What an impressively exhaustive piece of narrative nonfiction this is. I'd been holding off on watching the miniseries that have come out on the same What an impressively exhaustive piece of narrative nonfiction this is. I'd been holding off on watching the miniseries that have come out on the same subject (DOPESICK with Michael Keaton, and more recently PAIN HUSTLERS with Emily Blunt, which I think may have been based on Keefe's book), wanting to read this and absorb the story as it was meant to be read; I'm really glad I did, and the book has just made me more keen to watch those takes on the opioid crisis.
I worked in frontline healthcare for a long time, and I've also had health issues that have necessitated the use of opioid pain management, which made this story particularly interesting to me. When I worked in family practice I saw countless drug reps every day, most of them playing hardball and bearing insane offers to "persuade" the GPs to sit down with them and agree to prescribe their companies' drug of choice before anything else: there were Hawaiian cruises and platinum seats at hockey games, season passes at the nicest country clubs and a summer's worth of free golf, trips to "pharmaceutical seminars" in fancy places (wherein the seminar would take one day out of seven, and the other six were spent hobnobbing with drug reps and dining free of charge in upscale restaurants with other doctors from across North America). It felt icky even then, but getting a look behind the curtain and seeing why things were set up this way pushed it into real-life horror story territory.
It's important to note, as per Radden Keefe himself, that EMPIRE OF PAIN is more interested in focusing on the Sackler family as a unit and as individuals, which means that there are other books out there that will fill the need for a deep dive on the social and medical implications of opioid addiction. (The author recommends a few in his afterword.) There's some of that here, of course -- it wouldn't be possible to tell the Sackler story without at least some exploration of what their pharmaceutical inventions have done at a human level -- but this book is more about the family, and how that family's business started out as something that might have been noble (for example, their early projects included psychiatric medications that almost singlehandledly stopped the commonplace occurrence of lobotomies, and helped to cut down on things like ECT) before devolving into a corporation built on lies, bribes, and greed. The reviews that compare EMPIRE OF PAIN to the show SUCCESSION aren't far off, and I say that as a positive.
Anyone with an interest in medical history will find this fascinating. Radden Keefe narrates his own audiobook, and he does it very well; I honestly thought he was a professional narrator, not just the author. If you're into nonfiction that reads like a dramatic family saga with high stakes, don't miss this one....more
Review to come - I wish I'd come away from this feeling like I knew him better than when I went in!Review to come - I wish I'd come away from this feeling like I knew him better than when I went in!...more
So...I think most people absolutely loved this memoir, right? Going into it as a fairly neutral reader (okay, maybe leaning slightly toward the positiSo...I think most people absolutely loved this memoir, right? Going into it as a fairly neutral reader (okay, maybe leaning slightly toward the positive in favour of Harry), I didn't quite expect to come out being unsure of how to feel. I can easily see both why a reader would love it and why they would hate it. I'm in the middle somewhere. I think all I can do by way of a review is to make a few points that kept coming to me as I listened to the audiobook, read, of course, by the author.
- I started out feeling so, so badly for Harry. Obviously what he went through as a kid, losing his mother in that way and feeling quite alone, was terrible. Hearing about the night his father told them she was gone, and how for years he chose to believe she was simply in hiding and would come back for him one day, was shattering. It was interesting to read about how divided he felt from his father and brother, too, despite there being plenty of love between them, simply because the future kings had to be protected at all costs while Harry was sort of left to the side. I'd never thought about the fact that Charles and William would never have been allowed to be in the same plane or car for fear of an accident that could maim or kill them both. I'd also never considered the weight of knowing, as Harry did, that he was essentially a potential organ donor for these two relatives. That would do a number on you.
- But. But! It's not long into adolescence before we start getting a taste of the excuses Harry is still making for many of his own poor decisions. He's furious that his father publicly scolded him for his drug binges, saying Charles only used them for good PR for himself, while still outright stating that yes, he did in fact have a few substance abuse issues. There are weird military anecdotes that he approached in a strange almost glib way. And then there's that whole "dressing up like a Nazi for a party" thing...which he says he only did to make Kate laugh. Way to deflect responsibility while also throwing your eventual sister in law under the bus, there, Harry! This sort of thing comes up time and again, showing a weirdly low level of self-awareness for a 40 year old man.
- I came away from this having no doubt that The Firm, a.k.a. the Royal Family, is indeed so deeply entrenched in their colonial roots that none of the accusations of racism and other hateful behaviours are surprising in the least. I'm okay with them being called out for that. Someone had to do it, and it was long overdue. Interesting that he waited until the Queen was gone before doing so, but the affection between them seemed sincere enough, so maybe that makes some sense.
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- I feel like some of the problems Meghan has faced are due not just to the family being a bunch of medieval bigots but also to Harry woefully under-preparing her for any of what was ahead. He pays lip service to it, but it took him far, far too long to start actively protecting her from any of it. I have no opinion on whether she shares any of the blame in not learning more about the institution before deciding to join the family, but it seemed clear to me that Harry should have done a better job of removing her and their child(ren) from it, rather than hand-waving it all away and wishing they would all come around. They never had before.
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- Some of the stuff Harry chooses to share here really didn't need to be shared. His own life is his to tell, certainly. But he could've written a sincere, thorough memoir without dredging up other people's private details. I have a generally negative impression of William, but even with that, I cringed pretty hard at some of the very personal exchanges Harry chooses to blow wide open. For someone who says he wants to repair his relationship with his brother...a lot of what he talks about sure sounds petty. And for someone who says he sees how problematic and generally terrible the Royal Family is by design, it's deeply confusing that he says he wants to be back in the fold on any level.
I guess that's the crux of it right there. A memoir can by design only be told the way the person writing it has experienced life, that much is fact. But it's jarring to read one where there are endless contradictions between what the writer says they want and how they're conducting themselves in (alleged) service of that goal. I couldn't fully immerse myself in what it must be like to be this man when I was regularly being yanked out of it with thoughts like, "Wait, what? You said you loved this person and now you're saying XYZ..." It didn't feel...cohesive? Authentic? No, maybe this is it: It didn't feel like he's being honest with himself. About much of anything. And that makes it difficult for a reader to relate to him, which is, I assume, why many of us would read someone's life story.
I won't weigh in on the whole "but he says they want privacy so why did he write a book and do a documentary omg wtf" debate that has been rehashed a million times. I'll just leave it at that. I started listening to this thinking it was going to break my heart, and I was surprised when I found that, more than doing that, it frustrated me.
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--- Original: This is gonna be an all-over-the-place review whenever I write it......more
Full disclosure: I actually started (just barely) reading this in May, thinking it would be best to take it in during baseball season, but I got boggeFull disclosure: I actually started (just barely) reading this in May, thinking it would be best to take it in during baseball season, but I got bogged down and had to return it to the library before I could get very far. As it turns out, reading it while still nursing the bruises of another bitter disappointment of said baseball season might have been a better idea after all.
[image] (My first attempt in the spring, while catching some baseball in the back yard.)
John Gibbons was the manager of my favourite team, the Toronto Blue Jays, for several seasons. I fully admit to not being a fan of his managerial style while he was here; his bullpen decisions in particular filled me with a white hot rage more often than I can say. I did always admire his willingness to get ejected when defending his players, though, so my distaste, if you can call it that, was never especially personal. His postgame interviews were often amusing, too -- he always had this laid-back Texan way of approaching reporters' questions, even the ones he clearly thought were stupid.
This book, while off to what I felt was a slow start (by necessity, I suppose; the man has to tell where he came from in order to explain where he ended up), gets into pretty much everything: the reporters he liked most, the reasons he made some of those bullpen decisions, the players he loved (and a few he decidedly did not), the highs and lows of his tenure(s) here, and so on. We get some insight into conversations we've always wondered about (a notable one being an angry public exchange he had with Jays MVP Josh Donaldson, who incidentally wrote the foreword to this memoir), and we're told of some eye-opening things that went down behind closed doors with the front office of the team.
It's worth mentioning that on my second go-round of reading this, I opted for the audiobook. Whew. That was...a choice. At first I was stoked to find out that Gibby narrates it himself. Within a couple of chapters I was starting to go a bit crazy listening to him, because as much as I realized I missed that drawl, he is not a good narrator. But once I found the right listening speed and got used to his cadence, I settled back into being glad he was telling his own story. I'd totally understand if not everyone had that same feeling.
As for how I feel about him on the other side? I think I generally came out liking him more than I did going in, which is always the sign of a good memoir. Having said that, just when I would be impressed by how progressive and tolerant he sounded about certain things (which, given his Deep South tendencies and the image he crafted for himself over the years, was a surprise to me), he would go off on some tangent that was so Don Cherry-esque (if you're Canadian you know exactly what I mean) that I would cringe. Apparently you can teach an old dog some new tricks, but that dog may still refer to players as "sissies" and tell them they ought to wear dresses on the field if they're going to be that way, then triple down on it when asked to apologize. Ay yi yi.
But overall I'd say he comes off well, and I wasn't expecting to laugh as many times as I did at his anecdotes and observations. It was a pretty entertaining read, and if you're a baseball fan you'll find things to like about Gibby's stories....more
I know why the caged bird sings, ah me, When his wing is bruised and his bosom sore, When he beats his bars and would be free; It is not a carol of joy o
I know why the caged bird sings, ah me, When his wing is bruised and his bosom sore, When he beats his bars and would be free; It is not a carol of joy or glee, But a prayer that he sends from his heart's deep core, But a plea, that upward to Heaven he flings – I know why the caged bird sings.
- Laurence Dunbar
I'm so very many years late to this for some reason. There's nothing I can say that could add to the more erudite reviews that have been left in previous decades. One thing I will highly recommend, though, as a sort of bonus multimedia experience for those who have either read this already or who have long thought about it, is: find a way to listen to the hour-long BBC 4 Radio dramatization of it. (That link worked for me despite being in Canada, so it may also work for you wherever you are in the world.) It's obviously much shorter and only highlights the more significant parts of the life story Angelou is telling, but it's done beautifully and I was really happy to come across it.
As for the book itself...well. Maya Angelou was known as one of the world's great poets, and it's abundantly clear why here. Even her prose reads like a song. Her early life may not have been the most remarkable we've ever seen written about, but it's compelling nonetheless, and her way of communicating it is so evocative you'll feel like you were watching it over her shoulder rather than just reading her words.
Obviously there are content warnings for things like sexual assault of a child, hate speech and slurs, and violence, so you might want to do a deeper dive on that element before reading. If you still want to learn about Angelou's childhood but want to avoid some of the more explicit material, the BBC production might be a better fit....more
3.5-4 stars... RTC... All I'll say in the meantime is that listening to the audiobook is an absolute must. Liu has a fantastic voice, for starters, an3.5-4 stars... RTC... All I'll say in the meantime is that listening to the audiobook is an absolute must. Liu has a fantastic voice, for starters, and on top of that he's very expressive, chuckling at amusing anecdotes and getting choked up when remembering emotional moments. If you're going to read this, listen to the man tell his story....more
I’ve only ever seen Jennette McCurdy in little guest starring roles on shows like LAW & ORDER and WITHOUT A TRACE, so I went into this basically blindI’ve only ever seen Jennette McCurdy in little guest starring roles on shows like LAW & ORDER and WITHOUT A TRACE, so I went into this basically blind. I knew that the Nickelodeon environment and others of its ilk were bad for child performers. That’s really all I knew for background. I read this because it was buzzy. It exceeded my expectations.
Everything that could be said about this memoir has already been said, so all I can add is that listening to McCurdy read it for the audiobook is an experience I’d strongly recommend. I was surprised how many times she made me laugh, whether with her delivery or her observations. The rest of it is, of course, deeply affecting and sad. The abuse she suffered at the hands of her mother went much, much further than I expected; I think I went into this knowing it would be a story about a “stage mom” and the fallout (addiction and eating disorders) from that dynamic. I didn’t expect the rest. Make sure you read every content warning you can before you decide to read it, but if you’re able, do read it. ...more
What an extraordinary story that somehow so few of us know.
Jonathan Freedland has given us a most remarkable accounting of the life of Rudi Vrba, a maWhat an extraordinary story that somehow so few of us know.
Jonathan Freedland has given us a most remarkable accounting of the life of Rudi Vrba, a man who was rounded up from his home in Czechoslovakia as a teenager and sent to multiple labour and death camps. The book centres around his absolutely jaw-dropping escape alongside Fred Wetzler from Auschwitz II, and it follows him throughout the rest of his life as he did everything in his power to let the world know what had happened to millions of others like him.
This book reads like a spy novel combined with an adventure novel plus a lot of painstakingly reported history and context. There are parallels drawn here by Freedland between Vrba's survival of the camps and the life he was able to lead later -- one example is an early chapter titled "Kanada," in which we're told about Vrba's work at that command unit in Birkenau, and a latter-third chapter called "Canada," which tells of Vrba's life as a family man and an activist after emigrating and settling in Vancouver. The life he lived post-Holocaust was very nearly as remarkable as the one he lived during it. What he risked to escape was literally everything, and yet he continued to risk so much long after he was free, constantly participating in documentaries and testifying at the trials of war criminals, including some at whose mercy he himself had been decades earlier. Freedland chose a truly book-worthy subject.
The audiobook, by the way, is narrated by the author, and he does an excellent job, knowing exactly where the emphasis ought to be placed and speaking in a way that lets us know he was moved by what Vrba's family relayed to him in the writing of this story. Its last chapter choked me up, because Freedland so poignantly describes some of the conclusions Vrba came to late in life, once he was able to look at the big picture and see humans for what they are and how they act. Truly stirring stuff, especially knowing that Freedland never had the opportunity to interview Vrba himself before his death, and instead got to learn everything from the man's copious notes, thoroughly documented appearances, and the stories he told his wives and daughters through the years.
He had had reason before to contemplate this difficult but stubborn fact: that human beings find it almost impossible to conceive of their own death. After all, one of Rudi’s fellow Auschwitz escapees had encountered this phenomenon directly and within months of his escape. In a desperate turn of events, Czesław Mordowicz was caught by the Gestapo in late 1944 and put on a transport that would send him back to Auschwitz. Inside the cattle truck, he told his fellow deportees that he knew what awaited them. ‘Listen,’ he pleaded, ‘you are going to your death.’ Czesław urged the people jammed into the wagon to join him and jump off the moving train. They refused. Instead they began shouting, banging on the doors and calling the German guards. They attacked Mordowicz and beat him so badly, he was all but incapacitated. He never did leap off that train, but ended up back in Birkenau. All because he had given a warning that the warned could not believe and did not want to hear.
For anyone who is a history buff or who wants something with higher real-life stakes than your average James Bond tale, I can't possibly recommend this enough....more
All I can really say about this is that I enjoyed the Apple+ series much, much more than I did the book on which it's based. That's unusual for me, alAll I can really say about this is that I enjoyed the Apple+ series much, much more than I did the book on which it's based. That's unusual for me, although it's also kind of rare for me to still seek out the source material after I've watched a movie or series, but I loved the screen adaptation so much I thought I'd like to dig deeper.
The book does elaborate on some details into which the show didn't delve too deeply, but -- and maybe I'm just shallow -- Keene the person is so much less likable than his televised counterpart. And considering I wouldn't call TV Keene "likable" in his own right that's saying something. I found myself reading and getting annoyed with how smugly pleased Keene sounded with himself throughout, bragging about his exploits like he's learned little if anything since getting out of prison. Who would've thought Taron Egerton would make him seem less arrogant??
It's probably unfair of me to rate this when I'm so obviously unable to separate it from a truly fantastic TV series, but it's just my take. The bones of the story about how Keene got Hall to trust him is still worthwhile, so no matter which way you prefer to take it in -- TV or book -- I absolutely recommend that. If you asked me which route to take, though, I think you can suss out what I'd say. I mean, the use of this music choice in the final scene of episode 3 alone (no real spoilers there) is worth the price of the subscription....more
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