An unvarnished recollection of the difficulties and rewards of overcoming addiction.
Wrestling serves as an apt metaphor in this real-life tale of turmoil and redemption.
Jensen opens this gripping memoir during the summer after his high school graduation as he envisions wrestling at the community college level. However, his decision to make quick money in the Alaska fishing industry—where the mental and physical tolls of long, intense hours are often soothed with alcohol and drugs—leads to an extended, harrowing set of detours spanning nearly two decades. The devastating effects of Jensen’s meth addiction are on full display, with countless scenes of drug-fueled rage, recklessness, and depravity. At one point, he nearly died from blood loss, too altered to notice a serious injury. In a striking irony, readers witness the slow destruction of a body that in the context of wrestling would be treated as a temple through nutrition, training, and discipline. At the same time, Jensen’s physical prowess, spatial awareness, and mental acuity occasionally came in handy when violence erupted. The author effectively employs visceral language to describe these conflicts: “I was a master at masking fear, but you can only wear a mask for so long before the face beneath, the true face of who you are, eats its way to the surface.” In addition, he recounts several heartbreaking moments with family members, and if there’s a minor flaw to this book, it’s a lack of familial context at the beginning of his story. Jensen often mentions his reliance on values instilled in his upbringing, but it’s not clear what these are. Eventually, an epiphany and one last arrest sparked his grueling journey to recovery. Finally, at 36, he found himself where he had planned to be all those years before, wrestling on a community college team. Although the author repeatedly emphasizes that the ultimate goal was not necessarily winning, he reached the pinnacle of his wrestling career in 2016, becoming a Folkstyle national champion in the Masters Division. Overall, this memoir’s content and style make it easy to see why Jensen later found success as a motivational speaker.
An unvarnished recollection of the difficulties and rewards of overcoming addiction.Pub Date: April 16, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-987476-44-6
Page Count: 214
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Sept. 7, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.
A former New York City dancer reflects on her zesty heyday in the 1970s.
Discovered on a Manhattan street in 2020 and introduced on Stanton’s Humans of New York Instagram page, Johnson, then 76, shares her dynamic history as a “fiercely independent” Black burlesque dancer who used the stage name Tanqueray and became a celebrated fixture in midtown adult theaters. “I was the only black girl making white girl money,” she boasts, telling a vibrant story about sex and struggle in a bygone era. Frank and unapologetic, Johnson vividly captures aspects of her former life as a stage seductress shimmying to blues tracks during 18-minute sets or sewing lingerie for plus-sized dancers. Though her work was far from the Broadway shows she dreamed about, it eventually became all about the nightly hustle to simply survive. Her anecdotes are humorous, heartfelt, and supremely captivating, recounted with the passion of a true survivor and the acerbic wit of a weathered, street-wise New Yorker. She shares stories of growing up in an abusive household in Albany in the 1940s, a teenage pregnancy, and prison time for robbery as nonchalantly as she recalls selling rhinestone G-strings to prostitutes to make them sparkle in the headlights of passing cars. Complemented by an array of revealing personal photographs, the narrative alternates between heartfelt nostalgia about the seedier side of Manhattan’s go-go scene and funny quips about her unconventional stage performances. Encounters with a variety of hardworking dancers, drag queens, and pimps, plus an account of the complexities of a first love with a drug-addled hustler, fill out the memoir with personality and candor. With a narrative assist from Stanton, the result is a consistently titillating and often moving story of human struggle as well as an insider glimpse into the days when Times Square was considered the Big Apple’s gloriously unpolished underbelly. The book also includes Yee’s lush watercolor illustrations.
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.Pub Date: July 12, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-250-27827-2
Page Count: 192
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: July 27, 2022
A juicy story with some truly crazy moments, yet Anderson's good heart shines through.
The iconic model tells the story of her eventful life.
According to the acknowledgments, this memoir started as "a fifty-page poem and then grew into hundreds of pages of…more poetry." Readers will be glad that Anderson eventually turned to writing prose, since the well-told anecdotes and memorable character sketches are what make it a page-turner. The poetry (more accurately described as italicized notes-to-self with line breaks) remains strewn liberally through the pages, often summarizing the takeaway or the emotional impact of the events described: "I was / and still am / an exceptionally / easy target. / And, / I'm proud of that." This way of expressing herself is part of who she is, formed partly by her passion for Anaïs Nin and other writers; she is a serious maven of literature and the arts. The narrative gets off to a good start with Anderson’s nostalgic memories of her childhood in coastal Vancouver, raised by very young, very wild, and not very competent parents. Here and throughout the book, the author displays a remarkable lack of anger. She has faced abuse and mistreatment of many kinds over the decades, but she touches on the most appalling passages lightly—though not so lightly you don't feel the torment of the media attention on the events leading up to her divorce from Tommy Lee. Her trip to the pages of Playboy, which involved an escape from a violent fiance and sneaking across the border, is one of many jaw-dropping stories. In one interesting passage, Julian Assange's mother counsels Anderson to desexualize her image in order to be taken more seriously as an activist. She decided that “it was too late to turn back now”—that sexy is an inalienable part of who she is. Throughout her account of this kooky, messed-up, enviable, and often thrilling life, her humility (her sons "are true miracles, considering the gene pool") never fails her.
A juicy story with some truly crazy moments, yet Anderson's good heart shines through.Pub Date: Jan. 31, 2023
ISBN: 9780063226562
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Dey Street/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Dec. 5, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2023
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