An honest account of a life well-lived.
Fuller recounts the pivotal moments that have marked a life of fulfillment and true happiness in this memoir.
This unflinchingly honest account begins with a thorough detailing of the Fuller family’s beginnings, which the author is able to trace back to Plymouth, Massachusetts, in 1620. Edward Fuller—patriarch of the Fuller clan and descendant of the Mayflower expedition—eventually settled in Massachusetts, where his milk-peddling business thrived. The author reflects on his youth on the farm, peppering historical data with intimate personal stories of picking berries, getting into trouble with the next-door neighbors, and cherishing the sounds of a sickle bar cutter hay harvesting tool. Fuller includes a smattering of poems and photos from this time, drawing the reader into farm life with ease and a unique perspective. The author’s relationship with his father is particularly endearing as readers follow Fuller’s growing enthusiasm for motorcycles and travel—passions of his father that would significantly shape the course of the author’s life even after the elder Fuller’s tragic death (“motorcycle trips with my father are among my most cherished memories, and they have carved the deepest, most profound crevices in my brain”). Armed with an unparalleled sense of grit, perseverance, and passion for new experiences, the author embraced new and exciting experiences during and after college, including impromptu road trips during the Summer of Love in California, scuba diving, camping in secluded snowy mountains, and falling in love with the culinary arts. Such reminiscences drive the rest of the evenly paced memoir; Fuller’s relationships, though seemingly fascinating and complex, are given almost no time at all. As the author deprioritizes his sometimes-frustrating and tragic relationships in the narrative, the book’s brief and occasionally blasé treatment of the women in his life leave the reader wanting. Still, Fuller has indeed led a fascinating life, and his passion is palpable and contagious. The willingness to make mistakes, the inevitability of failure, and unending perseverance are relatable and inspiring themes woven throughout the text as the author proudly asserts that, with passion and tenacity, everyone can find their “felicity.”
An honest account of a life well-lived.Pub Date: June 16, 2025
ISBN: 9781960299796
Page Count: 306
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: Aug. 8, 2025
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
Not so deep, but a delightful tip of the hat to the pleasures—and power—of glamour.
A coffee-table book celebrates Michelle Obama’s sense of fashion.
Illustrated with hundreds of full-color photographs, Obama’s chatty latest book begins with some school portraits from the author’s childhood in Chicago and fond memories of back-to-school shopping at Sears, then jumps into the intricacies of clothing oneself as the spouse of a presidential candidate and as the first lady. “People looked forward to the outfits, and once I got their attention, they listened to what I had to say. This is the soft power of fashion,” she says. Obama is grateful and frank about all the help she got along the way, and the volume includes a long section written by her primary wardrobe stylist, Koop—28 years old when she first took the job—and shorter sections by makeup artists and several hair stylists, who worked with wigs and hair extensions as Obama transitioned back to her natural hair, and grew out her bangs, at the end of her husband’s second term. Many of the designers of the author’s gowns, notably Jason Wu, who designed several of her more striking outfits, also contribute appreciative memories. Besides candid and more formal photographs, the volume features many sketches of her gowns by their designers, closeups on details of those gowns, and magazine covers from Better Homes & Gardens to Vogue. The author writes that as a Black woman, “I was under a particularly white-hot glare, constantly appraised for whether my outfits were ‘acceptable’ and ‘appropriate,’ the color of my skin somehow inviting even more judgment than the color of my dresses.” Overall, though, this is generally a canny, upbeat volume, with little in the way of surprising revelations.
Not so deep, but a delightful tip of the hat to the pleasures—and power—of glamour.Pub Date: Nov. 4, 2025
ISBN: 9780593800706
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 7, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2026
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