The car of the future turns out to be the car of the past, according to Schiffer (Anthropology/Univ. of Arizona; The Portable Radio in American Life, not reviewed) in this peppy look at the electric car's Edwardian infancy. Schiffer begins with an astonishing statistic: In 1900, 28% of all automobiles produced in America ran on electric power. So why does an effective plug-in car currently seem like a science-fiction dream? Schiffer places this question in historical context, beginning with the 19th-century development of the steam-driven dynamo, which made electricity cheap and plentiful, and of the bicycle, which warmed the public to the idea of personal mechanical transport. In 1897, the first important electric car rolled from Pope's Manufacturing Company in Hartford, Conn., followed by a parade of battery-driven broughams and runabouts from other manufacturers, all of which offered a top speed of about 14 mph and a top distance between recharging of 25 or 30 miles. Henry Ford, meanwhile, was perfecting his cheap, durable gas-driven car, the Model T. Schiffer argues that the battle between gas and electric was, among other things, a skirmish in the war between the sexes, with women opting for the slower, safer electrics. But the truth is that gasoline motors went farther and faster than electric ones; they were also more reliable. Despite the efforts of Thomas Edison, who struggled for years to produce a more efficient battery, by WW I the electric car had become an afterthought. Nevertheless, Schiffer has an upbeat view of the future of electrics. While he admits that a battery that can go 500 miles between recharges would be ``miraculous,'' he foresees stations for rapid battery exchange lining the highways, giving rise to a new generation of nonpolluting drivers. More voltage for pro-electric forces, who can now claim that tradition is on their side. (41 b&w illustrations, not seen)
Pub Date: Sept. 20, 1994
ISBN: 1-56908-355-8
Page Count: 240
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 1994
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
IN THE NEWS
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
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