5 comments about Chechnya Diary: A War Correspondent's Story of Surviving the War in Chechnya.

1. This is the true story about the struggle the people of Chechnya are going through - a region I know little about. It is written through the eyes of a war correspondent - an occupation I know little about. Goltz brings some understanding to the layman with a direct, no-nonsense writing style that will capture your attention and send your senses reeling through sorrow, joy, dispair, hope and more. A must read for anyone who wants to gain some knowledge of the on-going struggle of Chechnya without wading through a dull textbook.



2. I'll state straight away that I count myself a an old and loyal friend of Thomas Goltz, and I'm a journalist too, so my five stars should perhaps seen in that context. But I believe they are well deserved, not least for the personal bravery the author displayed in getting the story. For me, this book's particular value is that for once it strips away the shield that we reporters feel necessary to arm ourselves with to protect ourselves from emotional involvement with the subjects of our reportage. This is the first time I read the account of someone who has faced up to naked realities of this situation. The result is a rare and compelling tale of the relationship between the interviewer and the interviewed, and set against a backdrop that shows how both sides behave and above all feel when trapped in forces outside their control.



3. This book is a sign Goltz has matured since writing "Requiem" and "AZ Diary", and has found his niche. This is to say, maybe he's realized he isn't much for political synthesis or history. He has obviously done a lot of good and original thinking about journalistic ethics in wartime and the "Hawthorne effect"--these are the reasons you want to read this book.
   
   There are a lot of books, historical and journalistic, in several languages, on Chechnya and this is the least exciting and informative of the ten or so of those I've read.
   
   "Allah's Mountains", "Chechnya--Tombstone of Russian Power" and "Chechnya--A Short, Victorious War" are more interesting and written by less self-obsessed authors.



4. Chechnya Diary isn't your typical book about war. For one thing, it reads more like an adventure or a novel than straight history. It's also much more philosophical than I would have expected. The book begins with the quote, "The observer affects the observed," and boy is that statement ever borne out as the story unfolds.

   Author Thomas Goltz sneaks into the country to cover the war, and ends up in a small town called Samashki, where he depends on the hospitality of a man named Hussein. Ostensibly there to record the fighting, Goltz soon becomes intimately involved, raising many tough questions about journalistic ethics and the effects of media war coverage.

   The book really picks up steam in the second half, as Goltz returns to Chechnya to discover the damage his participation has caused, and tries to rectify it.

   It's a thought-provoking book that provides background on the Chechnyan war but also goes far beyond that to dwell on how our shallow media culture affects our understanding of world events (and beyond that, how media coverage actually determines the course of those events as they play out). Goltz is a likable narrator who doesn't shy away from implicating himself when it comes to the sticky moral questions. He brings to life real Chechnyans in such vivid fashion that you'll remember them every time you hear about Chechnya in the news.

   I had tears in my eyes as I finished the book. Highly recommended.




5. Until I read 'Chechnya Diary' I was willing to accept what seemed to be conventional wisdom about the conflict in Chechnya--i.e., just another incidence of Islamic fundamentalist terrorism. Mr. Goltz provides another view: i.e., an effort (at least initally) to restore to a displaced people the homeland of which they were deprived by the Stalinst regime. I also found it refreshing to read something by a journalist who is willing to acknowledge that his presence may have an impact on the turn of events. All in all, I think this is a most enlightening book and, like Mr. Goltz's 'Azerbaijan Diary', a terrific adventure story.

5 comments about World Of Mike Royko.

1. The book gives glimpses of his personal life, his upbringing, along with his professional life as a journalist for the Daily News, Sun Times, and finally the Tribune. I have read the Tribune for many years but never did read Royko's columns. I read this book to get an idea of why he was such a revered journalist.

   I found that the book had some great stories in it and overall it was an enjoyable read, but I did not emerge as impressed with Mike Royko as I thought I would be. A good book for a nice overview for someone trying to figure who Mike Royko was. If you are not interested in learning about Royko this book will bore you out of your mind.




2. My oldest son,now in his thirties,greatly suprised me earlier this year when he responded to my question of what book had the most impact on him when he was growing up.He said it was more than just a book;it was the columns of Mike Royko,particularly those describing the views of Slats Grubnick."They countered all the dining room table"liberalisms"you and mom always were urging on me".While Slats and his creator,Royko,are no longer with us to directly influence my son's son on a regular basis,they are brilliantly brought back to life in this loving and honest book by Madison newspaper columnist,Doug Moe.I don't recall reading if Moe ever met Royko in person,but in this absolutely enjoyable gem,written with the cooperation of Royko's family and cohorts,Moe writes with an authority and wisdom that The Great Royko himself would love.See for yourself!As for me,I'm planning atrip to The Billy Goat tavern where I plan to hoist a few:to Slats,Royko,and Doug Moe.Thanks for the memories and inspiration.



3. This book is a wonderful look at one of the great journalists of the 20th century. Whether you are a long time fan of Royko or are just curious about who he was and why his writing had such an impact on readers, you are in for a great read. The photos and text work very well together as Doug Moe masterfully takes you from the humble beginnings of Royko's life down through the years to his final days as the most syndicated columnist in America. Royko's story is fascinating. He was not your typical journalism school product since he, in fact, never went to journalism school. He was a self-taught, street-smart genius who learned his craft while on the job. As this book makes clear, he quickly mastered the fundamentals of sound journalism and then went on for decades entertaining and informing us all with his great writing. The book covers the highlights as well as some of the intriguing details of how it all unfolded. I recommend you read it and pass it on to a good friend.



4. This is far from a comprehensive biography, but still supplies a lot of information that I was always curious about. The pictures alone are priceless. Perhaps some day Studs Terkel or Bill Grainger will write the definitive Royko bio. But for now, those of us who dearly miss Mike's face on Page 3 of The Trib will have to be content with this.



5. Like millions of others, I followed the columns (read: exploits) of Mike Royko when he was in the Chicago newspapers. Doug Moe's biography serves his subject well in lean, workmanlike prose, capturing the flavor of the Chicago streets and neighborhoods as well as the man himself. Moe brings it alive so you can almost feel the ink smudges on newsprint and smell the Old Style in the corner bars in the dim light of winter nights. Photos and anecdotes complement the narrative, which Moe relates with his usual straightforward understated virtuosity (in other words, no sentences like this one), compelling the reader to turn the page to see what is going to happen next. Indispensable reading for anyone who wants to learn more about Royko, the writing life, newspapering, and a certain now-vanished and legendary era in Chicago journalism. The book fills a welcome niche on the bookshelf.

5 comments about Kinfolks: Falling Off the Family Tree - The Search for My Melungeon Ancestors.

1. How disappointing!I enjoyed reading Alther's first two books. Now that she and I are middle aged and beyond, her "Days of Whine and Reefer" assumptions are tired and boring: European white men never did a good thing. Christianity is bad,stupid and is praticed by ignorant people. Brilliant elites support abortion-even as she marvels over her own newborn grandson.But if you are willing to view American history through these bratty spectacles, you might like this book.Her many references to the Inquisition reveal a positive lack of cursory research on this subject. Interested readers might find the following more current and accurate: Characters of the Inquisition by William T. Walsh. Catholicism and Fundamentalism by Karl Keating. Nonreaders might like "The Myth of the Spanish Inquisition" a BBC video shown on the tv series "Ancient Mysteries". Briefly put, if you are interested in good solid historical and genealogical inquiry, this book is not for you.



2. Lisa Alther hasn't lost her sense of humour or her keen insight into human nature. This is a great book and I learned a lot about history of the Southeast of which I knew nothing before reading this. I found it very interesting and I also loved learning more about Lisa's life as she is a favorite author of mine.



3. Lisa (LYE-ZA) Alther's latest, Kinfolks, falling off the family tree, is irresistible!
   
   Kinfolks is the most humorous and entertaining book I have read in years! (And I've probably read 15,000 in my lifetime of 81 years.) It also introduces you to a very interesting woman who is unafraid to reveal her weaknesses and foibles. She is also a marvelous role model of openness and self-effacement for the young as well as a reassurance for all senior citizens.
   
   Do not be fooled this is only about ancestors or genes. The genealogy and DNA searches provide the structure for very wise and unhurtful humor--a very rare quality.
   
   Most Americans no longer live where they grew up. What they gained by living among strangers, what they lost by uprooting, and what they may profit from by accepting ALL their roots, traits, and history are hilariously illustrated.
   
   The Melungeons, interesting as they may be, only provide a vehicle for Alther's search for more self-knowledge by a very gifted writer. The writing draws one on as Alther reminds us of cogent points through artful means: she contrasts northeast Appalachia church message boards' weekly quotes with Vermont bumper stickers to give us insights into two very different responses to extremes of the Appalachians. She teases her family who seem recognizably familiar, and she tantalizes us with the potential of what DNA may one day tell us about ourselves and others.



4. This was a great book. It is styled like an autobiography and tells the tale of the authors childhood through adult years, focusing on family, culture, and the things she learned about her family through the years.



5. Well written, easy reading. But if you are looking for the history of the Melungeons, take this book very lightly. Borders on "Cultural Genocide". As with the works of Brent Kennedy and Elizabeth Hirschman, a very poor attempt at rewritting the history of the Melungeons.

1 comments about I Am My Father's Daughter: Living a Life Without Secrets.

1. I had to read this book for a class. The book was amazing and very interesting! I love the book!! Worth buying and reading!

4 comments about No Hurry to Get Home: The Memoir of the New Yorker Writer Whose Unconventional Life and Adventures Spanned the 20th Century.

1. Hahn tells of an exotic existence in a practical and clear voice rich with her honest observations of the people and places of Chicago, London, the Belgian Congo, and Shanghai. Not a memoir in the traditional sense, Hahn, with forthright economy, simply allows the articles she's written throughout her lifetime to illustrate tales of her travels. An inspiring read for woman and men who long for an adventurous life!



2. While approximately 30% of this book is taken up with interesting stories about life abroad in the early part of the 20th century, in no way, shape, or form is this book actually a memoir. It is a collection of her old New Yorker articles, most of which do not even deal with her life abroad. In fact, the majority of the chapters comprise uninteresting tales of her domestic life -- not quite what the title implies, either.

   The foreward states, in a fit of honesty that apparently didn't make it to either the title or back-cover copy, that Hahn was under contract to write a memoir, and instead, since she had already been paid and didn't much feel like writing anything more, took a bunch of her old New Yorker clippings and sent them in to her publisher. Anyhow, it certainly shows.

   I had heard of Hahn before, and was interested in reading about her China exploits in particular. One could understand, then, that I would be quite chagrined to find that fully the first half of the book is taken up with boring childhood reminiscences of St. Louis and Chicago, and that the last few stories are set once Hahn has become safely re-domiciled in NYC, and concern similarly banal domestic issues.

   This is not to say that there is no merit whatsoever in the book. At least a few of the stories are good and interesting: one or two about her life in the Congo, one about the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong, another two about Shanghai and her opium addiction. But even, with these, her writing style is usually so insubstantial, so affectedly flaky, like Dorothy Parker after a partial lobotomy or a teenaged girl dumbing it down so the boys like her, that I would in all likelihood not have liked this book had it been what its title and packaging claimed it to be.

   This book is mostly just a collection of irrelevant, poorly written prose that was slapped together to pay the bills. The publisher should have demanded his money back.




3. In his lively and evocative Introduction to this book, Hahn biographer Ken Cuthbertson says that Emily Hahn "moved from here to there to everywhere, like some sort of multi-colored and quixotic literary butterfly" for around forty-seven years. Sheila McGrath, in her Foreword, looks through a different lens, seeing "an inborn and unyielding independence that must have been difficult to maintain," a wholly original woman who traveled, had adventures, made friends, and wrote about all of it with an unflagging energy and dedication. She lived exactly as she chose to, for her entire long life.

   This book is a collection of essays that Hahn herself assembled in 1970, in order to fulfill a commitment she'd made to a publisher to produce an autobiography, which she was loathe to write, according to Cuthbertson. There are several delightful pieces on Hahn's good childhood and school days in the American midwest, and then the rest bright and incredible travel pieces - letters home, really - that appeared in The New Yorker magazine, from 1937 to 1970. (One describes a cross-country trip she and a friend made one summer during the '20's, as undergraduates, in a Model T). Artful and sensitive ordering of these pieces supplies the reader with a chronology. Unfortunately, the pieces are undated, so you must guess as to date of writing, and date of publication.

   Hahn's adventures and quirky and strong views are fabulous and charming - and quaint at times. From "The Big Smoke": "Though I had always wanted to be an opium addict, I can't claim that as a reason I went to China." She supplies a witty and thorough description of how she did it. (And later, of how she kicked the habit.) In other venues she had a pet gibbon named Mr. Mills, she lived in the jungle for a while, and was literally trapped in Shanghai for a spell. Amazing things, reported in a calm - but playful - voice. The people she met and got to know are drawn less fully than her escapades. You, in turn, never really get to know them, either.

   Hahn does not go deep so much as range far and wide. She has a great ear, an even better eye, and is fearless. That she reported so dryly and well on her doings in the US, the Congo, China, Japan, England and Europe is the icing on the cake. A very good and atmospheric read.




4. 'Emily Hahn was an original--a first-generation feminist who chose not to be called one, a woman of courage who constantly underplayed it, a reporter of the acts of men and animals, whose peculiar likeness she grasped perhaps better than any other writer of her time. Above all, she was a prose stylist, a plain writer whose simplicities are never simple, and whose every sentence ends with a sharp, clean bite. Her (beautifully) episodic memoirs can stand alongside those of M. F. K. Fisher, who she in so many ways resembled, as a model of clarity, precision, calm sensuality, carefully weighed sadness.' --Adam Gopnik, New Yorker writer

No comments about Brodsky: A Personal Memoir.

3 comments about Natalie Scott: A Magnificent Life.

1. Natalie Scott was one of the best newspaperwomen in America and spearheaded a colony of intellectuals who gathered in New Orleans' French Quarter during the 1920s. She also was a war nurse, awarded France's highest medal for bravery after rescuing patients from a bombed medical building, as well as a celebrated journalist and socialite. Any collection strong in New Orleans history or women's biography will find this an excellent survey of the vivid life and accomplishments of Natalie Scott.



2. If the U.S. needs a positive role model for it's young women (and it does!), this thoughtful, well-written story offers it. Seriously, put this book in their hands!
   
   This is an elegant biography that is written with the clear intention of spreading the warmth of a kind and exceptional soul. Natalie's Scott's life was not only an adventure, it was a force. It began on the Gulf Coast of Mississippi and spanned the globe.
   
   Being from the Louisiana, I have always reveled in the unique strength, grace, and humor that so many of the women I know carry. Natalie seems to be an epitome of this. From nursing soldiers through both World Wars, riding a horse alone North to South through Mexico, to being the hidden thread between many famous writers and artists that you know by name, this woman was quite a character.
   
   The book reads like a story and much of it includes her own words, as she was a storyteller herself. Alot of great first-hand history is offered as well, from the origins of the French Quarter as we know it today to the early days of Mexican ethnography.
   
   This was an outstanding read and I highly recommend it.



3. This book was recommended to me by my daughter and I finished it this morning. What a wonderful story, one that entertains but also ingrains eternal lessons. Natalie Scott was a war hero in both world wars...the only American woman in World War I to win the Croix de Guerre, France's great medal for heroism in combat. An author, playwright, actress, newspaperwoman and columnist in New Orleans, Natalie's French Quarter companions of the 1920s included friends like young William Faulkner, Sherwood Anderson, Lyle Saxon, Frans Blom, William Spratling, Roark Bradford, among numerous writers, novelists, artists, anthropologists etc. Here she opened a boarding house for writers and authors in a broken down mansion on Pirate's Alley, became a central figure in publishing the colorful Double Dealer magazine, co-founded the most successful experimental theater in America (La Petit Theatre du Vieux Carre), while traveling and writing her newspaper column and articles from all over the world.
   Taxco, Mexico became her home by 1930. Here her friends and co-workers on the Mexican Folkways magazine included great talents such as Diego Rivera, David Siqueiros, Roberto Montenegro, Katherine Anne Porter, Miguel and Rosa Covarrubias, Rufino Tamayo, etc. But she made a more important legacy among the impoverished people of Taxco where she opened a school and medical cooperative for the children there. Her home and bedroom became the sanitary spot for local women to give birth to their babies, Natalie serving as mid-wife. As an anthropologist and adventurer during the 1930s, she led horseback expeditions for museums over thousands of miles into the most remote regions among the indians of Mexico's mountain ranges and jungles. Here she also opened a pension for writers and authors taking refuge in beautiful, remote Taxco where she continued her literary influence and school for the balance of her life.
   In WW II, Natalie was back in the war zone with our soldiers and wounded; she served with our troops in Africa, Europe, and Asia. Her Red Cross mobile field hospital (she was nurse and translator)was part of America's invasion forces that invaded Germany in 1945. She led the Red Cross unit in Seoul,Korea until 1948. Then she returned to her children and school in Taxco for the final decade of her life where she devoted herself among the impoverished locals while also the center of a colorful world of visiting celebrities (writers, Hollywood figures, and painters, among many others).
   This biography of Natalie Scott utilizes the author's vivid narrative permeated with letters and writings of Natalie Scott to build a picture so complete that the reader comes to know the woman body and soul. Writer John Ed Bradley describes the book this way on the dustcover: "This is a winning and long overdue portrait of an ungorgettable American, told with relish by a writer clearly enthralled by his subject."
   I agree and heartily recommend the book.

5 comments about Home and Away: Memior of a Fan.

1. Home and Away : Memoir of a Fan is a great book and not just for sports fans. Like Scott Simon I am a "Chicagoan Away" living in the Washington, DC area. He evoked the nostalgia and the connection of many a boy, and more than a few girls, to their hometown sports connections in their adult lives. Add to that, for Chicagoans, the bittersweet Chicago fan experience of intense loyalty through decades of defeat and disapointment.
   
   Like him, I was a northsider and a Cubs fan, though I spent a few contrary years as a White Sox fans. As a political appointee both at the federal level and for the Mayor of Chicago I experienced the collision of feelings and connections in a town that is both a sports and a political town. Like him, I experienced special connections to my father through sports, since we were both Northwestern alums. Unlike Scott I wasn't much of a sports fan, but it became a part of me nevertheless. It came up when I lobbied a Republican House Committee chair from Chicago, using the White Sox as a common reference point despite a wide gulf in our politics relating to civil rights issues. Home and Away is full of personal recollections both while he lived in Chicago and away when it allowed him to bridge differences that would've otherwise been enormous with sports recollections.
   
   He writes about sitting alone as a new Washingtonian in a largely gay steak house in DC and sharing the experience of a Chicago sports fan away from home with a stranger. I've been there, actually to the same restaurant. So many of us have made those sorts of connections. And while the Chicago experience is unique, the special feelings we develop for the sports teams that we follow in our youth keep us connected as we travel far away from our neighborhoods, literally or merely symbolically.
   
   He talks about Michael Jordan, a superstar and a Chicago winner standing above a lifetime of sports letdowns. He talks about the Mike Ditka's Bears who won the Superbowl in the 1980's and how it affected him (I worked for the Mayor at the time). I remember getting my hopes up, which Chicago fans do only cautiously, only to hear, while traveling in Japan, that after winning two playoffs, my Cubs were knocked out by the Padres. We revel in our winners, in sports and politics, though we will stand by our losers as well because we are Chicagoans. Is it any wonder that Barack Obama is our current political superstar!
   
   Scott Simon's writing is as personal as his pieces on NPR. He has just written a new novel, Windy City, about Chicago and its ethnic politics. It will feature a South Asian alderman who becomes acting Mayor in a turbulent time. Much like the death of Mayor Harold Washington that I lived through,though as an Asian American I must note that there have never been any Asian American aldermen, Congresspeople or state representatives in Illinois despite rapidly growing communities. I hope Scott is just a little ahead of reality. I can't wait to read it.



2. Scott Simon does an excellent job recreating the atmosphere in Chicago during his childhood, and up to the end of the Michael Jordan era.
   
   Having grown up there (10 years behind Scott), I could really relate to his storytelling and history. His vivid descriptions brought back lots of great memories.
   
   I enjoyed the way he tied the sports into larger issues going on in his life, in society, and in the world. I really got a good feeling how American sports create good will around the planet.
   
   This book is mandatory for any Chicago sports fan, and will be enjoyable for anyone who ever related to their father via sports.



3. Any sports fan (especially from the Chicago area) will definitely enjoy this story of growing up as a fan in Chicago. The only thing that keeps me from giving this book 4 stars is the inaccuracies. In several instances, Simon gives incorrect scores, dates and places. You would think it would be easy for someone in his position to have the correct info, so this unfortunately distracted me from an otherwise fine read.



4. I admit, as a transplanted Chicagoan and die-hard sports fan, its hard to be objective about this book. Scott Simon cleverly weaves his own personal remembrances of growing up in Chicago, into an historic timeline of sports and politics, which amounts to must read for anyone who wants a true glimpse into the soul of 'the city with big shoulders'.
   I laughed hard and often at the family anecdotes, its easy to see where Simon gets his sense of humor, thrilled at reliving the Cub season of '69 and saddened, once again, at Brian Piccolo's courageous battle with cancer.
   After finishing 'Home and Away', I was compelled to send copies to a few of my sports buddies...less fortunate souls having grown up in cities of less character.
   I am a fan of the city, its teams (except the Sox...go Cubbies), and this writer ,who embodies it all so well in this book.
   Bravo.



5. I picked up Home and Away because I like to read books on sports by sophisticated minds. And initially, I wasn't disappointed. Scott Simon delivers a vivid depiction of his childhood and his childhood love for sports, offering touching and revealing personal moments in the process. When he discusses his father and stepfather, we see the fan in a context larger than just the game, which I appreciated and admired.

   But after the stepfather's criminal conviction, the narrative transitions into the story of the recent Bulls dynasty. Here is where book's self-indulgent love for Chicago turns to insufferable, sentimental cheese. In addition to slathering extra layers of sentimental goo on the Bulls--more than Simon previously appropriated for either Butkus's or Ditka's Bears--Simon covers ground already covered expertly and thoroughly by David Halberstam in Playing for Keeps. Only unlike Halberstam, Simon all but kisses Michael Jordan's behind, assessing no blame and even offering excuses for the star's occasional bad behavior. To me, the blatant sycophancy (is that a word?) on the part of the author makes me wonder if he willfully compromised his journalistic integrity or if that occurrence was inadvertant. Either way, I was thoroughly disappointed and had to stop reading. As do most Chicagoans, Simon simply got unBearably self-indulgent in his love for his city.

3 comments about A Late Education: Episodes in a life.

1. Alan Moorehead was a war correspondent during WW2 and since authored a number of fine documentary works, including the White Nile, Gallipoli, and many more. In this book he recounts episodes from his fascinating vocation, mostly from around WW2, but the book is also a heartfelt memoir of a life long relationship with a dear friend and colleague. The stories include some excellent commentary his journalistic approach, and give a glimpse of his fantastic writing career, developing from a mildly uninspired Australian schoolboy into one of the finest documentary authors of the 20th century.
   
   Alan Moorehead has the uncanny ability to keep the reader's eyes glued to the pages. He is enormously satisfying and enjoyable to read. He must have been a person of great compassion and intelligence, and I imagine him being moved by a unflinching desire to search for and faithfully report the truth.



2. To the other glowing reviews I can only add that it's worthwhile for the piece about Hemingway alone. The final chapter was emotionally wrenching and unforgettable



3. I got into Alan Moorehead by picking up an old Penguin edition of A Late Education second-hand at South Melbourne market. Since then, I've read more, and it seems to me that Moorehead is one of the great prose stylists of the 20th Century. The Australian Moorehead was a war correspondent in Europe during the Spanish Civil War and WWII. This is an account of Moorehead's friendship with another young war correspondent, Alex Clifford, throughout the North African and Western European campaigns, and after the war, up to Clifford's untimely early death. It is a fascinating portrait of young journalists thrown into adventure and danger, and of a unique friendship that grew as a result. As such, it's a kind of mix of The English Patient and Salvador - and very well written.

2 comments about Southern Daughter: The Life of Margaret Mitchell and the Making of <I>Gone With the Wind</I>.

1. At 463 pages, "Southern Daughter" is definitely a well-researched and informative biography. However, the barrage of dates, facts and other figures take away from a smooth, enjoyable reading experience and makes it hard to get through the book at times. My advice is read this book only if you are extremely curious about the life of Margaret Mitchell or have to do research on the topic. Otherwise, look for a more reader-friendly biography.



2. The research is well done but there are too many details repeated. I would have enjoyed it more if it were condensed at least 30 per cent.