My review of Paul Newman: A Life by Shawn Levy is in the hands of my able editor at the Internet Review of Books. It was a difficult book to review because there isn't much to criticize -- it is a quality book that tells and interesting story. It is well written, organized logically, accomplishes its goals, and doesn't have any flaws worth mentioning. So I tried to explain just why I thought the author did a good job of making a celebrity biography interesting to readers who do not usually read celebrity biographies.
The September issue of the IRB, including my review, will be out on September 15. In the meantime, here are a few tidbits I learned from reading Newman's biography:
• Newman really did concoct his “own” recipe for the salad dressing he used to launch the Newman’s Own brand. His Westport, Connecticut caterer, Martha Steward, judged the taste test for the original commercial recipe.
• Although not starting until his mid-forties, Newman became an avid race car driver. He came in second place at the famous 24-hour race in Le Mans and, at seventy, became the oldest person to win an officially sanctioned auto race.
• Newman and Joanne Woodward were as famous for their 40-year marriage as for their careers, despite Newman’s brief and tawdry affair with a Hollywood gadabout named Nancy Bacon. The affair began during the filming of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and Bacon later wrote about it in her 1975 autobiography, Stars in My Eyes . . . Stars in My Bed.
• A “functioning alcoholic,” Newman typically drank a case (as in 24 beers) a day. A penchant for exercise and a hummingbird metabolism kept him lean, handsome, and apparently sober, in spite of his prodigious consumption.
• Newman was a true philanthropist. In addition to giving away several hundreds of millions of dollars to charities, he rolled up his sleeves and worked himself. For example, not only did he come up with the idea of a summer camp for children with cancer, he designed the first Hole in the Wall camp himself, hired the doctors to staff it, and visited at least twice every summer to play and eat with the kids.
What a fun book!
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
Notes on Paul Newman
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My review of Paul Newman: A Life by Shawn Levy is in the hands of my able editor at the Internet Review of Books. It was a difficult book to review because there isn't much to criticize -- it is a quality book that tells and interesting story. It is well written, organized logically, accomplishes its goals, and doesn't have any flaws worth mentioning. So I tried to explain just why I thought the author did a good job of making a celebrity biography interesting to readers who do not usually read celebrity biographies.
The September issue of the IRB, including my review, will be out on September 15. In the meantime, here are a few tidbits I learned from reading Newman's biography:
• Newman really did concoct his “own” recipe for the salad dressing he used to launch the Newman’s Own brand. His Westport, Connecticut caterer, Martha Steward, judged the taste test for the original commercial recipe.
• Although not starting until his mid-forties, Newman became an avid race car driver. He came in second place at the famous 24-hour race in Le Mans and, at seventy, became the oldest person to win an officially sanctioned auto race.
• Newman and Joanne Woodward were as famous for their 40-year marriage as for their careers, despite Newman’s brief and tawdry affair with a Hollywood gadabout named Nancy Bacon. The affair began during the filming of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and Bacon later wrote about it in her 1975 autobiography, Stars in My Eyes . . . Stars in My Bed.
• A “functioning alcoholic,” Newman typically drank a case (as in 24 beers) a day. A penchant for exercise and a hummingbird metabolism kept him lean, handsome, and apparently sober, in spite of his prodigious consumption.
• Newman was a true philanthropist. In addition to giving away several hundreds of millions of dollars to charities, he rolled up his sleeves and worked himself. For example, not only did he come up with the idea of a summer camp for children with cancer, he designed the first Hole in the Wall camp himself, hired the doctors to staff it, and visited at least twice every summer to play and eat with the kids.
What a fun book!
My review of Paul Newman: A Life by Shawn Levy is in the hands of my able editor at the Internet Review of Books. It was a difficult book to review because there isn't much to criticize -- it is a quality book that tells and interesting story. It is well written, organized logically, accomplishes its goals, and doesn't have any flaws worth mentioning. So I tried to explain just why I thought the author did a good job of making a celebrity biography interesting to readers who do not usually read celebrity biographies.
The September issue of the IRB, including my review, will be out on September 15. In the meantime, here are a few tidbits I learned from reading Newman's biography:
• Newman really did concoct his “own” recipe for the salad dressing he used to launch the Newman’s Own brand. His Westport, Connecticut caterer, Martha Steward, judged the taste test for the original commercial recipe.
• Although not starting until his mid-forties, Newman became an avid race car driver. He came in second place at the famous 24-hour race in Le Mans and, at seventy, became the oldest person to win an officially sanctioned auto race.
• Newman and Joanne Woodward were as famous for their 40-year marriage as for their careers, despite Newman’s brief and tawdry affair with a Hollywood gadabout named Nancy Bacon. The affair began during the filming of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and Bacon later wrote about it in her 1975 autobiography, Stars in My Eyes . . . Stars in My Bed.
• A “functioning alcoholic,” Newman typically drank a case (as in 24 beers) a day. A penchant for exercise and a hummingbird metabolism kept him lean, handsome, and apparently sober, in spite of his prodigious consumption.
• Newman was a true philanthropist. In addition to giving away several hundreds of millions of dollars to charities, he rolled up his sleeves and worked himself. For example, not only did he come up with the idea of a summer camp for children with cancer, he designed the first Hole in the Wall camp himself, hired the doctors to staff it, and visited at least twice every summer to play and eat with the kids.
What a fun book!
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
Challenge Wrap Up: Battle of the Prizes
The Battle of the Prizes Challenge ended yesterday on Labor Day. This was the first challenge I hosted and I want to give a huge THANK YOU to everyone who participated.
To recap: This challenge pitted winners of the Pulitzer Prize for fiction against the winners of the National Book Award. The goal was to read one Pulitzer winner, one National winner, and one that won both prizes; to read all three books between May Day and Labor Day; and to post reviews and comments here.
A list of all the reviews follows (if I missed one, please leave a comment with a link). Also, a couple of people did wrap up posts with some comparing and contrasting of the prizes. For those who signed up but did not finish the challenge, I am still so pleased that you participated -- good intentions definitely count when it comes to reading challenges.
REVIEWS
Sophie's Choice on Chaotic Compendiums
The Optimist's Daughter on Joy's Blog
Middle Passage on Living Life and Reading Books
Advise and Consent on Rose City Reader
Empire Falls on Chaotic Compendiums
Gilead on Tip of the Iceberg
Olive Kitteridge by J.G. on Hotch Pot Cafe
The Fixer on Rose City Reader
The Fixer on Hotch Pot Cafe
The Great Fire also on Hotch Pot Cafe
The Magic Barrel on Book Psmith
The Collected Stories of Katherine Anne Porter on Chaotic Compendiums
The Fixer on Book Psmith
March on Remember to Breath
The Fixer on Remember to Breath
Sophie's Choice on Remember to Breath
Invisible Man on Tip of the Iceberg
WRAP UP POSTS
J.G. on Hotch Pot Cafe
Mine here on Rose City Reader
Remember to Breath
Book Psmith
THOUGHTS? IDEAS? COMMENTS?
Hosting this challenge was a lot of fun for me. It helped focus my attention on a couple of the lists I am working on and it was fun to "hang out" with other list-obsessive readers.
I plan to host the same challenge again next year (there are still many Pulitzer and National winners I haven't read yet). But I might expand the dates. This was "the Sunshine Smackdown" this year because I didn't think of the challenge until the spring and tried to contain the dates somehow. But I might make it a year-long challenge in 2010.
Also, as Psmith guessed in her wrap up post, this was "the American version." I have plans for the British version of a Battle of the Prizes Challenge. That one would pit Booker Prize winners against . . . I don't know yet. Costa winners? Too short and too dissimilar to the Booker, I think. Probably James Tait Black winners. But I can't launch that challenge until I get the JTB list added to my List of Lists there in the right hand column.
What are your thoughts and suggestions?
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Monday, September 7, 2009
Mailbox Labor Day
HAPPY LABOR DAY!
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My Mailbox Monday list is very short:
Plainsong by Kent Haruf finally showed up after a long time en route. I have to jump on this one because it is my Book Club book for September.
Much more exciting -- the book I have waited for for eight years is finally here: The Age of Reagan (Vol. II): The Conservative Counterrevolution, 1980 - 1989 by Steven F. Hayward.
The first volume of Hayward's two-part biography, The Fall of the Old Liberal Order, 1964 - 1980, came out in 2001. Although volume one is over 800 pages, it seemed like a "quick read" because it is full of interesting information and Hayward is a terrific writer with a light touch. Unlike Dutch, Edmund Morris's strange, semi-fictional "memoir" of Reagan's life, Hayward's biography relies on primary source material and analysis. Hayward is a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, so it is no surprise that he approaches his subject from the right, but his work is definitely biography, not hagiography.
I am so looking forward to volume two. This one covers Reagan's years as President and Hayward was able to use Reagan's Presidential diaries, which were published in 2007. I am going to review it for the Internet Review of Books.
.
My Mailbox Monday list is very short:
Plainsong by Kent Haruf finally showed up after a long time en route. I have to jump on this one because it is my Book Club book for September.
Much more exciting -- the book I have waited for for eight years is finally here: The Age of Reagan (Vol. II): The Conservative Counterrevolution, 1980 - 1989 by Steven F. Hayward.
The first volume of Hayward's two-part biography, The Fall of the Old Liberal Order, 1964 - 1980, came out in 2001. Although volume one is over 800 pages, it seemed like a "quick read" because it is full of interesting information and Hayward is a terrific writer with a light touch. Unlike Dutch, Edmund Morris's strange, semi-fictional "memoir" of Reagan's life, Hayward's biography relies on primary source material and analysis. Hayward is a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, so it is no surprise that he approaches his subject from the right, but his work is definitely biography, not hagiography.
I am so looking forward to volume two. This one covers Reagan's years as President and Hayward was able to use Reagan's Presidential diaries, which were published in 2007. I am going to review it for the Internet Review of Books.
.
Sunday, September 6, 2009
Author of the Day: James Lee Burke
James Lee Burke writes wonderful, literary mysteries. He has a couple of series going, but his most famous is his Dave Robicheaux series, featuring an ex- boozer and ex-New Orleans homicide cop now settled in New Iberia Parish.
The series has gone on for so long, that Robicheaux has gone from cop, to bait shop owner, to sheriff, to ex-sheriff, to sheriff again. He's on his 4th wife. It's hard to say how old he is, but he must be over 70. His three-legged pet raccoon named Tripod is the oldest living raccoon in history, since it first appeared in Heaven's Prisoners in 1988 and was still scampering around, at least as of The Tin Roof Blowdown in 2006. Just how long do raccoons live?
The series is dark, complex, plenty gritty, and rich with lyrical details of beauty and evil. Once you sink your teeth into one, you want to gobble them all up. But I have found that more than a couple at a time are too much. I get tired of Robicheaux's dry drunk sermonizing, bored by the 700th description of rain on the bayou, and as worn out by the parade of creepy bad guys as Robicheaux himself must be. But then a few months or so will pass and I am ready for another.
Those I have read are in red. Those currently on my TBR shelf are in blue.
The Neon Rain
Heaven's Prisoners
Black Cherry Blues
A Morning for Flamingos
A Stained White Radiance
In the Electric Mist with Confederate Dead
Dixie City Jam
Burning Angel
Cadillac Jukebox
Sunset Limited
Purple Cane Road
Jolie Blon's Bounce
Last Car to Elysian Fields
Crusader's Cross (reviewed here)
Pegasus Descending
The Tin Roof Blowdown (reviewed here)
Swan Peak (reviewed here)
The Glass Rainbow
NOTES
Last updated October 4, 2012.
Review: The Tin Roof Blowdown
Sometimes fiction can make real what the news or government reports, no matter how immediate or thorough, cannot. In The Tin Roof Blowdown, the 16th novel in James Lee Burke’s Dave Robicheaux series, Burke describes the devastation and tragedy of Hurricane Katrina with a gut-wrenching emotional intensity that no amount of news footage could ever achieve.
While the hurricane rages and floodwaters rise, Robicheaux and his sidekick, Clete Purcell, track down the usual assortment of psychopathic deviants and lost souls, including several rapists, Mafioso hooligans, a junky priest, and mercenary black marketeers. The details of the plot get a little shaggy, but as a historical record and ode to a New Orleans that is gone forever, this one deserves its fourth star.
OTHER REVIEWS
If you want your review listed here, please leave a comment with a link. .
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