Reviews

Review — Trespasses: A Memoir by Lacy Johnson

May 1, 2012

How does home define a person? Does it seep into skin; into speech; into society? Lacy Johnson’s Trespasses: a Memoir explores these questions as she examines her struggle to escape home in order to discover it.
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Review: Tough Sh*t by Kevin Smith

May 1, 2012

Any fan of Kevin Smith will immediately feel right at home with his fondness for four letter words...
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Review: In the Memory of the Map: A Cartographic Memoir by Christopher Norment

April 1, 2012

In his memoir, In the Memory of the Map (University of Iowa Press, 2012), Christopher Norment introduces readers to cartography, otherwise known as map-making. Norment translates his experiences into written word through revealing his own map of life in pursuit of the trail ahead. It is through this picturesque book that readers are given...
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Review: My Battle of Algiers: A Memoir by Ted Morgan

April 1, 2012

Graduate of Yale and Columbia Journalism School, Ted Morgan recounts his service to the French army in his memoir, My Battle of Algiers (Smithsonian Books, 2005).
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Review: The Family Silver: A Memoir of Depression and Inheritance by Sharon O’Brien

February 29, 2012

The Family Silver: A Memoir of Depression and Inheritance follows the author Sharon O’Brien on her quest to discover the familial roots of her depression.
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Review: Anthropologies: A Family Memoir by Beth Alvarado

February 29, 2012

“My mother and I are sitting in the small dining room of her town-house; we are sitting at the table she’s had since I was a girl, but I am nearly fifty.” Thus begins Beth Alvarado’s memoir Anthropologies: A Family Memoir. This first sentence sets the tone and style of the book—clear pictures and...
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Review: How Can You NOT Laugh at a Time Like This? by Carla Ulbrich

February 1, 2012

cover of how could you not laugh at a time like this with bunny slippers

In How Can You NOT Laugh at a Time Like This? Carla, also known as The Singing Patient, outlines realistic coping strategies and supportive advice along with anecdotes of how she deals with several autoimmune diseases. Her unique approach is sincere and instructive.
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Review: Happy Chaos by Soleil Moon Frye

February 1, 2012

Happy Chaos Covern featuring soilel moon frye and her two girls on a bed

Now, I'll be the first to admit that I'm not one to run out and buy the latest celebrity memoir, but when I was offered the chance to read and review Soleil's new parenting book, Happy Chaos: From Punky to Parenting and my Perfectly Imperfect Adventures In Between, I wasn’t about to say no.
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Review — Running the Books: The Adventures of an Accidental Prison Librarian by Avi Steinberg

January 1, 2012

In 2005, Avi Steinberg did what any Harvard-educated, obituary-writing, non-practicing Orthodox Jew would do at a crossroads in his life: he took a job as a prison librarian with the Suffolk County House of Correction in Boston.
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Review — Confessions of a Left-Handed Man (An Artist’s Memoir) by Peter Selgin

January 1, 2012

In his collection of essays, Confessions of a Left-Handed Man, Peter Selgin unabashedly delves into some of the most intimate and often humiliating moments of his left-handed life. Selgin’s essays describe the difficulty of being a first-generation Italian-American twin in a small hat factory town in Connecticut.
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