For open-minded readers, an exceptional narrative that champions the discovery of freedom in sexuality.
The memoir of a former TV star who found freedom, success, and herself in the pornography industry.
Known for her roles on The Bold and the Beautiful and Boy Meets World, Ward looks back at her life growing up in Los Angeles, becoming an actor, finding some success in TV, and her current work in pornography. Throughout the narrative, the author is clear and engaging in her frank discussions of sex and womanhood. “The turn of the millennium was a hard time for young actresses,” she writes. “We were expected to exude sexuality and erotic appeal, but also to remain a virgin until we were married….Women’s desire or sexuality became solely focused on what a man on the other side got out of it, whether it be a spouse, or a father, or just a guy in the audience.” While her parents stressed the importance of being nice, which was well intentioned, “I was left with the idea that being nice was my value. That’s a dangerous thing to instill in a young girl.” Ward walks readers through her burgeoning sexuality and maturation process in the entertainment industry, showing how she learned some of the predetermined roles that she would play on mainstream TV before she began to look for a new path and found it in cosplay and, later, adult films. The author is generous and insightful in her reflections on finding a larger sense of self as well as finding true friends in an often superficial industry. “Anyone who tries to shame you for living in truth and happiness isn’t looking out for you,” she writes. “That’s a fact that takes too many of us, especially women, far too long to learn.” Regarding her work in porn, Ward expresses herself with effortless honesty and humor about the support and creativity she found in an industry where the creators “are all too often forgotten about as being human and deserving of anyone’s real help.”
For open-minded readers, an exceptional narrative that champions the discovery of freedom in sexuality.Pub Date: Sept. 6, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-982195-89-2
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: May 30, 2022
PERSPECTIVES
A conversational, pleasurable look into McConaughey’s life and thought.
All right, all right, all right: The affable, laconic actor delivers a combination of memoir and self-help book.
“This is an approach book,” writes McConaughey, adding that it contains “philosophies that can be objectively understood, and if you choose, subjectively adopted, by either changing your reality, or changing how you see it. This is a playbook, based on adventures in my life.” Some of those philosophies come in the form of apothegms: “When you can design your own weather, blow in the breeze”; “Simplify, focus, conserve to liberate.” Others come in the form of sometimes rambling stories that never take the shortest route from point A to point B, as when he recounts a dream-spurred, challenging visit to the Malian musician Ali Farka Touré, who offered a significant lesson in how disagreement can be expressed politely and without rancor. Fans of McConaughey will enjoy his memories—which line up squarely with other accounts in Melissa Maerz’s recent oral history, Alright, Alright, Alright—of his debut in Richard Linklater’s Dazed and Confused, to which he contributed not just that signature phrase, but also a kind of too-cool-for-school hipness that dissolves a bit upon realizing that he’s an older guy on the prowl for teenage girls. McConaughey’s prep to settle into the role of Wooderson involved inhabiting the mind of a dude who digs cars, rock ’n’ roll, and “chicks,” and he ran with it, reminding readers that the film originally had only three scripted scenes for his character. The lesson: “Do one thing well, then another. Once, then once more.” It’s clear that the author is a thoughtful man, even an intellectual of sorts, though without the earnestness of Ethan Hawke or James Franco. Though some of the sentiments are greeting card–ish, this book is entertaining and full of good lessons.
A conversational, pleasurable look into McConaughey’s life and thought.Pub Date: Oct. 20, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-593-13913-4
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Oct. 27, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
A fierce, penetrating, and empowering call for change.
Artist and activist Vaid-Menon demonstrates how the normativity of the gender binary represses creativity and inflicts physical and emotional violence.
The author, whose parents emigrated from India, writes about how enforcement of the gender binary begins before birth and affects people in all stages of life, with people of color being especially vulnerable due to Western conceptions of gender as binary. Gender assignments create a narrative for how a person should behave, what they are allowed to like or wear, and how they express themself. Punishment of nonconformity leads to an inseparable link between gender and shame. Vaid-Menon challenges familiar arguments against gender nonconformity, breaking them down into four categories—dismissal, inconvenience, biology, and the slippery slope (fear of the consequences of acceptance). Headers in bold font create an accessible navigation experience from one analysis to the next. The prose maintains a conversational tone that feels as intimate and vulnerable as talking with a best friend. At the same time, the author's turns of phrase in moments of deep insight ring with precision and poetry. In one reflection, they write, “the most lethal part of the human body is not the fist; it is the eye. What people see and how people see it has everything to do with power.” While this short essay speaks honestly of pain and injustice, it concludes with encouragement and an invitation into a future that celebrates transformation.
A fierce, penetrating, and empowering call for change. (writing prompt) (Nonfiction. 14-adult)Pub Date: June 2, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-593-09465-5
Page Count: 64
Publisher: Penguin Workshop
Review Posted Online: March 14, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2020
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