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LIVE FROM THE BATTLEFIELD

FROM VIETNAM TO BAGHDAD, 35 YEARS IN THE WORLD'S WAR ZONES

A world-class newsman's absorbing, anecdotal account of his experiences as a high-profile foreign correspondent. While Arnett has covered events in a host of remote venues, here he focuses on his lengthy stint with the AP in Southeast Asia's combat zones, as well as on a briefer but vastly more visible sojourn as CNN's man in Baghdad at the height of Desert Storm. The New Zealand-born author, 59, was first assigned to Vietnam in mid-1962. Although his front-line reportage on America's involvement there often infuriated the US military and their Washington masters, he earned himself a Pulitzer—and the respect of his professional peers (Malcolm Browne, Horst Faas, David Halberstam, et al.). Posted to the AP's Manhattan headquarters in 1970, Arnett returned to Vietnam frequently, filing dispatches with a variety of datelines—Hanoi, Hue, and even Saigon weeks after its fall to the Communists. Casting his lot in 1981 with the fledgling CNN, Arnett learned the TV trade on the job, in such hot spots as Afghanistan, Beirut, El Salvador, Moscow, and Panama. Heading once again toward the sound of the guns, the author (who became an American citizen following his tour in the Soviet Union) slipped into Iraq days before the US-led coalition unleashed a savage aerial assault on its capital city. Although his under-fire broadcasts from the al-Rashid Hotel, a lengthy interview with Saddam Hussein, and follow-up reports on civilian casualties gained him further enemies in official circles, Arnett's on-air exposure made him a star with the viewing public. Here, in offering his side of this story (and others), he provides compelling reminders that journalism is indeed a calling that—for all its sins of omission and commission—does free people a service whose value is often beyond reckoning. An engrossing memoir—complete with perceptive commentary on colleagues and contemporary notables—from one of the fourth estate's authentic paradigms. (Sixteen pages of b&w photographs— not seen)

Pub Date: Jan. 20, 1994

ISBN: 0-671-75586-2

Page Count: 464

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 1993

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THE PURSUIT OF HAPPYNESS

FROM MEAN STREETS TO WALL STREET

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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BLACK BOY

A RECORD OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH

This autobiography might almost be said to supply the roots to Wright's famous novel, Native Son.

It is a grim record, disturbing, the story of how — in one boy's life — the seeds of hate and distrust and race riots were planted. Wright was born to poverty and hardship in the deep south; his father deserted his mother, and circumstances and illness drove the little family from place to place, from degradation to degradation. And always, there was the thread of fear and hate and suspicion and discrimination — of white set against black — of black set against Jew — of intolerance. Driven to deceit, to dishonesty, ambition thwarted, motives impugned, Wright struggled against the tide, put by a tiny sum to move on, finally got to Chicago, and there — still against odds — pulled himself up, acquired some education through reading, allied himself with the Communists — only to be thrust out for non-conformity — and wrote continually. The whole tragedy of a race seems dramatized in this record; it is virtually unrelieved by any vestige of human tenderness, or humor; there are no bright spots. And yet it rings true. It is an unfinished story of a problem that has still to be met.

Perhaps this will force home unpalatable facts of a submerged minority, a problem far from being faced.

Pub Date: Feb. 28, 1945

ISBN: 0061130249

Page Count: 450

Publisher: N/A

Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1945

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