An exhaustive, nicely done biography of the late Idaho senator Frank Church, whose four terms (1957-81) ran from the beginning of the Cold War to the post-Vietnam era. A liberal Democrat who ``resembled a rejuvenated New Dealer,'' Church represented an extremely conservative and Republican state. Ashby (History/Washington State Univ.) and journalist Gramer note that even though he developed considerable national clout, Church was always fighting for survival back home. Elected at age 32, he was one of the youngest senators in US history. His role in passing the 1957 Civil Rights Act, by supporting the removal of a section deemed too liberal by some, gave early notice that Church would ``balance his idealistic impulses with political realities.'' But this ``tendency to compromise,'' write Ashby and Gramer, ``also provided the basis for criticism that followed him'' throughout his career. The keynote speaker at the 1960 Democratic National Convention, Church helped usher in the ``new liberalism'' of the Kennedy administration. His ardent sponsorship of wilderness- preservation legislation alienated Idaho big business, and his emerging role as a Senate ``dove'' during the 1960s spurred a right-wing backlash that culminated in a nearly successful recall movement in 1967. He survived, according to the authors, by politicking against gun-control legislation in his state. He defied his own party's president on the war in Southeast Asia, and it was his bipartisan Cooper-Church amendment that—on paper, at least- -prohibited the use of ground troops in Laos, Cambodia, and Thailand. He achieved national recognition when he chaired committees investigating the CIA and ITT's manipulation of the Chilean elections and, later, looking into the ``profits from Pentagon-sponsored export sales'' garnered by weapons manufacturers Lockheed and Northrop. While overtly pro-Church, this is nonetheless a fine examination of the fate of New Deal liberalism, its role in the Cold War, and its failure to stand up to what the authors call the ``growing power of the New Right.''
Pub Date: April 1, 1994
ISBN: 0-87422-103-X
Page Count: 792
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 1994
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
PERSPECTIVES
Well-told and admonitory.
Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.
Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.
Well-told and admonitory.Pub Date: June 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-074486-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
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