5 comments about Wounds of Passion: A Writing Life (Wounds of Passion).

1. What a treat for her fans and admirers. This is a glimpse into a brilliant mind and a radiant soul. It's also a precious companion for many black women struggling with the double loneliness and struggle of life in america and the writing life anywhere. How gracious of her to share more of her personal history with us.

   Her observations are wise. Her grasp of history is absolute. Her ideas stimulate intelligent and loving thought, conversation, and action. Read this book.




2. Wounds of Passion by bell hooks is an autobiography that explains the struggles of a very independent-nonconforming-feminist-black-woman-writer from the South struggling through a difficult childhood then later trying to adapt to the "foreignness" of the academic world of California. Just like hooks, this book is not easily placed into a clearly defined category. It could be at home among works of women's studies, feminism, African-American studies, cultural criticism, or autobiographies, just to name a few. This book is not merely a memoir of bell hooks' writing life. It presents several strong statements about American society and how difficult it is (even down to the family level) to be independent and to challenge the status quo. She calls the reader to bear witness to her pain and struggles throughout her life as a black female writer.

   Two intertwining voices throughout the book make it a very interesting and unique narrative. As one voice is telling the story through time as the events are happening, another voice is looking back at these events as a third person in the here-and-now. This gives a reader more than the normal single-perspective and brings the reader a little closer to the story she's telling.

   One of the many statements hooks makes with Wounds of Passion is blackness does not have a universal truth. This is exemplified by the following quote explaining the fundamental differences between her and her boyfriend Mack (who was born and raised in California) throughout their long, rocky relationship. Hooks explains, "He does not feel the pain of Jim Crow. Shared black skin does not draw them closer. Her kinda blackness is strange to him. His kinda blackness I've heard about but find it hard to believe" (52).

   Many social issues surface in Wounds of Passion such as domestic violence, conflicting feminist views among black and white women, racial issues of the South, stereotypes, issues of social class, and several others. But hooks does not preach or prescribe any concrete "solutions" to these problems. She seems to merely want people to recognize these problems exist, and with that acknowledgment, be taking the first step in the overall solution.

   She speaks many times about how poetry and words are a place for her to escape from the harsh reality of everyday life and how she moves beyond the boundaries of race and class through books (105). "Poetry is a place of transcendence" (109). Poetry is often a place where gender and race is not usually evident or important in the words and their meanings.

   Although there's never any doubt that bell hooks is a feminist black woman, she says in the following quote about two good friends of her and Mack: "Their gayness is both significant and not solely defining. This is how she wants to feel about blackness, that it can always be significant without being the only aspect of her identity that matters. The same is true of being a woman" (237-238). This outlook will hopefully be the "norm" someday. Wounds of Passion will definitely help get us there.




3. As a black woman poet/writer, I was able to connect with hook's experiences and frustrations. There were deeply moving passages that explored the pain in loving and the satisfaction of pain articulated. "Language is a body of suffering and when you take up language you take up suffering too." At times, though, I felt that hooks could have been more succinct; the book could have been half its size. All in all, it is an interesting exploration into the heart of a writer and is an honest read.



4. This insight to a black woman's life learning her craft of writing is insightful and very revealing. Those who have read Ms. hooks knows she leaves no leave unturned and has a no-holds approach to telling it like it is. The abuse, both physical and mental she witnessed in her childhood home must have been painful to relive. In expressing how it was to both want to follow her love of writing and loving a black man with the same ambition is a testament to her perserverance. When she found that she was being stifled she knew she had to choose for her own well-being. Loving and writing. Can the two be done? I recommend this book as a part of black women writers.



5. I have read so many of bell's books, and she is by far one of my most favorite authors; her work has greatly influenced my own thinking and writing. No one with a bit of openness and academic integrity can reject the wealth of insight bell has offered to feminism, race theory, and cultural studies.

   With such a prolific career, however, there will be inevitable ups and downs. Without a doubt, bell's earliest works (ain't i a women, yearning, from margin to center, talking back...) are among her most groundbreaking; these works set the standard for studying race and gender as interrelated social phenomena. some of her later works lack the novelty and texture of her vintage writing.

   for this reason, i am THRILLED to see wounds of passion. i love this book. having read bell's other books, i can appreciate the story she is telling -- it is interesting to see how her life experiences contribute to her academic writing. for those who describe the book as "self indulgent," self-centered, etc. Guess what? IT'S AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY!!! TO WHOM SHOULD SHE HAVE GIVEN THE ATTENTION????! Anyway, the book reveals how writing is often a mechanism for processing life's trials and tribulations. Congratulations, bell, on another wonderful work.

2 comments about The Letters That Never Came (Jewish Latin Amer Series).

1. Like Mauricio Rosencof, the author of this book, I am Uruguayan - but this book has a message for every reader, regardless of his or her nationality, religion or political ideology.
   
   The son of poor Polish/Jewish immigrants (his father was a tailor), Mauricio Rosencof's childhood was punctuated by poverty and absence - that of his elder brother, who, as he tells us, "protected me all my life, until he died", and that of his parents' Polish relatives, assassinated by the Germans and authors of the real or imagined "letters that never came". But Mauricio's early years were also marked by the kindness of his parents, by his hungry alertness to the world, and by the magical background of a long-gone Montevideo - all of which he evokes masterfully.
   
   Suffering was to feature prominently in adulthood too. For about twelve years (1973 - 1985), Uruguay was scourged by a shameful and bloody military dictatorship that ended one of the longest and stablest democratic traditions in South America. Mauricio, a left-wing activist, was imprisoned and tortured, while his aged father and mother were persecuted as the "parents of a subversive". During these dark times, the letters that never came were the ones he could not write, the ones that told of the brutal treatment meted out to him, of the terror, the hope and the endurance.
   
   I read the book in the original Spanish and so cannot comment on the translation, but I hope it does justice to Rosencof's spare, austere and yet profoundly evocative writing.
   
   It should also be noted that "The letters..." inspired a play (which included Hebrew dances or "rikudim") and ran for a long time in Montevideo's renowned "Teatro El Galpón".
   
   This wonderfully crafted memoir is an urgent and important read which speaks of family ties, heritage, love, grief, beliefs, and - above all - the force of the human spirit.



2. i read this book in the original spanish a couple of years ago and was blown away. rosencof creatively weaves together his own history with that of his ancestors who perished in hitler's camps. i have not read this translated version, but it is probably excellent since it is part of a series that has included terrific books.

1 comments about Turning South Again: Re-Thinking Modernism/Re-Reading Booker T..

1. Overall, I was very dissapointed with Baker's approach and expected much more from someone with a good reputation for literary analysis. I could accept his psychoanalytic speculative ventures about Booker T. Washington's personal biography, but as the major underpining of a judgement against Washington that he is intent on making, it is very thin. Especially when there are no specific references from Up From Slavery, or testimony by students, acquaintances etc. to support such theorizing. All in all I found it very unbalanced and unscholarly.

1 comments about Making Civil Rights Law: Thurgood Marshall and the Supreme Court, 1956-1961.

1. This book is a decisive history of Thurgood Marshall's actions and the effects that he had on the civil rights of African-Americans while he worked with the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). His successes, failures, and discussions of his effects make it a very informative book. It is quite obvious that the author spent a great amount of time researching his topic of choice. The book is absolutely full of quotes from people of the time and very detailed factual accounts of events. Unfortunately, the content is not written in an extremely appealing matter. It tends to drone on and on about various cases and actions which have no major significance in history nor in the life of Marshall. If you can read through the dry spots, though, its a great book. You can really get a felling for the social climate of the era as well as the thoughts and feelings of Marshall himself. As a research tool, this was definitely the most valuable book I came across. If I was rating this book based on its information it would be an easy five. Ultimately, it is a good book for pleasure reading but not the best. I would have to say that Juan Williams' Thurgood Marshall: American Revolutionary is the best. If you are interested in Marshall's career, though, you want to look at Tushnet's other book Making Constitutional Law : Thurgood Marshall and the Supreme Court, 1961-1991.

5 comments about Who's Afraid of a Large Black Man?.

1. I grabbed this in a bookstore discount bin because it was cheaper than the magazine I had in hand. I have Charles' other book and enjoyed it, so I thought it would be better time spent.
   
   Unlike his previous book, this isn't about Charles Barkley at all. Rather, it's a series of interviews with prominent Americans with peppered comments from Charles on racism and race relations. It was a little disjointed, and I don't think it really made any points other than racism is a bad thing and someone needs to do something about it. But I will give him points for attempting to use his notoriety to call some attention to the issue, and it was great to hear from many of the people he selected. I wouldn't have expected some of the responses I read.



2. I love the title, by the way.
   
   The premise is simple. Barkley rightly sees racism as a cancer, and he believes we need to open a dialogue on the topic, so he interviews people who have something to day. I'm sure there's a list of them elsewhere in this Amazon listing.
   
   The execution is pretty much flawless, and the subjects are chosen well. And after that, readers can simply read, enjoy, learn and ponder. A very commendable effort.



3. Until now, I was not much of a of Charles Barkley fan. I always saw him as a "washed up bully" and ex-basketball superstar, still trying to cash-in on his name recognition and tying to keep it in the "limelight" by saying outlandish and provocative things. I no longer think that after reading this book, which I bought after seeing it, and Barkley "unceremoniously put down" in Larry Elders incredibly ill conceived, confusing and poorly written book called "Stupid Black Men."
   
   My thinking was that if Larry Elders didn't like Charles Barkley, then there must still be something good and redeeming about him that I had not yet discovered. And sure enough, there was: This book, which is a miniature masterpiece. Barkley is no "Stupid Black Man," as Elders has portrayed him to be.
   
   Rather incredibly, this book is the missing dialogue on race that America has never had, and may never have. It is just the opposite of Elders' "Stupid Black Men" and the "Bill Cosby and Alvin Poussaint two-man road show:" "Come on People," in which both take the fashionable "low road of least resistance: "Just attack Black men, and you are safe: America will love you, but nothing will ever be done, and nothing will ever change:
   
   End of the American dialogue on race.
   
   Perhaps for the first time in American history, we get a collection of what fourteen successful and well-known people have to say about race in America -- rather than mindless ideological tripe, oozing out as more "Christianized racism," from the likes of Armstrong Williams and Larry Elders. And what these fourteen people (most of whom are black) have to say will not only surprise Cosby, Pousaint and Elders, but the rest of America as well.
   
   Hear what Tiger Woods, Ice Cube, Barack Obama, George Lopez, Samuel L. Jackson, Morgan Freeman, and many others both black, white and other colors, have to say about the racism that still exists across the American landscape in every industry and in every town.
   
   Rather than steal the book's thunder, I will simply say this: If one wants to know what the racial situation is like in America, they would be wise to interview some successful black people and others who understand and know the consequences of racism rather than listen to the "hired conservative media hit men" who all speak the same language: "Uncle Tom-speak."
   
   Five Stars



4. Although I'm not a huge basketball fan, I know who Charles Barkley is and was curious to see what type of book he would write. Consequently I was overjoyed while reading the introduction it grabbed me from the start. It's an easy read and the writers puts you at ease by making you feel as if you're listening in on a conversation with friends. I am throughly enjoying being enlightened, informed and educated all at the same time. I only wish I had know about the book when it first came out. Excellent read, I have bought numerous copies as gifts for the young men in my life.



5. For some strange reason I am a Charles Barkley fan, that is why I recieved the book. I was disappointed, it wasn't what I expected at all! Know what you are buying before ordering this book.

5 comments about The Book of Sarahs: A Family in Parts.

1. This book touched me to the core! Catherine's story is searingly honest, human, passionate and moving. Inspite of being extremely busy I could not put it down from the time it was delivered until 3am when I had finished it. This tour de force not only addresses issues of adoption, identity, race and prejudice but also how one's environment and circumstances affect one's own perception of events and experiences. It is the best book I have read in years!



2. Catherine went searching for the truth and she found it. It was reality and not a made up story with a happy ending. I believe that she was very self serving in telling the story. I felt she did not really appreciate the parents who raised her, until the very end. I wondered how they felt after reading this book. She certainly laid out all her complaints about them. I personally could relate to her mother, who was doing the very best she could for a rather unappreciative daughter.
   On the other hand, I think I gained some insight to what it was like to grow up black in a white world, not easy at all. I'm glad she was able to tell this story with as much depth and clarity as she did.
   This story also brings to light the plight of the children of a middle class woman who had several children and didn't choose to acknowledge or care for them. What about birth control? Yes, she was mentally ill, but I wonder if we can excuse her for that.
   
   In the last several years I have done the research that reunited my husband (in his 60's) with the birth mother who gave him up. The search was very interesting and it was a miracle how it all came together. The story has a bittersweet ending, since his birth mother passed away within a year of their reunion.
   
   This is a great story and I couldn't put it down.



3. It can be hard enough to come to terms with family and identity when one is not adopted. Imagine growing up the transracial adoptee of a white family in a tiny working class town in rural Massachusetts (read: all white). Moreover, you are biracial and subject to putdowns and jibes by "full-blooded" members of your race. This background makes up the first part of Catherine McKinley's compulsively readable memoir. The second part is her search for her roots, and her reckoning when she finds those roots and they are not quite what she expected.

   McKinley has a superb ear for dialogue and mood. Moreover, The Book of Sarahs is so full of suprises that sometimes it's like reading a thriller. McKinley starts out by giving us her fantasy of her birth mother that carried her through her youth (most adoptees have one)...and part of the fun of the book is seeing just how different reality is from her fantasy, again and again. McKinley also writes with wonderful humor and subtle characterizations that make it difficult to dislike anyone in her book despite their foibles. Finally, I can't agree with other reviewers that McKinley was cruel to her adoptive family. Her adoptive parents clearly understood her journey, and by the end of the book she intimated that she had resolved her issues with them.

   Don't miss this one...one of the best I've read this year!




4. This book tells the tale of Catherine McKinley's search for her birth parents. McKinley, who is biracial, was adopted at birth. Brought up in a White family, she found herself drawn towards African American culture in her search for building her own identity. As an adult, questions about who she was and how she came to be gradually took over the focus of her life. In this book, she details how she searched for her birth parents and eventually found them, as well as other family members.

   From reading the blurb on the back cover of the book, I had expected the book to focus more on McKinley's experiences of growing up as an adopted biracial child. I have very little experience myself with issues relating to adoption, and I had no idea how consuming the questions of identity and family can be for an adopted child. Prospective adoptive parents might learn quite a bit from this book about how adopted children may have an unquenchable thirst for knowing their birth parents, a thirst that can taint relationships between them and their adopted family members if not handled appropriately. Adoptees, on the other hand, may be quite interested to read how McKinley proceeded in her search, and how the results of her search compared with her dreams. The emotional issues concerning adoption are never easy to reconcile; after all, every adoption starts with a tragedy that has resulted in parents having to give up their children. The children and all of their parents, both adopted and birth, must spend the remainder of their lives putting the pieces back together.




5. I beg to differ with some of the other customer reviews posted for The Book of Sarahs. Reality is messy. Members of the adoption triad--birthparents, adoptees, and adoptive parents--share a complicated, emotionally charged relationship from the moment the adoptee is born. There are one thousand and one reasons why birthmothers feel that relinquishment is the best possible choice for their child; there are just as many reasons why adoptive parents choose to raise a non-biological child. But the adoptee has the most to gain or lose. In my twenty-six years as a birthmother, I am continually amazed by the infinite variety of paths triad members have traveled, yet we're all connected by the same feelings of uncertainty, wistfulness, and longing for what might have been. Thankfully, adoption today is much more open, kinder, gentler; many studies have documented the impact of adoption on all triad members, and there are fewer black holes than there were a generation or more ago. Catherine McKinley's personal story of life as an adopted Black child raised in a white family and predominately white community will captivate readers. One does not have to a member of the adoption community to appreciate her search for self. Ms. McKinley's prose is a pleasure to read, a beautifully, richly written story of relationships that readers will find hard to put down.

No comments about Barack Obama - Hope and Change (Biography).

1 comments about Great Jews In Entertainment.

1. Any of the "great Jewish" books by Darryl Lyman are swell. Big coffee table books with great black and white photos and interesting bios of Jewish folks in the entertainment business. I'm Jewish and I did not know Harrison Ford was a yidloch [a Jewish boychick]! Note-this is the same coffee table book, essentially as Lyman's tome called Great Jews in showbusiness [or some such title, I know cause I bought both! One was done in 1999 and one 2005. The 2005 book has a few new additions but is virtually the same. Such a deal!

No comments about DK Readers: Free At Last, The Story of Martin Luther King, Jr. (Level 4: Proficient Readers).

No comments about The Dancer from Khiva: One Muslim Woman's Quest for Freedom.