No comments about When Men Become Gods: Mormon Polygamist Warren Jeffs, His Cult of Fear, and the Women Who Fought Back.

5 comments about Gift from the Sea: 50th Anniversary Edition.

1. This is a must read for anyone & especially for women (of all ages). I
   re-read it every few years just to be rejuvinated again. I've been giving
   it ,for yrs., as gifts to special friends. The last time I gave it to my
   friend ( a Presby. lay pastor)who took it with her from the WV mts. to
   her family home in Fla....she read it while on the beach & upon returning used it as the basis for her sermon for Women's Sunday.Each time I find
   something "new/eye-opening & worthy" in the examination of the shells to
   our individual lives.



2. Everyone should read "A Gift From the Sea". This is a book filled with wisdom. Unfortunately I read it later in my life. I wish I would have had this book in my twenties. Anne Morrow Lindbergh was a woman who understood life.



3. There are a gazillion books out there on how to find yourself, follow your bliss, and cope with midlife crisis, but none more succinct or more profound than this slim and elegant volume. Each chapter is lovingly structured according to a particular species of shell, and the result is a beautifully observed prose poem about the evolution of the female psyche. With its compact size and attractive cover art, it makes a particularly charming gift.



4. Read it once, pass it on, read it later, pass it on, read in when even older, pass it on . . .



5. This book will touch your heart. I rarely ever read a memoir more than once, but this book is an exception. When you're reading it, you can feel yourself transported to the beach. There's a peacefulness that settles over you as Anne Lindbergh talks about shells, and oysters and the sand and sea.
   
   Interwoven with the talk about the sea are her observations on life. How modern gadgets complicate life, rather than simplify it. Or how a good relationship is like a dance, where the two partners love so completely, they forget to ask themselves whether they're loved in return.
   
   This is a beautiful and inspiring book, which continues to touch your life long after you read it.

5 comments about Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith.

1. This book is written differently than just your average book. It's a compilation of several life lessons all molded into one story. The short stories are really interesting and her humor gives it a fun kick. She tells her stories in such detail it feels as though you're experiencing it with her. The stories are so diverse that I guarentee someone finds some story in there that they relate to. No matter what your religion is, this book is a really powerful read. Prayer helps the author out in numerous ways that will prove to the readers that there is power in prayer. This book is touching and it really makes you think about life.



2. Anne Lamott writes with tremendous vulnerability and sincerity. She opens her veins for us and spills the contents of her life onto the page--the good, the bad, and the very very ugly. Her words are raw and evocative.
   
   I must say that while this book resonates with many people, including myself, who have been hurt by life, disillusioned by the church, and a bit angry at things, I did not come away feeling closer to any tangible answers. I didn't think her crass and vulgar language added much to her message. It was kindof distracting, and I felt like taking a shower after wading through it.
   
   My generation is craving something more--something deeper. We want real answers for real problems. While I continue to read Lamott, I would not say this is her best work.
   
   Shameless plug--check out my new book Sex, Sushi, and Salvation: Thoughts on Intimacy, Community, and Eternity



3. Brutally honest, endearingly quirky, funny as the dickens, and turning on dimes to catch a reader's heart by surprise. This little volume is a treasure. From discussion of her formative years and early losses, through alcoholism and on into single parenting, Lamott holds nothing back. Her prayers, her curses, her neuroses, her blessings, are all laid out for inspection. Through it, despite her admitted self-absorption and bottomless fears, wisdom born of close attention and contemplation leaps off the page. More than once the reflected brightness lit up parts of my own life and character and motives that suddenly seemed to have lain too long in the dark. Breezy and deep are not two words I would commonly apply to the same essay. Here they fit.



4. An "in the trenches" view of spirituality that puts a human face on her version of Christianity. Don't mistake this for a run-of-the-mill "God squad" inspirational or How-To book: It is a powerful narrative of spiritual enlightenment that would be good for anyone to read. I am not a Christian nor do I subscribe to any specific religion -- frankly I'm more likely to be Agnostic as anything else -- but this book was a powerful and important read for me and part of my spiritual journey.



5. Lamott's Traveling Mercies takes the reader along on her journey of self-discovery and search for faith. A touching, wonderful, thought provoking story.

5 comments about Eden's Outcasts: The Story of Louisa May Alcott and Her Father.

1. 
   
   Thank you to Jim Matteson for reading every scrap the Alcotts left behind and digesting it into this wonderful dual biography.
   
   I was a young reader of Little Women (maybe 10 times) and the rest of the series. Later as an adult, I never quite put together the pieces the family. Now I know how the Alcotts fit in with Emerson and Thoreau, the role of Fruitlands in the life of the Alcotts and how it was the Amy came to marry Laurie.
   
   The above paragraph could sound flip without the understanding of how Louisa's fiction was a byproduct of both her father's idealism and his inability to support his family. Louisa would be his standard bearer, but she would at all costs, support the family.
   
   Bronson's philosophy of education was ahead of his time. While it can be debated whether his career ending publications served the cause, it is clear, it did not serve the family well. Followed by a second public humiliation in the touted but failed Fruitlands experiment, you can imagine the grief of a former idealist with a young family to feed.
   
   How many father's careers have been rescued by their children... and in the 19th century... any by their daughters? In the case of the Alcotts, it is more than a career redeemed, it is also values and virtues.
   
   Matteson gives a wonderfully readable dual biography. He sticks with his thesis. It's good that he resisted the temptation to delve into the other interesting personalities of the time. Just like when I first read Little Women, I didn't want this book to end.



2. I agree with all the other reviewers, this is an outstanding biography. It is also something of a cautionary tale of the utopian urge that occasionally effects intellectuals. Never able to support his family, Bronson Alcott persisted in searching for a heaven on earth. His actions to actually create such a place are very sad.



3. The author manages to do justice to both his subjects, Louisa May Alcott and her father. He also creates an excellent picture of the time and explains the transcendtalist movement. Besides L.M. Alcott and B. Alcott one learns a lot about Emerson, Thoreau, Elizabeth Peabody and other luminaries of the time. The book is fact driven, there are often long quotations from original material and it is very well written. A most enlightening book, bringing its subjects and their surroundings to life. I originally bought this book becasue of my interst in L.M. Alcott but by the end I found her father at least as interesting.
   I read this book like a thriller, finishing it in three days.



4. This is an engaging work of nonfiction. Matteson delivers a well written, fact driven, story about the interwoven lives of Bronson and Louisa May Alcott. Wonderfully rendered, it's never boring. Definitely worth a read if you're interested in 19th century women, writers, or history in general.



5. A well writen biography of one of the 19th. Centuries least famous literary families...The Alcotts father Bronson, mother Abba and daughters Elizabeth "Lizzy", Lousia May, Anna and May...This is a book without training wheels Professor Matterson leaves it to the reader to be familuar with Transdentialism, Godwinism, American Putitainism the lives of Hawthorne, Thoreau (Brothers), Enerson, the Lake District Poets, Wordsworth, Carisle etc. he doesn't take the time to inform the reader how they fit in to the Alcotts story...The heart of the book deals with the relationships bewteen Bronson Alcott and disgruntled Puritain turn Emerson transdentalist (Americas first hippie)and his cast of daughters who were as individual and different from each other as they could be...Louisa May the number two daughter is the focus of that relationship but her three sidters play strong supporting roles...If 19th. Century American Literature is of interest to you and you have done the prerequsites this will be an enjoyable read that will advance your knowledge of a most interesting if disfunctional family that played an inportant role in both literature and philosophy.

5 comments about Candy Girl: A Year in the Life of an Unlikely Stripper.

1. Fabulous work that I could physically not put down. This book is to stripping what The Naked Ape is to humans. The author does not go for the easy kill of a tell all recollection of crazy times, rather she approaches the subject more from an anthropologists point of view but in a hysterical way. Cody is truly craftswoman with words, able to compress hilarious descriptions of disgusting situations and interesting people into single sentences. As a frequent patron of stip clubs I will never be able to gaze across the tip rail in the same way again. This book should be read by feminists and rockers alike.



2. Intelligent memoir about a profession where intelligence is the trait least required - stripping. Ms. Cody decides to try stripping on a bit of a whim, during a local amateur night. Even as she left the club that night she knew she would be back. She "wanted to feel the way I had onstage again. Agitated. More vulnerable that a newborn fawn still mottled with placental muck. If I could have recaptured that feeling by parachuting or finding God or backpacking to Marrakech or anything, I would have. But only one thing would hit the glory spot, and that was stripping".
   Cody's quick mind and original language are a definite plus.
   While I read this book I was aware of the voyeurism involved, both by Diablo herself, and by me by being intrigued.
   The title is apt as she does spin a frothy, candy coating on stripping although some parts, particularly her turn in the "Doll House" were downright sickening.



3. Candy Girl was written by Diablo Cody in her pre-Academy Award winning screenwriter days. Back then she was a very quiet copy typist who felt like getting out of her shell by signing up for amateur night at a strip club. This wonderful, hilarious and insightful chronicle she has produced gives you all the gory details without them even seeming gory. I read it in two days without forcing myself. By far my favorite book by my favorite writer.



4. Very entertaining & extremely well written. The subject matter isn't boring at all either :) The style is great, a lot like Diablo Cody's screenplay 'Juno'.



5. Written in a clever and articulate manner, Candy Girl is a great read. Diablo's vocabulary and use of descriptive sentences kept me highly entertained and made it impossible for me to put the book down. Anyone who has ever been curious about exotic dancers and the like will be left satiated.

5 comments about The Complete Persepolis: Now a Major Motion Picture.

1. I was surprised to find it was in comic strip format, but I enjoyed the lite reading.



2. Without harping too much on what has already been said about the political observations that Satrapi makes or her commentary on the limits faced by everyone (and most especially) women in Iran, the truly inspirational achievement of this work is how honest she can be about herself in the story. That with everything whirling around her, the fact that she can be honest about both the good and the bad of the relationships she'd been in, the despair both at home and abroad, the flickers of hope that she clung to during the darkest times and how (true to the reality of a hopeful young woman) the very worst thing that can happen is ultimately to let down yourself and to let down your loved ones is stark and amazing. The scene where she loses the trust and the good standing with her grand mother is heart-breaking and yet could happen to any teenage girl anywhere in the world. That it's depicted in basic drawings doesn't detract from the power of the moment in the least.
   
   And not that graphic novels these days have any trouble being seen as legitimate art, but Persepolis certainly puts a nail in the coffin of the arguments made by detractors.
   
   Trust this book for it's emotion, for it's personal honesty, for it's attempts to always find something good even under the most extreme circumstances. It is not a history book. It is a personal history book. And it is one that deserves applause.



3. In the chapter "The Shabbat", set before she leaves for Austria in 1984, Marjane describes how Iraqi Scud missiles start raining down on Tehran, killing her Jewish childhood friend and neighbor, Neda. However, according to Jane's Intelligence Review and other sources, no missiles reached Tehran before Iraq's Al-Husayn missile programme in February 1988. Why would she lie about this?



4. This book can join Art Spiegelman's "Maus" and Joe Sacco's "Safe Area Gorazde" as yet another graphical masterpiece. Very enjoyable book, couldn't put it down.



5. Even though I don't know much about graphic novels, I thought Persepolis was incredible. Also, I learned a lot about Iranian history from it. Also, even though I'm not Iranian, there are many parts of the book that are easy to relate to, for instance going to school thousands of miles from home. A great read!

5 comments about Bitter is the New Black : Confessions of a Condescending, Egomaniacal, Self-Centered Smartass,Or, Why You Should Never Carry A Prada Bag to the Unemployment Office.

1. Lancaster's mean, but hilarious.
   
   And by the way, the word is pedestal, not "pedistool."
   
   (Another reviewer wants Lancaster to fall from her "self-created pedistool.")
   
   I hope she never does!



2. I read this book after being laid off from my job on the advice of a friend. It took me 24 hours because Jen is brilliant. My stomach hurt from laughing so hard that I almost was unable to direct my boyfriend what chores I wanted done while I read. If you have not done so, save yourself some time and buy all three books. I'm like a junkie looking for a fix I'm so psyched for Such A Pretty Fat to be arriving at my door.



3. I have been reading this book for almost 3 weeks- I read a bit before I fall asleep. It is very humorous but moves very slowly. I am about midway thru and honestly there is nothing to really keep my attention except the funny lines thrown in here and there. Not bad but NOT a big page turner for me.



4. This is an excellent book. I would recommend it to anyone. I can't wait to read the others.



5. This was the best book I read last year (and I read pretty much every book in the same genre), so good I won't let anyone borrow my copy.
   
   Truth-be-told I almost didn't read past the first forty pages. The opening of the book highlights Ms. Lancaster's ability to belittle underlings and worry about her Prada bag and hair highlights. Don't let the opening fool you, this book is a smart treatment of the Post 9/11/Enron/Worldcom/Tyco unwinding of wealth. Any twenty/thirty-something sporting a good job with a nice paycheck and an optimistic future in 2000 was in for a shock during the recession. I and most of my friends worked in Tech and Finance, 70% of my friends were laid off and, while I was lucky to keep my job, I did lose all my bonuses. Ms. Lancaster's book is an intelligent treatment of how 9/11 affected a non-New Yorker's life. Ms. Lancaster is hilarious, brutally honest, a crisp writer and this is a great read.
   
   I highly recommend this book, this author's blog at www.jennysylvania.com, and this author's other books. I could also see this book being a classic one day and required reading at schools looking for a first-person treatment of early 2000's.

5 comments about Home CD: A Memoir of My Early Years.

1. Dame Julie Andrews is our British import of an AMERICAN Sweetheart. She captures our hearts in whatever she does from Maria in The Sound of Music to Guenevere in Broadway's Camelot and of course, the role she is best known for, Mary Poppins. Her words and career are like the songs she sings
   
   
   WHAT DO THE SIMPLE FOLKS DO?...However one would wonder her humble beginning. Well in Home, Andrews does a great job in recanting her family history with the warth she has always been known for.
   
   CLIMB EVERY MOUNTAIN....Ms Andrews takes on the on of storyteller in her family history and her early career (pre-Mary Poppins). She leaves no stone unturned as she climbs into the family history. Her narrative exutes the warmth she brings to her films. Her voice creates verbal characters with ease, which makes this thirteen hour production seem like a breeze.
   
   JUST A SPOON FULL OF SUGAR... The narrative seems indepth but still too nice in spots. Andrews makes her family likeable. I dont know if it her narrative or her story. She does not SUGAR coat her words, it just seems like happy reflection.
   
   IT'S A LOVELY HOLIDAY...Andrews narrating skills are nice. She developes each family member in a different voice. She recants even a nasty situation with a niceness in her voice that you know the displeasure, but it is semi-sugar coated by Andrews pleasant vocals.
   
   
   MY FAVORITE THINGS...This audio is what a simple biography should be. It is an honest piece of life. The story of the making of an actress. her real life ups and downs told in the fondness of reflections. Her voice may not be in great singing quality, but I wish I could listen to her narrate more audio productions. One would hope she would narrate someof her children's books
   
   THAT WILL BRING US BACK TO DO..This audio memoir syop at 1962 when she was given the role of Mary Poppins. With an audio memoir this good, i have one personal request.... Ms Andrews, please hurry and write the second volume of your memiors (and of course put it to audio) soon
   
   Bennet Pomerantz AUDIOWORLD



2. Home - A Memoir of My Early Years is an awesome CD. I felt like I was sitting accross from Julie Andrews and listening to her read to me. It is a surprising insight into her growing years both personally and as an entertainer. From the beginning one is felt drawn to her, the hardships, her sadness, her courage and determination, makes you very aware this amasing, gentle, elegant, loved icon has guts. She is a powerful role model for all women young and old. This CD is a must have for all Julie Andrew fans like myself. Beautifully packaged and arrived in good time.
   Thankyou.



3. I loved listening to Home - Julie Andrews' memoir of her childhood and early career - in Julie's clear beautiful English voice. It doesn't seem fair that one person can be so multitalented! She is a wonderful writer besides being an amazing singer, children's book author and actress. Her childhood was difficult but she had an especially loving father. Her mother was another story. I was intrigued by her experiences starring on Broadway in My Fair Lady when she was only 21 years old. Filled with ancedotes and related very candidly in Julie's always classy way, this is a book to savor.



4. I purchased this audiobook CD set simultaneously with the hardcover edition of the book "Home: A Memoir Of My Early Years" by Julie Andrews. I urge all true fans of the actress/author to do the very same. I read the hardcover book first, and have been enjoying listening to Julie Andrews "tell" me the story of her incredible life from 1935-1962 again on the 11-CD set; which is unabridged.
   For my thoughts on the audiobiography and Miss Andrews herself, please read my review of the book. I don't want to repeat what I've stated in the "book" review. But it is a real gift for her many fans, and much more so for her own family, to have her incredible life told in her own words and in her own voice on CD recordings. "Home" ranks with Patty Duke's "Call Me Anna," Carol Burnett's "One More Time" and Mary Tyler Moore's "After All" as one of the most honest, candid, and courageous celebrity audiobiographies I have ever read. Carol Burnett and Mary Tyler Moore, incidentally, are also friends/colleagues of Julie Andrews.
   In an age when most celebrity audiobiographies/biographies are filled with monumental amounts of conjecture, speculation, self-pity, and self-absorbtion, "Home" stands out as a breath of fresh air. Julie Andrews writes and tells her story with wit, warmth, generousity, perception, and pathos. To reiterate my closing statement from my earlier "book" review: Julie Andrews proves that she is, without a doubt, one of the last, true "class acts" left in show business.



5. Julie Andrews' new book "Home" is beautifully written and captivating. She writes with an authenticity that combines the trauma of her early years, her relentless love of family, her naivete to being a rising star, with humor and unquestionable inspiration. I could not put her book down -- at the same time not wanting it to end. I was quite taken by surprise to realize how very physically and emotionally challenging her young life was. Yet she turned her pain into courage and determination as she pursued her passion -- music. I was 14 when "Sound of Music" made its film debut and at such a young age, found her to be such a wonderful role model and inspiration in my own life. I have saw her in an outdoor theater in 1978, on Broadway in "Victor/Victoria" in 1996 and watched every film and television program where she appeared. As an adult, I admired her integrity and privacy. I always secretly wished that some day I might meet Julie and know more about her. Thank you Julie opening your heart and sharing your memoirs with all of us. It has been a privilege to get to know you. And, I sincerely hope there will be more volumes to follow.

5 comments about Chosen by a Horse.

1. This is a beautiful horse story. It should be paired with Joe Camp's "The Soul of Horse", another beautiful horse story.The Soul of a Horse: Life Lessons from the Herd



2. Chosen by a Horse
   
   This book is absolutely the most delightful reading I have done in quite some time. Ms. Richards story telling abilities were as refreshing as a cool glass of water on a hot and humid day. Ms. Richards story was expressed in the most honest, touching, and gentle way, it enabled me to connect to her experience almost as if I had experienced it myself. Her story telling style is clean, direct and unadorned, hence that lovely feeling I had of having read something almost pristine in the context of the written word. The story was so well told the only disappointment I might express, was that it ended much too quickly. I truly felt saddened when I came to the end, and only wished that it could have gone on longer. Happily for myself I just found out that she came out with a follow up book, which I am purchasing today, the title is "Chosen Forever". I cannot wait to get my new book and continue along this journey that Ms. Richards began to pen so beautifully in "Chosen by a Horse. I purchased numerous copies of this book and shared it with all of my friends, I hope you enjoy it as much as we have.



3. I loved this book! I became attached to Lay Me Down. This book is perfect in demonstating horse-owner relationships. Animals in general have a way of tuning us more into ourselves by just spending time with them. A perfect book for any horse and/or animal lover!



4. I really enjoyed this book. What a remarkable horse Lay Me Down was, and you really got a sense of that through Susan Richards writing. I enjoyed her writing style and wit. If you like this book, you'll also love books by Melanie Sue Bowles (my other favorite real-life horse author) like The Horses of Proud Spirit.



5. What a beautiful story! A friend sent me this book and I finished reading it within a day. The author really knows how to write in a flowing, easy-going manner with plenty of wit and intelligence, making it easy to do so.
   
   "Chosen By A Horse" refers to one pre-named Lay Me Down whom the author, Susan Richards rescues through the SPCA and brings back to health and a better life.
   
   Ms. Richards had already been through a hauntingly rough childhood. In her later years, she indulged in her love of horses and had three to take care of before bringing Lay Me Down to the herd. She knows and writes about her horses as another might describe the personalities, antics and endearments of human children. One can easily picture and imagine each horse - especially Lay Me Down - the sweetest and most trusting of horses in spite of what the brood mare had suffered in her past life.
   
   When a tumor develops near Lay Me Down's eye, Ms. Richards writes about Lay Me Down's reaction to the vet's visit and tests, "She sighed over the bucket and licked the lid of the sonogram machine. Everything she did seemed precious to me, precious and tender. For me, her terrible past was always a presence, a reminder of what it was that had survived: this sweet, kind nature, qualities so lacking in my human family they seemed like miracles to me now."
   
   When death seemed imminent, this is written: "It was as though Lay Me Down and my childhood had merged into the same thing: losing what mattered, losing love. In a crazy way, it felt like Lay Me Down had been taking care of me ever since I got her, bringing to life parts of me that had died with my mother. By her gentle affection I felt restored to the status of someone who mattered, someone who was needed. She gave me that, a sense of family. We both had belonged to nobody, nobody who cared, and now so late in our lives, this miracle had occurred. We had come together on my farm, and for the first time, we had both been free from our fears."
   
   The ending is especially poignant and touching.

5 comments about Kabul Beauty School: An American Woman Goes Behind the Veil.

1. I suggest this book to everyone. It was an amazing memoir that reads like a novel. You will see the country of Afghanistan in a new light. Kabul Beauty School: An American Woman Goes Behind the Veil



2. It's worth reading if only for a view into cultural insensitivity and the lack of reflection that plagues our society. One can only marvel at Rodriguez' inability to reflect on the danger in which she places her former friends in Kabul by publishing this memoir. Her veracity is suspect in many passages (a solitary woman crossing the Hindu Kush without proper documents?)and the reader finds herself astonished at the author's refusal to reflect on how her beauty school perpetuates the subjugation of women in Afghanistan. Written in a folksy tone that only heightens her cloddish behavior, it's hard to be a patient reader.



3. First, let me say that the writing in this book is not bad - it's not great either, but it is readable. The content is a different story. The first chapter of this book describes how Debrorah saves her friend by tricking her friend's new husband (and everyone else in the family) into believing that her friend was a virgin when she got married. I spent the next 15 minutes leafing through the rest of the book, hoping to see that the friend had somehow escaped what was undoubtedly the death sentence that Deborah had committed her to when she published her book. Not getting any such assurance, I have been hoping since then that Deborah was lying through her teeth. I can not believe that anyone who knew fully well what would happen, could have been so irresponsible. Deborah comes across like Amazonian airhead - after all, she must be fairly muscular to collar a fully grown man when he groped her bottom and drag him across the street to a cop; and marrying a man who she knew absolutely nothing about can't be considered the wisest move in world. She is obviously very proud of being feisty and not standing for any nonsense, but she has an American passport and could (and did) get the hell out of Dodge when the going got rough. All those girls she "liberated" and then wrote about might not agree that their lives were worth the story she lived to tell.



4. Well written, highly personal story of a wonderfully gregarious woman who tried to help Afghani women become more independent by teaching them hairdressing and how to set up beauty salons. She sounded as if she would make a social success wherever she went and her dedication is admirable.



5. This book provides an excellent insight into the daily ups & downs for the women of Afghanistan. I was impressed that the author gave up her life and clients in America to live very differently in Kabul. My son was in Afghanistan for a year - I felt like I knew some of the places from his descriptions & photos. Very delightful book.