A vexing and tedious memoir that offers only brief glimpses of the extraordinary creativity of the King of Pop.
Seven years after his death, Michael Jackson's secret girlfriend reveals their peculiar 20-year relationship.
First-time author Mangatal met her idol while working as a receptionist in Jackson's talent management office. From the beginning, their mutual attraction was obvious to her co-workers; it “was so strong it was impossible to ignore.” Shortly after their first kiss, she "just knew that Michael and I would soon be an official couple. In my mind, he was already my boyfriend." Despite his eccentricities—"every time it seemed he was acting normal and like a regular man—someone I could see myself having a real relationship with—he would revert back to this mask-wearing dude with a little boy by his side. It was difficult to understand”—her obsession remained. Mangatal details Jackson's work on his post-Thriller albums, his competitive nature and perfectionism, and his playful, pranksterish nature, which often came out on video sets. Unfortunately for her, she rebuffed several men and agency clients because "all of my thoughts and focus were totally consumed by one person—Michael." Unfortunately for readers, the author’s prose leaves much to be desired, with many passages seemingly pulled from an eighth-grader's diary—e.g., "Michael was like a drug I was addicted to”; "I am his forever”; and, regarding the child abuse allegations, "this beautiful, sweet soul couldn't harm a fly." The author seems to believe that their chemistry, her (limited) sexual experience with him, and his flirting with women on set definitely proves that Jackson was heterosexual. "Interacting with him,” writes Mangatal, “was sometimes like dealing with a 14-year-old boy—and it wasn’t an act. It was like he had stopped maturing emotionally the moment massive fame snatched away his childhood.”
A vexing and tedious memoir that offers only brief glimpses of the extraordinary creativity of the King of Pop.Pub Date: Aug. 29, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-61373-617-3
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Chicago Review Press
Review Posted Online: May 31, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2016
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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