5 comments about Why Sinatra Matters.

1. Another masterpiece by Hamill. This work reveals the humanity of Sinatra. It is short, but oh soooooo good! If you are interested in Sinatra, read this book. It is sophisicated and loaded with the nuances of the man who did it his way, faults, bruises, and all.



2. This is a small book. Short and sweet. Mr. Hamill gets right to the point . There isnt a lot of fluff in this book. A few pictures and so anecdotes to start some of the chapters. It written well and the layout is succint. This is a must read for any Sinatra fan.



3. Ironic that Pete Hamill should write this book. To my ears and eyes, Pete Hamill has never written a sincere or honest word in his life.
   
   The irony is that when Sinatra was asked how he wanted to be remembered, he said he would want people to think of him as an honest singer.
   
   The book is good, but read it with a grain of salt due to the author.



4. I like this book because it isn't like all the other Sinatra biographies out there. In fact, it isn't really appropriate to call "Why Sinatra Matters" a biography at all. Author Pete Hamill was an acquaintance of Sinatra's and much of the book is built around conversations that the two men had together, which is very interesting. This book gives a general overview of Sinatra's upbringing and rise to stardom. Hamill explains how Sinatra's childhood and Italian American background contributed to the development of his music. Sinatra's "fall from grace" is also examined, but Hamill is quick to point out that the only thing that really matters is that Sinatra was able to overcome his obstacles and make an incredible comeback. There has never been another singer like Frank Sinatra and there never will be again. Sinatra continues to represent so many things to so many people, which is why his music will live on forever.



5. Many of the basic,well known aspects of FS's life are mentioned here, starting with the Genoan and Sicilian branches of his family history, his quiet father and brash, Democratic Ward Leader mother. The segment on Bing Crosby's huge influence on 1930's popular culture, especially in the new radio-centered family (like TV today) is great, and perhaps not known too much today. FS as an icon for immigrant Italians, along with LaGuardia and DiMaggio, is also a high point. The days with James and Dorsey are also well done, if rehashes, like much of this otherwise excellent book. And much is written about FS's legendary "Fall" and 2nd Rise, the Fall being among the most overdone of FS's incredible life.(Many would love to fall from such Olympian heights!). Mr. Hamill says that the music is what matters. Obviously, he's right! Only Frank could sing so well about the depths of anguish and despair, as well as the thrill of triumph! The author also gives a nice summation of the great work of FS with Nelson Riddle. Unfortunately, short shrift is given to Billy May, and a short paragraph mocks the "sugary" work of Gordon Jenkins. Oddly, the most famous pairing of Jenkins and FS, "September of My Years" is listed in the appendix as among Mr. Hamill's favorite albums! It would have been nice if a CD was included,since this book does not really mine the golden depths of FS's best recordings. Still, all in all, a fine and succinct presentation of The Man and His Music.

5 comments about My Twice-Lived Life: A Memoir.

1. After reading Tuesdays With Morrie by Mitch Albom, I found myself wanting more of the same type of novel and with that I stumbled upon My Twice-Lived Life. Being in my mid-40's, my mind set has started to wander about what lies ahead. Mr. Murray has done a tremendous job capturing not only his life but thought process. It's very easy to read, as the sub title chapter are carefully arranged. His sense of humor is comforting as he puts everything into proper prospective. Anyone looking for answers about aging should read this masterpiece. I loved every page and know I'll reread this treasured novel again and again. I can't wait to give it to my mother-in-law to read.



2. Look out Mitch.....you and Tuesdays with Maury are about to be replaced. Dr. Murray delivers his book even better than he did in the classroom. As a former student of his....this book made me laugh....brought a tear to my ear and a lump to my throat. First he taught me to write. Now he teaches me about life as we all face growing older. Thank you for a great read!!



3. I got to know Donald Murray's writing while living in Massachusetts in the mid-90s. Ever since, I've read his Boston Globe column online, and almost always forward it to people I know, from my teenage son to my father in his 80s. I keep hoping the columns will be collected in a book. In the meantime, there's this wonderful memoir. There is more wisdom in a Donald Murray column than in most of the rest of the paper put together, but it's not WISDOM, delivered from on high and meant to make you feel inadequate. He's had a mixed life - a ghastly childhood, wartime service, professional failure and success, profound grief, enduring friendships, a satisfying marriage - but the book is not just a collection of "and then I" passages. Murray conveys so well how the past is always present, how it can be seen more clearly from the distance that decades provide, and how old age is enriched by that clarity, even as one deals with the inevitable losses and physical decline. His style is conversational-seeming, but without the extraneous matter true conversation always has. The passages about being bullied in boyhood are heartbreaking because there is no anger in his account. He doesn't need to express it; the reader will be furious on his behalf. Murray is a teacher of writing, and as a writer, I find his books on the subject are well worth reading (wish I could have studied with him). Readers will learn a great deal about good writing from "My Twice-Lived Life," as well as a great deal about living.



4. My Twice-Lived Life has long been in the making. Murray's first idea was to publish a collection of his Boston Globe columns that dealt with aging, the Depression, and World War II. His editor convinced him to look at the subject matter as a memoir, whole and of itself. Good idea.

   I've read most of Murray's Boston Globe columns. It is often amazing what he does with these 800 word personal essays. But the memoir gives him more room to explore and develop his subject matter.

   We're used to Murray writing about writing. There is a little of that woven throughout the chapters in My Twice-Lived Life. But writing isn't his primary topic here. He writes about the stuff of his life---his childhood, his parents, and World War II, in which he was a paratrooper.

   One chapter is titled "The Not-So-Good-Old School Days." I'll use this chapter with my students at Miami University who are studying to be English teachers. In direct opposition to those who deify some past golden time of schooling, Don recounts his own school days and deromantizes that myth. He speaks of teachers today, how they seek further learning in summer programs and professional development, and he writes about how he came to teaching writing.

   All those chapters were good reading, but the really courageous chapters are about aging. His wife, Minnie Mae, has had serious medical problems with Parkinson's, diabetes, and breast cancer. Don writes about these times of increasing care-taking clearly, compassionately, and unsentimentally.

   In "Fatherhood" he ends the chapter by focusing on the death of his 20 year old daughter of Reyes' Syndrome in the late 1970s. Many of us know bits of this story, because those bits have worked themselves into Don's textbooks and columns, but here we get the most complete rendering and sense-making of that story, including one poem he wrote of Lee's passing.

   In the last two chapters Don writes about the extended dying of a neighbor, what he learned as nurses and one doctor tended to her and touched her and helped her to let go. I wished I'd had this book to read two years ago during the time my mother slipped away gradually and inexorably.

   A friend of mine in Utah used to say of such writing, "That's it. Write about the tough stuff."

   Don Murray does that in My Twice-Lived Life. Reading it made me want to live life well, fully attuned to my senses, aware of the compassionate stories around me, learning how I might approach the coming years with courage and caring and humor.




5. Some books are easy reads, some books are hard reads. What you get from a book is not necessarily a function of the difficulty of the read.

   Donald Murray gives you with his memoir an easy read, yet a rewarding feast. Counter to what he may think, his memoir is not about aging, it is about life.

   With people much younger than myself, I have read chapters of this book, and listened to chapters read to me. Treasure pieces about fear, hope, solitiude, and union with family and friends.

No comments about Jeanne Calment: From Van Gogh's Time to Ours, 122 Extraordinary Years.

2 comments about My America: What My Country Means to Me, by 150 Americans from All Walks of Life.

1. It wasn't as impactful as I thought it would be. Some of the people that gave comments gave some great comments and others, well, other gave comments. The selection of people was a good cross section but it didn't have meaning to it. I was looking for more in depth commentary. Maybe what I was looking for should have been said between each of the comments in the book. It might have looked like hugh just collected a bunch of email and old letters and thrown them together.



2. My America by Hugh Downs

   My America by Hugh Downs is a collection of 150 brief, one page or so on the average, comments on 'what America means to me.' Selected by invitation, these individuals express their patriotic feelings with stories or straightforward editorial comments. I have found nothing surprising. If you ask a handful of elite individuals who have already succeeded in their chosen profession in any country, you will find similar outburst of patriotic feelings.

   Missing in this book are the views and feelings of ordinary citizens. In my opinion America is a great country for ordinary people-like a man from India who came to this country because he knew this is where even poor people are fat, have television sets in the living room, microwave ovens in the kitchen and cars in the driveway, if not in the garage.

   Those who have made in any society will feel good about themselves and the society, but what about those who have not yet made? If Mr. Downs included the voices of another 150 ordinary citizens in his book, the book would have been much better reading.

   Of the 150 comments, the one story that touched me most deeply was the one by Pete Hamil, a journalist, an author and a descendant of an Irish immigrant. When he was a boy, he witnessed in the dark of the night his father weeping from physical pain. The stump of his ruined leg was covered with blisters caused by the heat wave. And yet, in the morning, his father went to work in the factory where there were concrete floors but no air-conditioning. He went to work because he was an American allowed to work without being asked about his religion, his family history, or his political beliefs.

   He writes, "Some Americans might be stirred into love of country by the sight of B-52 vapor trails. I prefer the image of a young Mexican-American woman in cap and gown, surrounded by weeping parents and aunts and uncles and brothers and sisters, walking into an early summer afternoon, clutching a diploma. In that moment, she honors her family. She honors mine too, and all those where a parent once wept in the dark. Above all, she honors America."

No comments about The Confessions of Jean Jacques Rousseau Volume 1 [EasyRead Large Edition].

5 comments about American Sphinx: The Character of Thomas Jefferson.

1. Absolute claptrap from a morally bankrupt excuse of a human being who cannot find his niche in his pathetic underachieving life. He resorts to "tabloid" history, finding it makes up for his inability to do real research or be able to critically evaluate it. His personal ability to read into the heart and motivations of the founding fathers is ridiculous.
   Save your money and buy a real book by a real historian. The more read you are on one of his "targets", the more you will find his writing vacant. He must have worked for the enquirer.



2. This book is quite pleasing, it is well argued and well written. If you like "juicy" biographies full of details and trivia you will be disappointed, nonetheless, it still has a wealth of biographical data that makes the book interesting and instructive. The main focus of the book is on Jefferson's achievements and legacy. The man (Jefferson) was an intellectual colossus and was never short on peculiar and original ideas; he remains an icon for all Americans that are wary of big government and all Americans that defend the sovereignty of the individual. I am glad I picked up this book as my starter on Jefferson.



3. A common theme amongst many reader reviews that appeared to be neophytes to American history was that this book is painfully slow and lacking a compelling narrative. While I disagree with the former claim, I agree with the latter. I believe this is a book that best serves more ardent students of history who've already studied Jefferson and are more than willing to wade through a lot of uneventful anecdotes to get to know the man better, which Ellis does a great job on the subjects he covers except Jefferson's position on religion - so for those that want to go deep into history, this is a very interesting, worthy book. Ellis purposefully strips out much of the narrative by design, it is a character analysis (see subtitle of book for goodness sakes!), and therefore a narrative would threaten the very purpose of the book.
   
   Ellis' Jefferson comes off as perfectly brilliant, utopian, progressive, somewhat dogmatic, impractical, subversive, and most importantly - all too human. Ellis does a wonderful job of describing the events where Jefferson was obviously on the wrong side of history as we look back in time - e.g., Jefferson's belief that the states would better defend individual liberty rather than the federal government, especially the Supreme Court which has ultimately become our greatest defender, along with eloquently analyzing his greatest accomplishments and contributions to mankind. Ellis brings Madison and Adams into this study in just the right amounts to provide an understanding of how Jefferson interacted with the other framers along with how Jefferson viewed the Revolution and ratification of the Constitution vs. their very different perspectives.
   
   Ellis's treatment of Jefferson's contributions to promoting the limits of government and its obligation to defend its citizens' liberty rights was well covered from a philosophical perspective but completely lacking from a constitutional perspective. While Ellis covered Jefferson's firm position on the importance of secular government if men were to fully enjoy liberty was noted, this analysis was all too brief given the current times where the religious right continuously mischaracterize Jefferson's position on religious freedom, e.g., President Bush's 2008 Independence Day speech is a good example of a modern day character distorting Jefferson's writings to achieve a political objective perfectly contrary to Jefferson's clearly stated position. Given that Jefferson believed that individual freedom is only possible with a secular government with zero evidence to date he was incorrect; Ellis shortchanges his readers by not spending more time on this critical contribution, especially given Jefferson's radical position, and in hindsight his genius on this subject. In fact, Jefferson's position is still so radical there is no way a modern-day politician could espouse views like Jefferson's and get elected in America.
   
   Ellis also leaves out some out critical time periods in Jefferson's life, like Jefferson's second term as President. Given the paperback's main body comes in at 367 pages, I felt one hundred fifty more pages to include more on Jefferson's religious viewpoints and his second presidential term was well deserved given the importance of Jefferson relative to America's founding ideals passed down by him and the other framers.



4. I am a well educated person with a particular interest in Jefferson. I was amazed at the assertion by Ellis that Jefferson formed the republican party. The republican party was not established until 1854. The party the Jefferson formed evolved into the democratic party. Are we living in the soviet union now? if you don't like real history you just change it. How do I get my money back on his piece of crap book? I knew this guy has a history of stretching the truth but I didn't know it went this far!



5. I thoroughly enjoyed Professor Ellis's book about that enigmatic man: Thomas Jefferson. It is not a biography of Jefferson nor is it a complete history and those of us who want to know more about this period in American history will need to look to other sources.
   
   For me, the value of this book is the articulation of some of the perceived contradictions between Jefferson's idealism and his actions as a man of his time. Regardless of Jefferson's likeability as a man, he had a profound influence over the shape of the emerging American republic. In exploring the character of Thomas Jefferson, Professor Ellis provides an historical and social context as a prism through which to view the man and his actions. It is ironic that a man with the vision to work with others to set in place the foundations of a great nation was unable to manage his own affairs so successfully. Public life is so often accompanied by significant personal cost.
   
   It may be true that `The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.' I doubt that in 1787, when Jefferson uttered those words, he could foresee how thirsty the tree of liberty would prove to be.
   
   Jennifer Cameron-Smith

No comments about Vet in the Vestry (Thorndike Press Large Print Basic Series).

5 comments about Educating Alice: Adventures of a Curious Woman.

1. If you love to travel, love to learn, or love great writing, Educating Alice: Adventures of a Curious Woman, is just the book for you. Pulitzer Prize winner Alice Steinbach quit her job as a journalist to pursue her dream of combining travel and learning. She spent eighteen months taking breathtaking trips and seeing the world in ways few of us will ever be able to emulate. When she returned, she wrote a memoir of her experiences. Readers share her adventures as she takes lessons and courses in gourmet cooking at the Hotel Ritz in Paris, Japanese culture in Kyoto, art at the British Institute in Florence, the life of Jane Austen in Winchester and Exeter, art and architecture in Havana, gardening in Provence, writing in Prague, and Border collie training in Scotland.
   
   I love all traveling, learning and great writing, and I love this book for many more reasons:
   
   Steinbach's mastery of the writing craft is evident in every story. Although each trip is an independent story capable of standing alone and she gives no details of her life before, between, or after these trips, she quilts them together into a unified account with the thread of her evolving long-distance relationship with a Japanese widower she met on a train in France sometime before this story began. She lets us glimpse flashes of intimacy in fragments of letters to him. Thoughts of him twinkle like fireflies throughout, and we meet him in person in Kyoto.
   
   Steinbach attracts spontaneous adventures that supplement her planned activities, adding depth and intrigue to her tales. In Kyoto she is unexpectedly able to meet and interview geishas. In Florence she wanders into an old church and is drawn into the mystery of the flood that nearly destroyed it. The life of a Jewish girl who perished in the Holocaust intrigues her in Prague. Twining serendipity and mystery with the predictable adds spice to what could be a bland tale.
   
   Everyone has experienced flashes of memory that pop into awareness at the strangest provocation. Steinbach's stories glitter with such sequins, recalling moments with her dearly beloved grandmother, a woman of style and dash, and moments with her mother. These personal anecdotes endear Steinbach to me, revealing her own personality and humanity.
   
   Steinbach herself emerges gradually into view as the stories continue. I felt as if I were seeing the view from behind her eyes, listening to the conversation she carried on with herself inside her head. She shares her reactions to things she sees, and describes the memories they evoke. She writes as freely of words uttered by her "thinking voice" as she does of spoken dialog. She's a master of metaphor and simile, using phrases such as, "If Louisa Jones were a garden, she would be the garden of the Martin-Ragets."
   
   A writer myself as well as a leader of writing workshops, I was especially drawn to the section on Prague. Steinbach had little good to say about the writing workshop she took there, finding it intimidating and less than helpful. It seems the participants felt an obligation to tear apart each other's work rather than suggesting ways of building on what was working. Though she never directly states this, the chapter is a strong warning to be careful where and with whom you study writing and avoid competitive critiquing.
   
   Steinbach's work sizzles with rhythm and a variable beat. This is no formula travelogue. On some trips, she goes into detail about the tribulations she overcame to get there. On others, she starts further into the trip and works her way back. She generally, but not always, follows a chronological approach within each story. The constants throughout are the memory sprinkles and juicy descriptions.
   
   This book went beyond teaching me all sorts of exotic and fascinating tidbits about life and history in far-flung places, and inspired me to seek nontraditional ways of learning in my own travels. It nudged my imagination to new levels as I think about creatively compiling assorted memories around a theme. Now I'm eager to backtrack and read her two earlier works, Without Reservations: The Travels of an Independent Woman and The Miss Dennis School of Writing and Other Lessons From a Woman's Life.
   
   by Sharon Lippincott
   for Story Circle Book Reviews
   reviewing books by, for, and about women



2. I have been reading Educating Alice at night before I go to sleep. The chapters about studying in Paris, Japan, and Italy were interesting enough to keep me awake for a while. I love the writing about Cuba because I know nothing about that country. However, I'm on the section about the gardens of Provence. I've been stuck here for a while, and I'm having no trouble sleeping now! Alice takes all of these classes around the world, but none seem related. I'm wondering why we should care about these classes. I wish she would have focused on her relationship with Naohiro, her romance from the first book. Her adventures weren't as exciting as the first book.



3. I enjoy reading travel writing. I am an arm chair world traveler, knowing one day, I too will be fortunate enough to write my own travel memoirs.
   I enjoyed this authors approach to travel, since I too, love to learn new things, why not incorporate the two, travel and learning together. I was encouraged by how open and responsive people were to her visits and to her questions. I could only hope that people would be so receptive to me while traveling-of course she opened herself up to strangers and I would guess it was her "good-naturedness" and postive and humble demeanor that drew people to her as well.
   I could have done without the sentimental flashbacks and even more sentimental love letters to her friend, but that is just me. Overall, I enjoyed reading about Ms Steinbachs travels and experiences.



4. I enjoyed reading Alice Steinbach's "Without Reservations" immensely that I looked forward to reading this book with the same intensity, but I became disappointed with it towards the middle of the book and I even skipped some of the later chapters because it was making me sleep. I am reading her first book though, "The Miss Dennis School of Writing and Other Lessons from a Woman's Life", which is a collection of her articles in the Baltimore Sun.



5. I too really enjoyed Without Reservations, however, this book is Borrrinnng. I suppose her list of things to do/learn is vastly different than mine. She definitely has a Jones for the Ritz [in both books], which does nothing for me. I love Jane Austen, but have no interest in the all-things-Jane vigil. Gardens in Provence? I did enjoy the Havana story, but still am unsure how she went from the states to Cuba...I thought this wasn't legal. Upon reading other reviews right now, I've decided to skip her holocaust non-fiction writing [nothing like an American going to "holocaust country" and writing a story. sheesh.], and the apparently ever so REALLY boring sheep herding education.

5 comments about No More Words: A Journal of My Mother, Anne Morrow Lindbergh.

1. Reeve surely has Ann's gene for writing. This book should be read by all who still have parents alive and will be faced with their eventual death and by those who have already lost a loved one. Alzheimers and dimentia are a death before dying. It is hardest on those left behind and gilt and worry are only some of the emotions one has to deal with during the dying process. Reeve caught the essence of her mother and was fortunate to be able to have 24/7 caregivers to help her through this ordeal.
   This book is a tribute to Ann and to Reeve's Sister.



2. This is a touching memoir of the time when Reeve Lindbergh was helping to take care of her aging mother, the famous Anne Morrow Lindbergh in the last year(s) of her life. This book is a look inside the private lives of a very well known family during a difficult transition in their lives.
   
   The story is about how Reeve is trying to make sense of this time. It contains her thoughts and reflections and fears about the change in her mother's condition. I appreciate the honesty in which this book is written, I feel like the author held nothing back in relating her story. I was surprised and delighted at the openness of it. She wrote about things in dealing with this situation that people think, but would rarely admit to.
   
   I found this book to be very comforting, as I recently experienced a similar situation in my own family. There were so many times, as I read this, I was shaking my head thinking....I know exactly what you're saying. Throughout the ordeal, there are sad times, but there were also light and funny times as well. Dealing with the aging and decline of a loved one that you have known so well all of your life is difficult. They change, and when it happens, we don't always know how to deal with it or what to think, and we wonder what they are thinking. It's hard and it's confusing when you are trying to guess at what is going on in their world. Reeve writes beautifully about it all.
   
   I had not picked this book with the intention of experiencing what I did...the comfort of reading about someone else going through a similar situation as me. I initially picked this book because I love Anne Morrow Lindbergh's book 'Gift of the Sea' and I wanted to read more about her life. Once again, as I am a firm believer of...the right books come along at just the precise moment that we need them and so often they come in an unexpected way as this one did for me.



3. Reeve Lindberg has succeeded in giving us a marvelous journey through the last two years of her mother's life. It is also a very helpful description of what it is to deal with someone who is deep in the fog of an Alzheimer's like state. I plan to give copies to many of my friends, most especially those with elderly parents. Reeve's language is lovely and crisp in the strokes of its portraits. It is easy to see she that is her mother's daughter. I am so happy to have discovered this book and I would recommend it to anyone who is seeing or will see an elderly parent or friend through his or her last days and months. Tasha Halpert



4. This is a fast reading book concerning Mrs. Charles Lindbergh's last few years of life. Written by youngest Lindbergh sibling, Reeve, she tells of living on her own farm in Vermont, with a smaller house on the property her mother lived in during that time. Reeve Lindbergh is a wonderful writer - she doesn't need the famous last name to prove that. When she isn't writing about her mother, which is riveting for some reason, her writing of anything else in the book has such a fresh, emotional spirit behind her words. Anne Morrow Lindbergh, a legend in her own time both in flying, her husband, and her many published works, did not talk much in her last years. It is a story of how the family felt and coped with her condition, letting go of the vibrant mother they once knew. An excellent book for those who have been a caregiver to a parent or sibling. Anne M.L. was such a famous figure, it was both interesting and heartwrenching to have the privilege of reading about her day to day living. Thank you, Reeve Lindbergh, for sharing this story that you could have kept to yourself, but chose to share. It's a book that will be remembered long after it's read.



5. I have read Reeve Lindbergh's work before in her memoir, "Under A Wing". I was surprised at her candor regarding her father, and what was equally clear was her fondness for her mother. "No More Words", which records the last 17 trying and rewarding months of her mother's life, is a tender tribute that is notable for what it includes and for what it omits.

   The only photograph of Mrs. Lindbergh is the one that appears on the cover. The photograph depicts a young woman at the start of what would prove to be a life as fascinating as it was lengthy. The closing months of this woman's life are chronicled above all else with a great deal of respect. This is a most private family event, and just as the book is devoid of any pictures for the voyeur, the narrative too is informative without taking away any of the dignity of her mother. This would seem to be an obvious manner to write of one's parent, but a person does not have to look far to find books written with sales as the first goal, and exploitation of the subject left unconsidered.

   Reeve Lindbergh is a poet, she is reflective, and these aspects of her personality provide a narrative that is unique. This book is not simply a diary; it is not a chronological description of the systematic health decline of her mother. It is more of a story that is driven by the limited interactions she was able to have with her mother, and the memories that were either hers or recollections of her mother's life. This is not a sugarcoated story of what was a very trying time. The book is a balanced memoir about how difficult it is to deal with not only the death of a parent, but also the very real difficulties and frustrations that caring for an elderly, ill parent involves. Mrs. Lindbergh had the best care available which took much of the moment-to-moment care off of the family. It did not remove many of the difficulties, and the reader can easily imagine what it would entail to care for a parent with little, or no outside help.

   This is a very contemplative book that moves at an associated pace.

5 comments about The Way You Wear Your Hat: And the Lost Art of Livin'.

1. Great book, fast reading, it had to be a great life. What this book does is it describes what it was like to be a man before the days of sensitivity training, and equality for all...



2. This is a great book; I echo all those positive reviews that came before. But it left me seriously jonesing for a guide like this for women. I really wish there were a parallel book for us dames. Does anyone know of a biography or a guide that looks at "the lost art of livin' life" for my gender?? **Please** let me know.



3. This is a fun read. It's not really biographical; simply a collection of anecdotes and memories that paint a picture of a man over the years. I get a real sense of Frank Sinatra -- we all knew him, and yet perhaps no one really knew him at all.



4. This book takes a turn away from Sinatra the Musician, and focuses on Sinatra the Man. Sure, he had a temper. Which one of us doesn't? Sure, he made some mistakes in his life. Which one of us hasn't? The flaws that FS had were overshadowed by the good qualities, with one that stands out in particular - LOYALTY. He stood by his friends just as fiercely as he stood up to his enemies.
   
   This book doesn't take the angle of a biography like so many others do. It only gets into biographical details as they relate to how Frank lived his life. It's full of great stories told by his friends and family on how Frank lived his life. It was a different time, and while all the specifics may not apply to today, the ideals are still very relevant. Everybody should take a least a page from Frank's life through this book, and apply it to their own life.
   
   A flower's not a flower if it's wilted.
   A hat's not a hat 'till it's tilted.



5. I bought this book for my boyfriend. He loves Frank Sinatra. I gave it to him at Christmas along with a fedora (like Frank wears on the cover of the book). He read the whole book on Christmas. He said it was great!
   
   "Cock your hat- angles are attitudes"~Frank Sinatra