A fast-paced account quite likely to engender strong reactions among readers concerned with the U.S. military’s roles in...
A war memoir from a highly decorated Navy SEAL.
The news flash from this book by retired SEAL O’Neill is that he fired the bullets that killed Osama bin Laden in 2011. However, the shooting does not occur until more than 300 pages in; the narrative consists of much more than the sensational account of what happened on the top-secret mission to bin Laden’s hideout in Abbottabad, Pakistan. Some passages are redacted due to review of the manuscript by U.S. Department of Defense Prepublication and Security Review personnel. In addition, O’Neill disguises the identities of more than a dozen individuals. As a result, judging the accuracy of the sensitive, war-related information presents difficulties, especially in light of previously published information about the bin Laden mission. (The author does not mention the controversial book No Easy Day by fellow SEAL Matt Bissonnette, who wrote using the pen name Mark Owen.) Whatever controversy might ensue, most of the memoir is enlightening about military special forces, especially the SEAL component. Born in 1976 and reared in Butte, Montana, O’Neill enlisted in the Navy in 1995 with the goal of becoming a SEAL. He understood the rigorous training, and he knew the washout rate was high, but he persisted, overcoming months of physical and mental rigor. The author had his first deployment in 1998 and went on to participate in top-secret assignments in Afghanistan and Iraq in addition to battling Somali pirates. Zealously patriotic, O’Neill seems to have never seriously questioned the motivations or consequences of his missions. During his time as a SEAL, O’Neill married and became a father, and he discusses the havoc caused by his military assignments regarding his family life.
A fast-paced account quite likely to engender strong reactions among readers concerned with the U.S. military’s roles in foreign conflicts.Pub Date: April 25, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-5011-4503-2
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Scribner
Review Posted Online: April 3, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
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
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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