WhoGirl17

Intriguing story, but ultimately unfulfilling

Revisado: 03-05-20

I've been a devoted Who fan since I was a kid, so when Pete Townshend puts anything into the world, I'm going to consume it. While the initial premise of the story is compelling, it ultimately left me wanting more, and even groaning at its overdone melodramatic last third. Much like his lead character Walter, I think Pete had some trouble relating the things he was hearing and seeing into this book. But if you are a Who fan, there are plenty of nuggets interwoven in the narrative for you to discover and (rightly or wrongly) associate with Pete's own life experiences, as well as themes and threads that have permeated his work for decades.

Ultimately, the most disappointing thing for me is how the women are written. Not a page goes by that the female characters aren't being described by their desirable physical attributes or their sexual worth to the men of the story. Most of the women come off as very flat and uninteresting, with their defining qualities being their sexual appetites and their attraction to the men around them, while the male characters grapple with the bigger problems of the the world around them and how to create meaningful art. This problem at least gets recognized and commented on at the end of the story, but it still made the majority of the book an uncomfortable read for me. Also uncomfortable is the way the gay character (who actually seems to be transgender, but is referred to as a "cross dresser") is written as a total camp stereotype, and the casualness with which sexual assault is discussed and dismissed towards the end of the story.

As for the narration, I just wish they had picked someone with a younger voice. I understand that the story is being told by a man in his 60's, but I had a hard time especially with the tone the narrator (who is in his 80's) takes for the younger women in the story.

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esto le resultó útil a 99 personas

Gossipy and disappointing.

Revisado: 12-11-17

As a huge Bowie fan, there was not much I didn’t already know about the man, but after listening to this author’s Freddy Mercury bio, I was interested to hear her first hand perspective on Bowie. The book starts off well, with the author painting herself as a lucky fan girl who got to experience the rise of Ziggy, but then it starts to delve into lurid tabloid gossip, presenting every rumor about his supposed affairs as fact while leaving out the details of his recordings and inspirational process. Comments about his personal assistant get progressively more and more aggressive and she includes quotes detailing the size of Bowie’s genitalia and the authenticity of his marriage to Iman, but very little about his actual musical impact and creative projects. They say we all have our own Bowie, and the author seems to be bitter to have lost her idea of Bowie to the slick, serious, peaceful musician he became later in life. The narrator does a decent job of varying accents to portray those being interviewed, but a lot of misspoken song titles (saying TVC Fifteen instead of TVC One Five) betray a lack of knowledge about the subject matter by both the narrator and the director. In all, not a biography I would recommend for a seriously Bowie fan.

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esto le resultó útil a 21 personas

Interesting concept goes no where

Revisado: 01-21-15

Even though Rice says this was never meant to be a series, this book feels like a precursor to one. For a werewolf novel, the action is surprisingly lacking, and with no real villain, one is left wondering why the protagonist is conflicted at all about his fate. The set up is great, just not the pay off.

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