It’s not perfect, but this poignant memoir will motivate even the most disenchanted reader.
Despite a troubled childhood, numerous career setbacks and a life-threatening health problem, a determined woman never gives up in this inspiring memoir.
From the outside it appears that Ginac and her husband Frank are living the American Dream—they live in a million-dollar home in Austin, Texas, have high-paying careers that afford them every luxury and have a much loved 5-year-old son. But shortly after Frank unexpectedly leaves his job, Linda is shocked to learn that she’s a casualty of massive layoffs, and so starts the long struggle for Linda and Frank to re-establish stability in their usually idyllic world. As the Ginac family tries to rebuild their life during one of the worst economic downturns imaginable, Linda recovers from a miscarriage, builds a new business from the ground up and defeats breast cancer. As she overcomes each obstacle, Linda realizes that her husband is truly her biggest supporter and that with him by her side she can conquer anything life throws at her. Ginac’s memoir is brutally honest and remarkably inspiring. While some will find much of the author’s interminable detail unnecessary and occasionally tedious, Ginac’s sincerity makes up for her deliberate style. The author’s penchant for spending money and her admitted lack of frugality will not resonate well with some readers, especially those who are still experiencing the worst that the current economy has to offer. But those who can look past Ginac’s shortcomings will find themselves awed by her candor and vulnerability. The author does not gloss over her often unrealistic expectations of her husband, nor does she sugarcoat her imperfect marriage. Instead, she portrays her struggles in a way that allows readers to sympathize with and relate to her. Readers who pick up this book will find their inadequacies and insecurities reflected in Ginac, and will ultimately be moved by her determination to succeed.
It’s not perfect, but this poignant memoir will motivate even the most disenchanted reader.Pub Date: June 10, 2011
ISBN: 978-0983456100
Page Count: 270
Publisher: The Ginac Group
Review Posted Online: July 5, 2011
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
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
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