Let us now celebrate body parts, in this collection of generally fine essays from talented writers. Some of the 18 authors, like Jane Smiley, Mona Simpson, and Esmeralda Santiago, have contributed to the Fiffers’ earlier collections (Home, 1995; Family, 1996). Here both writers and editors seem to be hitting their stride with this format, with commentaries diverse in both tone and subject. Eyes, brain, hair, nose, teeth, scar tissue—literally head to toe—are themes of the individual sketches that the Fiffers have coaxed into this anthology. Smiley delights in her belly, whether flat or protruding with child; cartoonist Lynda Barry believes teeth are the “music [of] the face.” There is a challenging reflection on death, rebirth, and transformation from Richard McCann, who received a liver transplant (how would Lazarus, raised from the dead, be feeling?, he wonders). Thomas Lynch takes on the womb, beginning with his Roman Catholic rosaries (“blessed is the fruit of thy womb”), although he gets it seriously wrong in equating the Immaculate Conception with the Virgin Birth. Lynch does raise the question of whether men should have a choice in acknowledging paternity, as women have the choice of terminating pregnancy. Ron Carlson offers nothing new in his reflections on the penis, but Kyoko Mori runs engagingly along on the subject of her feet. Editor Sharon Fiffer discusses how she has mentally peopled the chambers of her heart with those she loves and despises (it got so crowded, she added a few rooms), and Rosario FerrÇ joyously celebrates “The Butt” both for its sexuality and its role as purifier of inner waste. Overall a winsome compendium, suitable for bedside or seaside, where body parts can be contemplated in their (relative) nakedness.
Pub Date: June 8, 1999
ISBN: 0-380-97713-3
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Avon/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 1999
A real-life Frank Capra tale, just as corny, sentimental and inspiring as It's a Wonderful Life.
Hokey but charming memoir, reminiscent of an afternoon spent flipping through the pages of an antique photo album.
Although an autobiography, Coleman chronicles his life in the third person with a dispassion and modesty remarkable for a novice writer. It is perhaps the era that speaks through his prose—not a child of the "Me Decade," Coleman reminds us that the past was, indeed, more difficult than the present. And people certainly tended to whine a good deal less back then. The account begins chronologically, with his birth in 1902 to pioneer parents, their eighth child. By the time he was nine, the family had moved to their own homestead in Myrtle Creek, Ore. That summer he contracted polio and lost the use of his legs. Overcoming his crippled condition occupied a good portion of his youth, admirably marked by self-reliance and invention. He whittled his own crutches, made violins and, at 19, attempting to find a trade that would accommodate his physical condition, paid a jeweler $25 per month in order to serve as an apprentice to the watchmaker. As a young man in the '20s, he married and became a father, then established himself as sole proprietor of a jewelry store. The narrative is interspersed with photographs, newspaper clippings, Coleman's poems (an unfortunate weakness), musical scores (also not very solid), jewelry designs and the Coleman family tree. At a glance, Coleman’s history, aside from his disability, is not unusual. He becomes one of the leading merchants of a small town, state archery champion, and president of the Lion's Club. His would seem to be the unremarkable chronicle of a small-town success of interest to no one outside his family. Even so, it's his banality that is oddly compelling. Following the ups and downs of the Coleman jewelry store through the Depression, World War II, and the post-war era up until Coleman's death in 1972, is an enjoyable journey through the low-key strength and integrity that sustains middle-American lives. Coleman's son, John Coleman, today runs Coleman's Jewelers, the jewelry store founded by the author, in Corvallis, Ore. (Proceeds from the sale of this book, which has an endorsement from former senator Bob Dole, will go to Rotary International's "effort to eradicate polio" and to the Austin Family Business Program at Oregon State University.)
A real-life Frank Capra tale, just as corny, sentimental and inspiring as It's a Wonderful Life.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: 0-9754140-0-3
Page Count: -
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: April 17, 2011
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Meet Norma Hazelton, connoisseur and collector of swizzle sticks. If you're not impressed by a plastic Jackie Gleason long since separated from its maraschino cherry, take a look at Robert Cade, inventor of Gatorade and a collector of Studebakers (re the carmaker's Dictator line of the 1930s, he says: ``Dictator was a good name until Hitler and Mussolini and Stalin. They dropped the Dictator line in 1937 because of them''). Among the 20 collections that Tuchman and photographer Brenner cast their eyes on are caches of Civil War memorabilia (a banjo, a musket, a toothbrush); aquarium furniture (a lot of mermaids); and representations of the Last Supper (a clock, a saltshaker, a funeral-home fan). Tuchman's text, mostly a pastiche of comments from the collectors themselves, is informative—and just glib enough to keep the whole book from feeling like a spooky visit to your mad Aunt Mabel's attic.
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 1994
ISBN: 0-8118-0360-0
Page Count: 144
Publisher: Chronicle Books
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 1994
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