Not every book offers concrete advice, but Donegan’s does. Two pieces of it, for that matter: (1) Never work in a used car...
The used-car lot with funnyman Donegan (No News at Throat Lake, 2000, etc.) and his amusing/depressing take on the business that has come to epitomize sleaze.
“Call me a miserable Scottish git but subconsciously I have long believed that life wasn’t meant to be perfect,” says Donegan, and he acts on that notion by foregoing a Silicon Valley job to sell used cars instead. In what amounts to one anecdote after another about how he amassed the tricks of the trade, he explains to readers how he became an asphalt warrior at Orchard Pre-Owned Autos. Though a long toss from being a car guy, he learns how to pick targets—couples with kids, fat people, Japanese—and scorn the time-wasters: single women and anyone from the subcontinent, China, or Europe. His coworkers offer advice and encouragement: be friendly, don’t be friendly, get rid of the ugly shit, or “selling cars is like fishing.” Donegan has a tendency to press his jokes on his readers much the way salesmen press their lemons on the unsuspecting: “buying a car at Orchard was like having a bit part as a victim in Jaws,” or “she took a test drive at a steady 50 mph, appearing not to notice there was a Metallica concert taking place where the engine should be.” But he also shows some ethics. He abhors the money culture of Silicon Valley and is tempted to explain to a computer executive why he sells cars: “Because it means I don’t have to sit in an office with small-minded, money-obsessed bores like you everyday.” And when, in the end, the phony smiles and petty scams reach critical mass for him, he quits.
Not every book offers concrete advice, but Donegan’s does. Two pieces of it, for that matter: (1) Never work in a used car lot if you cherish your soul, and (2) never buy a used car without a certified mechanic at one elbow and a bunko adviser on the other.Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2002
ISBN: 0-671-78583-4
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Pocket
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2002
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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
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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