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Compare this book to "Hillbilly Elegy"

Revisado: 02-22-25

I had originally read "Dreams From My Father" in 2004, just as Obama was emerging onto the national stage. By the time I listened to "Hillbilly Elegy" last year, memories of Obama's book had faded, but similarities between the two accounts -- and even between the two men's lives -- began to occur to me. A re-listen to "Dreams" last month confirmed that impression.

Even at first glance, there are obvious parallels. Both men had absentee fathers, and both were raised (at least in part) by their grandparents. Both were exceptionally bright, unusually studious, and recognized early that the path forward and upward was through education. Obama rocketed through law school, becoming editor of Harvard's prestigious law review. Vance did the same at Yale. Both men beat the odds in their own ways to find career and political success. And, of course, both wrote coming-of-age memoirs in their early 30's about trying to reconcile their ancestral roots with the very different world they had risen to.

Once you get past these superficial similarities, though, the profound differences between the two men begin to emerge. For me, this is where it got really interesting.

Both of these books are well worth a listen, providing insightful social commentary along with revealing biographical detail. We get to trace the evolution of two brilliant leaders through their formative years from obscurity to the brink of national prominence. Two radically different ideologies, built from like foundations, showing us the glory and the sacrifice, the promise and the injustice, that face an outcast in a place like America.

Both books are superbly narrated by the authors.

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Clear. Concise. Compelling.

Revisado: 01-11-25

You don't have to be a flag-waving patriot to come away from this audiobook with a deep sense of awe and appreciation for the early Americans intent on forming this nation. David McCullough gives us a vivid picture of the ragtag "Continental army" -- sleepless and freezing, some shoeless, leaving blood stains in the snow from relentless night marches -- outnumbered and outmaneuvered by superior British forces -- but still battling on.

Most compelling in the narrative (read admirably by McCullough) is the way the author brings George Washington to life. We're there at Washington's side as he endures failure after failure, despairing privately, convinced he is being tested beyond his capabilities, but rising through this with unshakable resolve to lead his dispirited band to final sweet victories.

No one in this nation's history (not even Abraham Lincoln) has shined so brightly when the hours were darkest. McCullough leaves little doubt why Washington's men revered him like a god.

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Incisive and intelligent

Revisado: 12-29-24

I finished this listen in bed before I began the day — one of my favorite ways to enjoy audiobooks — then headed off to the bathroom to begin my morning routine. Stepping on the scale even half-asleep, it dawned on me that I was already engaging in a “flow” activity, as defined by the author. I was meeting his four requirements: 1) a defined goal (in my case, getting down to 170 lbs.) 2) a clear set of rules (weighing in on a scale, in the buff, daily) 3) utilizing a skill (or, in this case, a discipline - dieting) and 4) getting "feedback" from the scale.
Did I find this enjoyable, as the author promises? I have to say yes, particularly since I was about 4 lbs. under my usual, even after all the Christmas dinners and desserts I had gobbled.
Keep in mind that the book is about 30 years old, so there are occasional parts that sound dated. But that’s irrelevant in this case. Happiness hasn’t gone out of style lately, and most people are still in the dark as to how to find it.
The narration in this one, particularly considering the range of concepts covered, is another thing of that flows quite well.

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Laudable, honorable, admirable. Also numbingly predictable.

Revisado: 12-08-24

This is an honest story. If you're looking for the truth and nothing but the truth about Katanji Brown Jackson, it's all here. The dates, the places, the events, the players. All credible, all undisputable.
And if you're a young professional -- particularly a female (of any color), you could hardly do better than this biography for inspiration. No one can deny that becoming the first black woman to sit on the U.S. Supreme Court is an historic achievement. And there's equally little doubt that the long years and midnight hours Katanji Jackson spent building impeccable credentials -- first as lawyer, then as judge -- weren't deserving of the rewards she eventually received.
For the rest of us, however, this lengthy biography is kind of a yawner, pretty much a case ofTMI, a tad pretentious and perhaps even a denial of underlying 21st century realities that made Katanji Jackson's success possible.

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For love of this book

Revisado: 05-31-24

If you're anything like me, by the time you get through with “For Love of Country," you'll be thinking of Democrat elites as the Tea Party of the 21st century. Only worse. More than just as partisan, more than just as egotistical, Tulsi shows us that they are willing to use any means — including subverting our laws, our rights, and our democratic protections — to tighten their grip on power.

Who better than Tulsi Gabbard -- once the darling of the Democrat elite -- to tell it like is? This bold, clear-eyed, fact-filled indictment from the ultimate insider leaves no doubt why she left all that behind. Get ready for an education.

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A gift and a must

Revisado: 04-13-24

Parents -- before your child announces or is pronounced "gender dysphoric" or falls prey to the extreme dangers of gender "reassignment," you owe it to yourself and your kid to listen to this book.

What Miriam Goldman shares here is a gift to anyone who seeks the plain truth about this very real, very contagious form of insanity. Receive it with open arms -- the sooner the better.

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Light on a Dark Problem

Revisado: 02-03-20

If the solution to our nation's epidemic of youth violence lies in understanding, James Garbarino gives us the keys in his powerful book. I listened to it twice because it is so rich in perspective about a problem the causes for which -- as well as the solutions -- we ignore every day.

The worst of our boys all are products of their families, their schools, and the communities around them. They start out bad and receive worse. Dr. Garbarino uses his expert first- person insights to show us how these boys emerge from abusive, often life-threatening childhoods ready to give the world nothing but the same.

Can these boys be saved -- or can we keep more of them off the paths toward lethal violence to begin with? Dr. Garbarino believes so and he constructs a many-sided solution to shows us how.

Cotter Smith's tight narration lends gravity to a critical subject without ever making it sound heavy. I found "Lost Boys" an eye-opener well worth the 4-hour listen.

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Well written, but a little misleading.

Revisado: 10-14-19

I picked this title because I'm a songwriter myself and a sucker for any "how to" guide that appears to be the least bit authoritative. I was disappointed. The actual insights on Christmas songcrafting are squeezed into the last five minutes of the recording and don't provide much in the way of revelation.
The rest of this little book traces the evolution of holiday songwriting from the origins of classics like "Silent Night" in 19th century Germany all the way to the hit-maker studio output in 21st Century America. Along the way, the author inserts frequent sound clips from interviews with a number of successful (and now mostly elderly) songwriters. This part I found quite enlightening, and it added a welcome variation to what I would call a pretty average reading.

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An epic history, an intimate story

Revisado: 06-12-19

When I finished this audiobook I went out and bought the paperback immediately. I didn't feel the experience was complete without seeing the 19th century photos S.C. Gwynne describes so vividly in his magnificent chronicle: Cynthia Ann Parker, "saved" after years living with the Comanches, put on display as she nursed her baby daughter, gawked at by Victorian whites like a circus freak. The ferocity behind the eyes of Jack Hayes, the man who put the six-gun in the hands of the Texas Rangers and the first white man to teach Comanches the meaning of fear.  And, of course, Quanah Parker himself, last chief of the fearsome Comanches, implacable warrior turned model U.S. citizen.

I've never read Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee or any other native American saga, so I have nothing to compare this book to. Standing on its own, though, I found Empire of the Summer Moon to be a great piece of history, a great piece of research, and a great piece of storytelling. This is an epic tale spanning the most turbulent times our country has ever seen, set in the most inhospitable country God ever created. But what continually held me to the narrative is the author's masterful handling of key characters we come to know intimately. Gwynne doesn't stop at simply telling a good story. He wants to put you there -- to have you live for a moment inside these remarkable people -- and he does so time after time.

A word of warning here. This book is not for the squeamish. Or for the politically correct. The Comanches clearly took special delight in making their victims scream. Gwynne spares no detail in his descriptions of Indian atrocities, particularly those committed against white women and girls. But if you can see these acts and that world as the author intends -- the outcome of an existential clash between Stone Age hunters and Industrial Age invaders -- I think you will find Empire of the Summer Moon as enthralling as I did.

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Becoming - Michelle Obama

Revisado: 04-11-19

The lives of Barack and Michelle Obama are so etched in our consciousness that you might not think her life story would offer much in the way of surprises.  You would be wrong.  Can you envision the two of them in marriage counseling?  Can you picture her dusting off this lanky guy with the strange name walking into her office at a Chicago law firm?  Can you see her (married and a mother now) so burned at him for coming home late again that she throws dinner out, locks all the doors, turns off all the lights, and goes to bed? 

It’s all here, as well as the historic moment when this awestruck but totally unfazed Afro-American couple and their children take up residence at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.  The feeling at that moment is surreal, and Michelle uses her considerable descriptive skills to paint the scene exactly that way.  Too bigger-than-life to be believed.  It’s an amazing ride she takes us on – starting in a cramped second-floor apartment on the south side of Chicago and ending at the summit of the free world – and she does so with grace, wit and a singular talent for knocking down challenges like dominoes. 

I have to admit I had a hard time with Michelle’s deliberate, almost reverent narration.  I found myself wishing for a little less Maya Angelou and a little more Whoopi Goldberg.  Michelle also has a speech mannerism where h’s get inserted between s’s and t’s (as in shtrong, shtreet, and shtrategy).  These little problems were minimized with Audible’s adjustable playback speed (2X I found moved the reading at a good clip without making the author sound like a chipmunk).

Becoming is predictably inspiring, but it ends with Michelle utterly baffled by the discovery that millions of women have voted in 2016 for Donald Trump, a man she readily labels a misogynist.  Looking back (she doesn’t), her disconnect from those women may have resulted from a bit of blindness.  Focused as they were on special-needs populations (often Michelle’s initiatives), the First Couple may have missed signs of growing frustration among America’s working class – along with a deepening mistrust of elites in power, whatever their skin color.  Time moves on and things change.  The Obamas now live in an $8 million mansion a long way from the south side of Chicago

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