An unfailingly optimistic take on the quintessential American success story.
An intriguing, upbeat memoir of an Argentinian doctor coming to America to practice his craft.
When 27-year-old Leo Grieben arrived at New York’s Idlewild Airport from his native Buenos Aires in January 1960, he had $215 in his wallet and the promise of a neurosurgery fellowship at Boston’s Lahey Clinic. The move was difficult for the young graduate of the Universidad de Buenos Aires’ medical school, but he willingly joined “the Argentine exodus” because “Argentina, the country I had been born and raised in, was going to the dogs.” He left behind his wife, Blanca, and his children, and decided to assess the situation in Boston by himself first, after a brief stopover in New York where he quickly learned the golden rule of all U.S. travelers: “[W]hen in New York, do what New Yorkers do.” At the Lahey Clinic, and at Boston’s various hotels and boardinghouses, he faced the challenges that confront all immigrants, from difficulties communicating with a thick accent to simply dealing with loneliness. His accounts of letters to and from Argentina are a touching reminder of the days before e-mail. Eventually his family joins him, and the memoir tells the story of his steadily improving medical career, which takes him from Boston to Minnesota, and includes plenty of warm character portraits and well-told anecdotes. One of the book’s most gripping interludes is a nerve-wracking return trip to Argentina, which proves the melancholy dictum that one can’t go home again. At another point, Grieben has a heart attack while on an outing with his family but his medical training allows him to advise his wife on what to do; this and other stories show the author’s keen awareness of the relatively primitive state of medicine in the 1960s. Through it all, however, Grieben never loses his sunny outlook or his puckish sense of humor.
An unfailingly optimistic take on the quintessential American success story.Pub Date: Dec. 3, 2013
ISBN: 978-0615800837
Page Count: 366
Publisher: Leo Grieben
Review Posted Online: Feb. 14, 2014
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955
ISBN: 0670717797
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955
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