Emotional storytelling and an inadequate overview of America’s response to autism now and then makes for a quick, linear...
Part sentimental diary, part how-to study guide, Ziegler’s memoir traces a mother’s personal and political struggle in raising an autistic child.
After a brief summary of the Ziegler family tree and the author’s foray into motherhood, Ziegler gives the straightforward chronology of her daughter Mary Ann’s life before and after the young girl’s diagnosis with autism. Ziegler forgoes substantive discourse on the tribulations of raising an autistic child within the confines of the uninformed public sphere and instead focuses on Mary Ann’s emotional coming-of-age narrative. This heartfelt storytelling would be more effective without constant allusion to a greater goal—systemic change at the local and national levels of autistic care. Following Mary Ann through the public education system of ’70s America, Ziegler paints a portrait of an institution replete with troubled students yet entirely without the funding and understanding necessary to meet their needs. Mary Ann eventually moves from Ziegler’s house to a group home for disabled adults, enters the workforce and earns the title “Employee of the Year.” She also suffers abuse from an aide and then successfully testifies against him in court. Often, Ziegler likens her daughter’s interpretation of the world around her to that of poets and philosophers, but this renders Mary Ann an abstraction and removes her from the larger conversation regarding autism in America. Though the text discusses a handful of national conferences, the overturning of antiquated statutes and a guide to the autistic spectrum, crucial information is both sporadic and delayed. Ziegler evokes a warm response in readers toward Mary Ann, but not toward the overall cause. By the time the author explains—through bullet points—how and why we should take action in the battle to understand and help those in the autistic spectrum, we are lost in a haze of anecdotes and acronyms.
Emotional storytelling and an inadequate overview of America’s response to autism now and then makes for a quick, linear read without a significant payoff.Pub Date: May 10, 2010
ISBN: 978-1-4502-2916-6
Page Count: 138
Publisher: iUniverse
Review Posted Online: Oct. 5, 2010
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A surprisingly warm and consistently outspoken retrospective for both fans and celebrity followers.
The self-described “king of all media” shares personal introspection and favorite celebrity interviews in his first book in two decades.
Stern (Miss America, 1995, etc.) is in top form in this entertaining amalgam of intimate confessional and Q-and-A archive. Opting for an older, wiser perspective this time around, the author strips away the juvenile raunch and sophomoric humor that made his first books runaway bestsellers. The book’s introduction, a meaty, contemplative 19-page affair, finds Stern, 65, candidly discussing his struggles with OCD, random regrets (namely his treatment of Robin Williams and Rosie O’Donnell), greatest moments (interviews with Conan O’Brien and Paul McCartney, animal rescue efforts), his move to SiriusXM in 2006, and the day he inexplicably took a rare show-day off to attend to an undisclosed cancer scare. It’s a kinder, gentler, all-grown-up side of the shock jock, which he credits to aggressive psychotherapy and his second wife, Beth. However, it’s the intimate, provocative celebrity interviews that make up the bulk of this weighty tome and which the author admits “represent my best work and show my personal evolution.” With his advancing age came wisdom, humility, empathy, and a dramatic sea change in the show’s direction and focus, as evidenced in more nuanced, probing interviews with Courtney Love, Joan Rivers, Michael J. Fox, Chris Cornell, and Lady Gaga, among others. Stern introduces each conversation with his personal perspective on the individual and the impression they made. His honest conversations with actors, music legends, and others represent an eclectic cross-section of celebrities, and his questions range from the piercing to the downright ridiculous. Perhaps the book’s most startling interview segments are those with a pre-presidential Donald Trump, whom Stern has interviewed dozens of times. Throughout the book, which is divided into thematic sections (“Sex & Relationships,” “Money & Fame,” “Drugs & Sobriety,” “Gone Too Soon,” etc.), the author’s personal growth and enduring legacy as a broadcast pioneer and unique profiler are on full display.
A surprisingly warm and consistently outspoken retrospective for both fans and celebrity followers.Pub Date: May 14, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5011-9429-0
Page Count: 560
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 20, 2019
While the author may attempt to mirror this ideal, the result is less than satisfying and more than a little irritating.
A disjointed debut memoir about how competitive swimming shaped the personal and artistic sensibilities of a respected illustrator.
Through a series of vignettes, paintings and photographs that often have no sequential relationship to each other, Shapton (The Native Trees of Canada, 2010, etc.) depicts her intense relationship to all aspects of swimming: pools, water, races and even bathing suits. The author trained competitively throughout her adolescence, yet however much she loved racing, “the idea of fastest, of number one, of the Olympics, didn’t motivate me.” In 1988 and again in 1992, she qualified for the Olympic trials but never went further. Soon afterward, Shapton gave up competition, but she never quite ended her relationship to swimming. Almost 20 years later, she writes, “I dream about swimming at least three nights a week.” Her recollections are equally saturated with stories that somehow involve the act of swimming. When she speaks of her family, it is less in terms of who they are as individuals and more in context of how they were involved in her life as a competitive swimmer. When she describes her adult life—which she often reveals in disconnected fragments—it is in ways that sometimes seem totally random. If she remembers the day before her wedding, for example, it is because she couldn't find a bathing suit to wear in her hotel pool. Her watery obsession also defines her view of her chosen profession, art. At one point, Shapton recalls a documentary about Olympian Michael Phelps and draws the parallel that art, like great athleticism, is as “serene in aspect” as it is “incomprehensible.”
While the author may attempt to mirror this ideal, the result is less than satisfying and more than a little irritating.Pub Date: July 5, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-399-15817-9
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Blue Rider Press
Review Posted Online: May 6, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2012
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