5 comments about Grayson.

1. This short novel transported me, and I read it straight through without stopping. It is a sweet and moving story that reminds us how fragile and delicate our relationship with the natural world is. I've given this book as a gift many times, and everyone I've recommended it to has enjoyed it immensely.



2. Reading "Grayson" is ....like Ms. Cox's 'Swimming to Antarctica" so wordy and stretched that the reader may give up before finishing. I did finish Grayson because I wanted to know the ending. I had even thought, when first reading, that I would give this book to my daughter who teaches Reading to fifth graders. But....I decided against it for the reason that I know they would love the first but really get bogged down before the final page. It's a great story but could have been condensed into perhaps 10 pages.



3. The book grayson, a true life story of a then seventeen year old woman who encounters a baby gray whale in the Pacific near Long Beach, is a story that is poetically and so beautifully told it will linger, I guarantee, in the mind of the reader for a long time, if not forever. This book, about interspecies communication is so beautifully written that I have nothing but admiration for the writer and her exquisite sensitivity. It is a story that is deeply philosophical in nature as the writer describes metaphorically her maintenance of personal positivity and her own soul desire to communicate with this whale and its lost mother. Can we communicate non verbally, with each other, with other species? Read this book and ponder deeply. I recommend this and hope you love it as much as I did and do!



4. Grayson, by Lynne Cox is a wonderful concise book with lots to say. There are three different story threads running through it. The smaller thread is about a girl athlete with lots of will and determination, and the second is a nature story about the sea animals in southern California and the third thread is the most moving. It is an inspirational story about a girl tiring to help a young baby whale finds its mother. It is a story for all ages. I'm 38 and I loved it, bought one for my 1st edition collection, and I bought another for my younger ten-year-old sister.



5. While listening to this tale as an audiobook, I was surprised to be sitting at the edge of my recliner! For a very simple premise, Lynne Cox crafted a plot with a lot of excitement.
   
   I was touched by the sense of communion between the human swimmer and the baby whale, each of them vulnerable and exposed.
   
   The communication and intelligence of the whales in this story, plus a mega-pod of dophins, made me think of the line, "Goodbye, and thanks for all the fish!" the title of Douglas Adams' fourth book in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series. (Where Wonko the scientist posits that dolphins were the actual creators of planet Earth.)
   
   I now own Grayson in an audio format and as a hardcover book, and I consider it a treasure.

5 comments about The Latehomecomer: A Hmong Family Memoir.

1. Very happy with my purchase and the timely fashion in which it arrived. Purchased several copies for a book club.



2. If you're Hmong, it's a must read. If you're not, it's still a must read.
   
   Why? Yang's writing style warms the heart and soul. The personal journey, the family journey, and the journey of reading this book will make many of us a better human being--for it reminds most of us of the things we forget: life is precious, family is precious, and the ability to turn one's dream (publishing the book) into a reality that others are touched by is too, precious...and priceless.
   
   Looking forward to the next book.
   
   Patch Xiong



3. The Latehomecomer: A Hmong Family Memoir
   
   The Latehomecomer: A Hmong Family Memoir
   
   The Hmong are an indigenous Lao people who were uprooted after the Vietnam War. Many of them immigrated to the upper Midwestern United States, where they encountered culture shock, rejection and sometimes violence. In her intimate memoir "The Latehomecomer: A Hmong Family Memoir" Kao Kalia Yang recounts her experiences coming to Minnesota in the 1970's. She and her sister spoke no English and couldn't read, so they were shunted from school to school. Her family was placed in a converted military barracks with other refugees. Relying on clan and family associations, they established their own diaspora. Food, clothing and transportation were in short supply.
   The experience of the Hmong mirrors that of many immigrants, from those who arrived from Russia, Poland and Ireland in the first wave of immigration in the last centtury to those now arriving from Mexico, El Salvador and the Caribbean.
   Like the second and third generation of other immigrants, the Hmong have established themselves in the professions, academia and business. Yang herself graduated from college and graduate school and has a start-up business providing service to other immigrants. She has written a heartfelt and moving memoir of her life as a refugee from the tropics of Southeast Asia to the snowswept prairies and lakes of Minnesota. I highly recommend her book, as well as "I Begin My Life All Over: The Hmong and the American Immigrant Experience."
   I Begin My Life All Over: The Hmong and the American Immigrant Experience



4. Living as a young child in a Hmong refugee camp in Thailand in the 1980s, Kao Kalia Yang says she "discovered the shapes of stories, how to remember them, and how to tell them." Her memoir, The Latehomecomer, is a heartrending account of those stories, from her parents and grandparents, aunts and uncles, cousins and siblings--a chronicle of a people who "had not had the opportunity to write their stories down" and whose history is shamefully absent from American accounts of the Vietnam War. The Latehomecomer is also an insightful narrative of Yang's own formation: an émigré becoming an American and a sad, silent child becoming a writer of remarkable wisdom.
   
   The Latehomecomer is a triumph--a testimony to the most beautiful and the most terrible of our humanity. Yang writes with the confidence of one who knows that her family's story is one worth telling. Her story is compelling in its scope of historical events alone. It is a must-read for its lucid portrayal of Hmong immigrants, the lasting effects of the Vietnam War, and the struggles of a people betrayed by our nation's failures during and after that war. But what makes Yang's memoir astonishingly beautiful is the rendering of those events by someone who has been learning from her first years of life how to be a truly gifted storyteller.



5. This is a stunning book, beautifully written by a courageous, young woman with incredible talent as a writer. The best non-fiction book I've read this year and I read a lot of them. Kalia shares the emotional and physical realities of her family's life in Laos during the secret war and the attempted genocide of her Hmong people, the difficulties of life as a refugee and the camps where they live, and the immigrant experience in adjusting to a very different life in America. Also a fascinating insight into the culture of a group that is overlooked in the immigrant stories and experience in the US.

5 comments about Priestblock 25487: A Memoir of Dachau.

1. This book hits the ground running and does not let up. It is in the form of a diary. It chronicles 18 months of the life of a priest become prisoner in a brutal and sadistic Nazi concentration camp. What makes it unforgettable is that it is not a work of fiction but rather true history. The story is not easily dismissed but rather lingers in the mind like smoke on a still evening. This book will change the way you see the world and yourself - at least it did for me.
   Very highly recommended for those how understand the value of history to understanding the present times.



2. 
   This Memoir of Father Jean Bernard grabs the reader's attention from the very first page.
   While rather brief (for a Memoir), it's packed with details; rather graphic.
   
   It forces the reader to grapple with the question, "What would I do in his situation?". - Not an easy question to answer.
   After six months, this reviewer is still wrestling with the question.
   
   The writing style is simple, direct and vivid.
   Fr. Bernard makes no attempt to spare the reader the horrors that he and and so many others had to endure; nor does he try to elicit empathy from the reader in his description of the hell in which he lived for 15 months.
   
   I've purchased four copies of "PRIESTBLOCK 25487", thus far; keeping one for myself and giving the others to friends. - One of which is a Catholic priest. I am looking forward to discussing Fr. Bernard's story with him.
   
   Fr. Bernard's Memoir is the inspiration for the movie, "The Ninth Day" aka "Der Neunte Tag", starring: Ulrich Matthes ("DOWNFALL") - Both were Excellent movies, by the way.
   
   This book is VERY HIGHLY RECOMMENDED to those interested in Concentration Camp Survivor stories/memoirs. - All of which are very important for educating our children as well as ourselves.
   
   It is this reviewer's most fervent hope that mankind never forget what those millions of dear and precious souls suffered because of hate and jealousy.
   
   Paradine



3. This book has become one of my favorites. It is a wonderful book that shows the hope that is always present in the face of evil. I highly recommend this book, you'll enjoy it.



4. Father Bernad's narrative, written shortly after the war, is especially effective in its understatement. Fr. Bernard was an intellectual but not a writer, and so his narrative, seeking to tell only the facts, without any embellishment (really, is anyone today capable of writing a narrative without clouding it with "it changed my life forever," "defined a generation," "horrific," and all the other assembly-line filler-phrases and adjectives?)is focused, tightly-constructive, and useful. Acquaintances speak of reading through Fr. Bernard's little book of daily life in a concentration camp in one sitting -- it really is that good.



5. This book brings the reader into the daily life of a priest who was imprisoned for speaking out against the Nazis. The cruelty and drudgery of camp life is vividly detailed in this diary and one cannot help but feel the reality of the events documented so well by Fr. Bernard.
   
   Of interest to those who are interested in the role of the Church during this time are the sections where life in the camp becomes harder for the priests when the Pope or a bishop publishes a percieved anti Nazi letter or sermon. This real life witness counters those trendy academic claims of Church complicity.

5 comments about Forward From Here: Leaving Middle Age--and Other Unexpected Adventures.

1. I usually try to read at least one book per week and, also, listen
   to one book on tape or CD . . . it was difficult to find the time to
   do the listening while away, so this past week I instead managed
   to read a second book . . . its review follows:
   
   Turning sixty is something I can relate to, in that I'll be celebrating
   that birthday next June.
   
   Anne Morrow Lindbergh in FORWARD FROM HERE describes
   how she went through a similar experience . . . as she enters
   the period her mother once described as "the youth of old
   age," the author details the many unexpected surprises
   she has encountered.
   
   Her observations were amusing at times, yet also
   oh-so-insightful--such as this one:
   
   * As I grew older and older, I got more used to the idea that death
   would happen to everybody, including me, but that in my case it
   would not happen for a very very very very long time. By the time it
   happened, I hoped, I would be so old that it wouldn't bother me. This
   is not quite true yet, but again, I think I may be getting there. I hope it
   takes me a while longer. There's no need to rush.
   
   As I journey on, I carry my lost loved ones with me: my sister, my mother,
   and all the others. I have learned over the years that I can do this, that
   love continues beyond loss. It continues not abstractly but intimately,
   and it continues forever. My experience has also made me understand
   that loss is inevitable, and that loss, too, continues forever, right along
   with love.
   
   I also liked what the author had to say about pets of all kinds . . . she
   devotes two chapters to birds . . . however, it was this observation
   about her dog that especially caught my attention:
   
   * Many of our visitors, seeing that we had a dog, entered the house
   with loud voices and waving hands, making a noisy fuss over him. This
   kind of behavior just caused the poor dog to slink off into a corner
   and stay there until the visitors left. Helen Wolff came in without
   commotion and then sat quietly and drank her tea, like the well-behaved
   guest that she was. The dog came over to greet her, eventually, sniffing
   her hand and wagging his tail, probably grateful for her good manners. She
   told me once that she felt it was better to let animals or children come
   to her, if they wished to, rather than the other way around.
   
   The part of FORWARD FROM HERE that most caught my attention
   was Lindbergh's account of how she discovered thirty years after
   the death of her father (famed aviator Charles Lindbergh) that
   he had three secret families in Europe . . . upon this discovery,
   she then went to meet them--discovering that her new extended
   family was far more complicated than she had ever imagined.



2. This is one of the best books that I've ever read. I've ordered others for my friends.



3. FORWARD FROM HERE will delight you if:
   
   --you remember with great fondness the writings of Reeve's mother, Anne Morrow. Making allowances for the generational differences, their styles and subjects are similar: family, nature, the written word per se, etc.
   
   --you have read and enjoyed Reeve's other books. I found her UNDER A WING more tightly focused and thus, to me, more engaging; and NO MORE WORDS more frank and moving. But FORWARD FROM HERE has much of the charm of a lovely, simple dessert,what Anne Morrow Lindbergh called "something sweet at the end of the day." I was happy to have this book waiting at my bedside table for several nights, and only wished it a little longer.
   
   --you are actively engaged in "moving forward" from 60-plus. The book deals honestly but cheerfully with a generous handful of the standard challenges of ageing. We are also offered time-tested insights on matters such as parenting, reading, writing, and modern drugs(pro and con).
   
   --you want to know a bit about Reeve's reactions to her father Charles Lindbergh's three secret simultaneous mistresses and families. (The "Lone Eagle" indeed!) Of course this long-hidden aspect of Charles Lingbergh's otherwise much-celebrated life might well be the subject of a complete and probing book of its own, written not out of prurience but with the intent to better understand the puzzling psychological and emotional temperament involved. But Reeve Lindbergh will not, I think, be the one to write such a book.



4. What a pleasure to read! I am not quite finished with this Kindle book and the more I read it, the more I'm enjoying it. Lindbergh is a sensitive, thoughtful, writer and I can relate to her experiences on so many levels. I, too, am a woman of a certain age, a mother, grandmother, potential (me, not her) writer. Her perspective on life, the natural world, her family just drew me in and I found myself wishing she were my friend.
   
   Thank you, Reeve, for a lovely reading experience. I'm recommending this for all my friends and if they don't buy it, they're getting a copy for their birthdays or Christmas/Chanukah.



5. Forward from Here is Reeve Lindbergh's best book yet. Funny, tender, compassionate, profound, Lindbergh reveals herself to be an accomplished and graceful writer--something you might already suspect if you have read her earlier books, Under a Wing (about growing up Lindbergh, with two extraordinary parents, Charles Lindbergh and Anne Morrow Lindbergh) and No More Words (about her mother's decline and death). In this book, Lindbergh (an author of books for children) explores the happiness and hazards she encounters as she journeys from middle age into her sixties--the "youth of old age." "I might as well enjoy the view as I travel along from my birth to death, inhabiting this being I call myself," she writes. "I may be a passenger on the journey, or I may be the vehicle itself, but I'm definitely not the driver. I'm here, but I'm not in charge."
   
   Maybe, but she's not just along for the ride. In this collection of nineteen personal essays, she laughs at the pleasures of her rural Vermont life--the joys of reading, writing, raising lambs and boys and encountering turtles--and takes a sober look at the challenges of living in an aging body. The vanities of youth are gone (she quotes her beloved sister Anne, now dead of cancer: "After a certain age, there's only so good you can look.") and she is making "friends with reality." Not sure that she wants to wear purple, with a red hat that doesn't go, she looks back on a time when she wore lavender eyeshadow and white lipstick (do you remember doing that? I do) and laughs at herself. In fact, she knows that's the best thing to do: "laugh at myself when laughter is called for, weep when I need to, and feel all of it, every bit of it, as much as I can for as long as I can."
   
   As far as feeling all of it goes, the most remarkable essay is the "Brain Tumor Diary," an account of the months (July 2006 through May 2007) when Lindbergh was dealing with a brain tumor--benign, thankfully, but large, intrusive, undeniably there, and needing to come out. It was a difficult time for her and her family. The saving graces were her writing and her focus on daily life: "Dailiness outlasts despair," she says. "For a while the rhythms of daily life may seem to be submerged, even drowned in disaster, but that is never true." The "Brain Tumor Diary" is a report from the front lines of daily life, lived in the face of possible disaster.
   
   The Lindberghs are no strangers to life on the front lines and in the public eye. Reeve and her siblings have had to deal with as many as fifty men who have claimed to be the Lindbergh child kidnapped in 1932. But there is more, and in her final essay, she writes movingly about the way she felt when she learned that her father, the picture of rectitude, a "stern arbiter of moral and ethical conduct," had three secret European families and seven children. Indignation, anger, rage at her father's deception and hypocrisy, shame--it's all there. But in the end, there is compassion, and even humor:
   
   I certainly could have done with his [my father's] endless lectures on the Population Explosion...A man who fathered thirteen--I think, I still have to stop and count us!--children, haranguing one of his daughters about world population figures? Give me a break!
   
   And in the end, knowing her father to be at once "deeply intelligent and incredibly energetic," and "angry, restless, opinionated...obsessed with his own ideas and concerns," she has to admit that the multiple families made a certain kind of sense: "No one woman could possibly have lived with him all the time."
   
   "I'm hoping that as I get older I'll get braver," Lindbergh writes at the close of this splendid and moving book. I'm hoping that Lindbergh will take us with her as she bravely explores her future, forward from here, and that soon we'll be able to read the next chapter of her journey.
   
   by Susan Wittig Albert
   for Story Circle Book Reviews
   reviewing books by, for, and about women

5 comments about It's Only Temporary: The Good News and the Bad News of Being Alive.

1. My daughter sent me Evan's book and it opened my eyes. Everyone can relate to his anger, joy and depression as he fights for life, success and happiness. There were times during the read that I wanted to shake him but in the end, I rejoiced for him.



2. Evan's brutal honesty helped me understand other survivors that I know including my daughter. I cried and laughed and was angry and even talked back to him as I read his story. Evan's story is a must read.



3. After reading Time On Fire - one of the most compelling books I've ever read - simply couldn't wait for a sequel. Evan's accounts of his life are so openly honest & human, without succumbing to piousness.
   It's Only Temporary follows along in the same vein, updating Evan's incredible journey to present day. He's glimpsed the fires of hell & come back to the "everyday" - neither simple or easy.
   Can't wait for next book.
   Read Time On Fire first.



4. I almost never write book reviews, but this book was so bad I felt the need to tell everyone not to waste their time reading it. The only thing I got out of this is that Evan Handler is an arrogant, self-centered person, who seems to want to share details of his boring sex life. Worse yet, he can't write.



5. I only knew Evan Handler from Sex and the City. I heard him interviewed and he was talking about his book, he was so funny and entertaining that I ordered his book. Loved it and know my Sister-in-law is loving it too! I would read any of his books!

5 comments about Reminiscences of a Stock Operator Illustrated (A Marketplace Book).

1. Reminiscences of Stock Operator is a classical works that testifies that the psychological and technical aspects that moves the market has not changed even to this present day... The beauty of the fictional story based on the greatest of minds that traded in the market and made millions and lost fortunes speaks very vividly to us today from their wisdom and experience... I have found the book to be full of wisdom, education and guidance that the financial markets is not a game to be played on the hopes of getting rich for nothing...To be successful requires the greatest discipline on our ourselves..And in the game of speculation this book let us know that the financial markets owes us nothing and that we can't force our hands...



2. As I read this book I wondered if it was written recently, as most books written in the last couple decades seem to have the same info, including the 'newly discovered' psychology of trading. Save a ton of money and buy this book first. Then you may not want any of the others. It's well written, though the author's whole intent is to prove no one can 'beat' the market, which is a little discouraging. I mean, after all, I think I will. Everyone interested in trading should read this early in their career, if not first.



3. As useful in the mad 1920's and 30's as it is today! Every trader should read it... at least twice. If you're into Hedge funds, Private Equity or Asset Management, you should probably read it not less than 3 times - in between the lines!



4. If you believe Market Analysis,you ought to choose Jesse Livermore.If you believe Company Analysis,you ought to choose Warren Buffett.If you believe Country Analysis,you ought to choose Jim Rogers.Good lucky!



5. Picture this; it's the early 1900's, the dawn of the Roaring 20's. Gatsby like characters abound and are romanticized in the Saturday Evening Post, Horatio Alger rags to riches stories are all the rave. Along comes Jesse Livermore, a ballsy, throw caution to the wind and risk it all by leveraging it up to the hilt and letting it ride type of guy. It's a time when the market is on fire and behaves something like the late 90's but the regulators are nowhere to be seen. Charles Ponzi takes Boston by storm with his promises of 50% in 45 days with his Ponzi Notes and creates an all out frenzy engulfing what seems like half of the City.
   
   I read this book in 1990 when I first entered the securities business, and promptly bough 10 copies to give to friends. Over the years I have either given as a gift or recommended this book to everyone entering the business (Wall St. and the investing business in general).
   
   In this edition the illustrations from the 1920's Post are worth every penny, however the market insight is invaluable. Just think about what you can learn from a guy that was day trading and scalping eights 70 years before it was in vogue!
   
   I enjoyed the ride of the market throughout the 90's as a Wall Street broker and then moved on to real estate in 2001. I would recommend this book to anyone just starting out on Wall Street and for those that are Street veterans and have not read it yet, shame on you.
   
   By Kevin Kingston, author of: A 20,000% Gain in Real Estate: A True Story About the Ups and Downs From Wall Street to Real Estate Leading to Phenomenal Returns
   
   Blog: bloglines.com/blog/KevinKingston

No comments about Yves Saint Laurent: Style.

5 comments about The Wishing Year: A House, a Man, My Soul A Memoir of Fulfilled Desire.

1. loved it. it makes me think in all different ways....the things around you and the things that happen to you make you think and react in a quite magical way



2. The book was enjoyable. I think the author made an honest effort to be fair and to believe. She had some preconceptions though that I thought held her back. 1. The experience of an unbeliever/cynic is more valid than someone who does not question and moves ahead with a premise. 2. It is somehow undignified and low class to want material things and, at the same time, makes you insensitive to the blight of others. 3. A person's wishes are something to be judged. Everyone lives their own life and our preception is our reality regardless of what others may think. We really don't have any authority to judge another just because their problem does not seem as important or as grave as others we can bring to mind. I would like to ask her if she thinks the world would be a better place if a majority of people were moving towards what gives them substance and satisfaction thereby reaching a place where they can contribute or by sitting in the dust lashing themselves feeling guilty. We are all unique gifts to this world, no exceptions, and we actualize that by following what gives us joy, not by gnashing our teeth over what we think is 'profane' in another.
   I wouldn't discourage buying the book. I definitely go something out of it, but I never felt she was comfortable enough with the material. She always seems to hold herself apart, afraid to admit somethings to herself. She is a good writer, but she may have finished the book before she finished the lesson.



3. Five Shooting Stars for The Wishing Year! I am so thankful that I ignored
   the first Amazon reviewer and bought it anyway. "See how our thoughts make
   our world? I feel like saying--but I resist." (page 255)
   One day I hope to get the nerve to try "Putting It Out There" myself. And if
   this happens I plan to take this book, place it under my pillow, focus on
   Noelle's poetic thoughts and words, and wish for a muse to sing through
   me...



4. Ninety percent of this book is mind-numbingly boring. If you want to read a great book of this genre, go for "Eat Pray Love" and skip "The Wishing Year." The author is not particularly likable and there is waaaay too much academic rambling.



5. I just finished the Wishing Year and my profoundest wish when I got to the end was that it wouldn't be over so soon. I wanted it to go on and on. Spending time with this author is like spending an evening with one of those mesmerizing friends who leans towards you over the table at your favorite bistro and says, "You won't believe what happened to me?" and then launches into a tale of meeting someone fascinating who transformed her life, or unexpectedly being offered a trip to an exotic place that she'd always wanted to visit, or another wondrous occurrence. You're left thinking, "why don't these things happen to me? Reading the Wishing Year is wish fulfillment in itself. You get to live Noelle's life for that year and it was a hell of a lot more fun than my life that year for sure.
   
   The best thing about her approach to wishing was that it made sense of New Agey gobbledygook like the "Secret." I, like her, am an intellectual, skeptical sort who secretly visits psychics and semi-believes in some of this woo-woo stuff but feels guilty about it. Oxenhandler removes the guilt by explaining the ancient roots of wishing and other attempts at magical intervention, and comes up with some scientific theories about why it might work. Hey, even Plato believed it. (sort of).
   
   I'm coming up with my wish list as we speak and will report back whether any of them came true.

5 comments about Witness.

1. I've never given much thought to Whittaker Chambers, although I was sympathetic to him in the Hiss case. His book, however, is powerful and insightful. Even though the Soviet Union is gone, the forces at work that are trying to undermine Western Civilization are still present. Now more than ever we need a "Witness".



2. During a recent vacation, I was able to finish reading Whittaker Chambers' startling eight hundred page autobiography, "Witness". And I must say that I feel both well informed and somewhat disturbed by the experience. Perhaps I may be allowed to explain.
   
   Whittaker Chambers is the name finally employed by the very strange character, born as Jay Vivian Chambers. This man was raised by a rather odd set of parents, his father, a failed artist and bisexual, and his mother, a never launched actress. Now despite the failings of his parents at their chosen professions, they nevertheless had the audacity to look down upon their economic peers, among whom the Chambers boys grew up. And, though much of the personal information included in the early chapters of this book, relative to Chambers' formative years, is excruciatingly boring, it is also instructive.
   
   Chambers was a diffident, slovenly young man, though evidently somewhat gifted academically. As a consequence, he was able to gain admission to Columbia University. There, his academic career was singularly unsuccessful. First expelled for publishing a blasphemous play about Jesus Christ, he later returned, but was unable to complete his basic degree. With this, we see a very odd, but recurrent aspect of Chambers' unique personality. Though unable to complete even a bachelor's degree, due to lack of discipline, he had the audacity to style himself as an intellectual. He began then, as his parents had done before him, to sneer condescendingly at those more disciplined and accomplished than he was. And, finally, he found a rationale for his rejection of discipline and orthodoxy in the writings of Marx and Lenin. Chambers became then a "dedicated" Marxist.
   
   Our "hero" then went to work for a number of Marxist journals, and pursued a deviant lifestyle. Finally, he joined, quite willingly, the communist underground, and became an asset of Soviet intelligence. In this role, Chambers recruited numerous government officials, including the noteworhty Alger Hiss, and was associated with such men as Soviet agent and US Treasury Department official Harry Dexter White.
   
   The cowardly Chambers eventually "broke" with communism, ostensibly on the occassion of the Soviet Union's treaty with Nazi Germany. In any case, Chambers then turned on his former colleagues. This turncoat behavior of the traitor brought him finally before the House Committee on Un-American Activities, and enabled him to establish a strange professional relationship with a hard charging young congressman on that committee, Richard Nixon of California.
   
   Having charged Hiss, and others, with that which he had been guilty of, being a communist, Chambers spent years as a cooperating government witness. Hence, we have the title of this book. In a stunning admission in this, his autobiography, Chambers allows that he perjured himself before a grand jury on the question of whether he had personal knowledge of espionage activity done in the United States on behalf of the Soviet Union. Hiss was later convicted of perjury on essentially the same set of facts. But Chambers was spared conviction, as a cooperating government witness.
   
   Given the above, it is stunning that the bisexual, cowardly, and deceitful Chambers has become a hero of the American "right". But perhaps this represents an essential aspect of the dialectical materialism of the "left/right" dichotomy of top level American politics. The despicable Chambers "broke" with communism. Hiss, equally despicable, never renounced this hideous ideology. American "conservatives" have since made a fetish of comparing Chambers to Hiss. To this reader, this comparison appears rather like trying to determine which is the taller of two midgets.
   
   Despite the above, the book is worth reading. It is overly long and terribly turgid. And the author is surely no hero. But the history contained within this account is well worth knowing.



3. This reads like a great spy novel, but (of course) it is true. After one has finished the last page there is a feeling of loss ... where are giants like Chambers these days?



4. I read this book when it was first published. I was fourteen or fifteen and in high school. It made a profound impact on me. Besides being beautifully written, its tale of a man who leaves what he calls the winning side (Communism) and joins the losing side (God) in the great conflict of the 20th Century influenced the course of my life.
   
   I am now 69 and still have memories of reading Chambers' autobiography. I became a lifelong anti-Communist even before I became a conservative. I come from a family of blue-collar Irish Democrats but even at a young age felt the call of the other party and when I registered to vote at age 21, I immediately registered as a Republican.
   
   Read this book and be astounded (as I was) about Chamber's life first as an overt Communist writing for the Daily Worker and then as an underground Communist working with cells in our nation's capital. We meet Alger Hiss and other important figures in the Roosevelt administration who led other lives as traitors and spies for the USSR. Doubtful as to those individuals? Then read the many books chronicling the findings in the Soviet archives after the fall of the Soviet Union (the Venona Project).
   
   My only regret is that Whittaker Chambers did not live to see the collapse of the USSR. He would have been pleased.



5. Witness is among the most haunting books that I have ever read. The reader who picks it up expecting only a combination spy story and courtroom drama is likely to be as profoundly surprised as was I.
   
   I had somewhat absent-mindedly placed Witness on my birthday gift list, in deference to the frequency with which it is cited as one of the indispensable political books of the 20th century. Upon receipt, I assigned it to the "to-read" stack, failing to note that it was a daunting 800 pages long. Shortly after I began it and realized its length, I feared it would prove too dense for me to enjoy. How wrong I was: when I at last closed the book a couple of weeks later, I knew that it would haunt me, possibly for all the years I have left.
   
   Many conservatives regard this book as a seminal founding charter, a characterization that not only underrates its literary quality, but which also erects a needless barrier before others who would appreciate it. This book is must-reading, regardless of political persuasion. I myself differ from Chambers in several fundamental ways: I am as predisposed to optimism as he was to pessimism; I relished elementary school as greatly as he was tormented by it; and I do not share his religious faith. But these and other differences do not inhibit a reader from appreciating this magnificent book.
   
   This book not only tells a riveting story, it does so with a poetic, melancholy beauty reminiscent of a great Russian novelist. Something about his writing reminded me of Nabokov (an inexact comparison, given that the style exhibits none of Nabokov's exuberant, puckish wordplay). But Chambers's fluid, graceful sentences, and his gift for reconstruction of sensory and emotional states, are comparable to those of the brilliant Russian emigre. Suffice it so say that this book does not read like a bestselling memoir, but rather as a great work of literature.
   
   The story of Witness is of a man originally alienated from his society, and of his struggle to find good and meaning in his world. Chambers's account of his early life is deeply saddening. One suspects that the entire family was genetically predisposed to depression, considering his brother's suicide, the narrator's own similar attempts, and his parents' many self-destructive actions.
   
   Attending school only accentuated young Vivian's (later Whittaker's) sense of isolation. One story he relates is hard to forget: on one of his first school days, he witnessed three boys urinating on a lollipop, and then tricking a later-arriving fourth boy into putting it into his mouth. (The incident itself is gloomy enough; equally so is the fact that Chambers later remembered it as emblematic of his school experience.) Young Chambers is traumatized by the pervasive cruelty around him. He struggles through the ordeal of school - the mockery of his name Vivian, the taunts of being a "sissy," and being compelled to fight.
   
   One is hardly surprised that such an alienated, secretly intelligent, unappreciated youth, convinced of the intractable injustice of the world, would be seduced by communism. In the central section of the book, Chambers details his gradual descent into that world, first as an open party communist, later as a practitioner in espionage. It is in this section that he meets Alger Hiss, and collaborates with him in betraying his country.
   
   This middle section of the book is probably the most arduous reading. At points, many of the figures and spy escapades seem to all run together. But stick with it, because the final 300 pages or so, detailing the Hiss case, are among the most gripping you will ever read.
   
   Chambers at some point realizes that the actions and amorality of communist agitation offend his still-living conscience. He finally responds to that conscience, and begins a further personal journey to where he locates the spiritual comfort he previously lacked: in truth, in family, in working the land, and in religious faith.
   
   Ultimately, Chambers's break with the party compels him to inform on Alger Hiss and others during a Congressional investigation of communist infiltration of the executive branch. Chambers chooses his title of "Witness" advisedly, meaning "witness" in quite the literal, religious sense - a moral compulsion to testify to what he knows, in spite of the danger to himself, in order to help save the world around him. Indeed, Chambers is convinced that he is defecting from the winning to the losing side when he makes his break, but feels he cannot rightly do otherwise.
   
   Popular memory of this period in American history has been, unfortunately, blurred by the excesses of Joe McCarthy. McCarthy's crude and reckless actions have made him a convenient whipping boy for subsequent Hollywood treatments of the Cold War. It is too little remembered that prior to the McCarthy debacle, it was revealed that in fact, there were many communists who had ensconced themselves in the highest levels of the American government, where they practiced a treasonous espionage. The Chambers-Hiss case, much more than the buffoonery of McCarthy, is the truly dramatic and relevant parable of the age.
   
   Much of the final chapters of Witness is told through transcripts of the Congressional hearings. Reading them, one can only wish for a skilled Hollywood treatment of these scenes. The events included every dramatic turn one could hope for - the steady unraveling of a senior State Department official as his lies are exposed on the witness stand, the relentless and skilled probing of Congressional investigators, dramatic personal confrontations, the discovery of critical evidence midway through the proceedings, and even the secreting of classified material in a hollowed-out pumpkin.
   
   What is sobering to realize is that the case would be likely to play out in much the same way today: the press reflexively sided with the urbane, politically-approved Hiss, while the slovenly, seemingly-shady Chambers was subjected to every calumny imaginable. But it turned out that it was the schlub who was actually the man of intelligence and integrity. Appearances are often deceiving.
   
   One thing that leaps out from these pages after the fact is just how pathetically incompetent a liar was Alger Hiss. You follow him weaving and revising and hedging, and not very convincingly. But so blinding were the ascendant political assumptions of the time that he was the one who was initially believed.
   
   One needn't share Chambers's views on politics, religion, or even of the mind of the typical communist subversive, to find his memoir to be a story of surpassing poetry and haunting resonance. Few people have had such an important story to tell in their memoirs, and almost none have told them so lyrically. Few are the books that are virtually impossible to forget. This is one.

5 comments about My Booky Wook.

1. This is the autobiography by Brit comedian Russell Brand. Russell tells us in his well written book about his youth and days of surviving his own life until he gets help with his various addictions from drugs, alcohol, and sex. He makes it interesting and funny yet honest and truthful. This book won several awards in England in 2007 and his writing style praised for his wit and compared to Oscar Wilde and Peter Cook. This book if nothing else reminds us that change is possible and anyone with the right motivation and help can change their lives for the better. He could be the poster child for recovery, finding a spiritual life.



2. I really enjoyed reading this book. I loved the honesty and the hilarity. He expresses his thoughts so well...a great story teller!



3. I highly recommend this book. Whether you know who Russell Brand is or not, you will after reading his autobiography. I've never read a book so honest. He is funny, caring, and genuine. However, this book goes deep into his past filled with drugs, booze, and yes, prostitues. This book made me laugh, want to cry, and scream out "WHAT?!" After reading this you will either love and applaud Brand or damn him. Either way, READ THIS BOOK!



4. When I first saw Brand--somewhere on British TV; Big Brother, I think?--I was kind of creeped out. But then I saw him as a contestant (with Noel Fielding, who is just plain charming and adorable!) on a quiz show, and my heart started to melt. Then I saw him in a more serious interview with Dawn French, and I was a smitten kitten.
   
   Next, I ordered his autobiography, My Booky Wook, and I honestly couldn't put it down. He makes me laugh; he makes me cry...he grosses me out. He admits to doing some truly disgusting things, and still, I love him so!



5. I first saw Russel Brand on youtube, he was doing something with Noel Fielding (mighty boosh) and i was instantly intrigued by his vernacular and his amazingly good looks :)I watched a few clips and a few episodes of various t.v. shows he was in... and then amazon popped this little gem into my recommendations. Not only does his humor and charm transfer well over paper, he also has reasonably good writing skills.