading list provided) and concluding with social and racial commentary. The Autobiography of Malcolm X is No. 1 on the reading list, and this book has a similar intensity and advocacy. Barlow’s recollections of his days as a dealer are particularly evocative, even shocking, with the author at one point noting that he worked the same hallway with several other pushers because “there were so many customers that we still made money.” In his social criticism, Barlow addresses government involvement in the Flint, Michigan, water crisis: “The residents of Flint, Michigan, the majority of whom are black and impoverished, were knowingly allowed to drink and bathe in water contaminated with lead.”
An impassioned, inspiring motivational manifesto.Pub Date: July 27, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-4834-4949-4
Page Count: 110
Publisher: Lulu
Review Posted Online: Sept. 12, 2016
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
IN THE NEWS
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
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