Tag: Review

In 1808, Solomon Northup was born a free man of color.  He grew into a man, owned a home, farmed and played violin.  He was married and had three children and did well for himself and his family.  In 1841, at the age of 33, Solomon was lured into a false job to play violin, he was then drugged and kidnapped, shipped to New Orleans and sold as a slave.  For twelve years Solomon was held and sold from one slave owner to the next.  His attempts at escaping were fruitless, if he tried to explain that he was a free man, he was beaten either for his lies, or for the fear the white owners had of what he said was true.  During this time Solomon had no way of getting word to his family, not knowing if they were dead or alive or what they thought had become of him.

In the twelve years of captivity, Solomon learned what it was like to be slave.  During his time of captivity he was able to see the darkest souls of man, but also see kindness in others.  Upon his release, Solomon wrote this recap of his time as a slave.  It was 1853.

12 Years A Slave was a powerful listen.  Narrated by Louis Gossett, in a smooth tone that made you feel that he really was Solomon Northup, retelling his days and months and years with all of his rights as a free man stripped from him. 

What makes this book all the more breathtaking is that it is non fiction.  Solomon shares with his readers the good, the bad, and the extreme ugliness of man during this time period.  I found my heart heavy as I can not wrap my mind around what it had to have been like for Solomon during this time of loss of family, and loss of hope of ever seeing them again.

12 Years A Slave is a remarkable story.  I am looking forward to seeing the movie. 

Kitchen Confidential, narrated by the author and well-known chef Anthony Bourdain is a “Don’t eat at a well-known restaurant in New York before you read this” type of book.  Anthony, in his typical dead pan style takes you through the ups and downs of his world of when you should and when you should not order seafood, why brunches and buffets are the dirty under belly of the food world, as well as good and bad relationships that go on beyond closed doors – or pointedly the kitchen. Kitchen Confidential will take you through Anthony’s rocky start in the world of white aprons and funny hats.  Through sex, drugs, and filet Mignon – the secrets of presentation and “how do I get my potatoes and chicken to stack tall like a restaurants, are all inside, if you dare to listen.

I have listened to and enjoyed Anthony Bourdain before in Medium Raw, another of his books on the adventures and pleasures of food.  Kitchen Confidential is, in my opinion, rawer than Medium Raw.  Anthony is more vulgar, or I suppose, honest in the relationships of the cooking world.  Let’s just say that in Kitchen Confidential Anthony readily admits that what he is sharing in this book could possibly get him fired…. if he is just being his sarcastic self, I do not know, but Kitchen Confidential is not for the  faint of heart.

Be sure before you enter into this read that you are committed to really wanting to know what is happening behind the kitchen wall.  Kitchen Confidential would easily receive a “R” rating if this were a TV show for language, drunks, sex and drugs.  Practices that you would probably rather not know about, but perhaps have often wondered (what do they really do with that bread plate that you did not eat?) are revealed. Yet it is not all stomach turning and checking another restaurant off your must try list.  Anthony also shares tips for your own cooking skills – sharing with the reader how not to be caught up in the chef knives industry and expense when really you only need one knife that is not a budget breaker and can do just about everything the bank breaking expensive sets do.

While I will admit that there are times Anthony Bourdain steps over the line of TMI a time or two or fourteen… I still enjoy listening to his stories.  Beyond the world of food and chefs, Anthony is also an incredible story-teller and if you can handle the truth (which some of we probably suspected) it is a dish worth trying.

Note:  You do not have to be a gamer to enjoy this read,Masters Of Doom is a story of friendship and living the dream of success and feeling the deep cutting pain of success as well.  Do not judge this book by its topic.  You will do yourself a disservice.~Sheila

Masters Of Doom is the true story of John Carmack and John Romero, two young gamers from broken homes that teamed up together to create games for the personal computer that changed the gaming world (and the real world) forever.  They took the flat screen square looking graphic games and brought them to life by adding screen scrolls, better graphics, and eventually… more violence.  Their biggest success DOOM was what finally tore them apart.  This book (audio) is their story from rags to riches, from binding friendship to a major falling apart of the two John’s.

Today, more money is spent on video type games than is spent on movies.  Does that not blow your mind?  Many of the population would rather spend time in a virtual world solving puzzles, crimes, or shooting or blowing things up.

Beyond my desire to know more about this story, was the narration of Wil Wheaton.  Seriously – the guy would read the newspaper to me and I would be thrilled.  If you listened to ready Player One on audio, that’s the guy!

Masters Of DOOM was an incredible listen.  I am not a big gamer, I did play some games as a kid but I was never hard core and never played DOOM or Quest (nothing bloody for me thanks), two of the games designed through this team.  I do however love the stories behind the success.  As I love the movie Social Network (the story behind Facebook), and the audiobook JOBS (the story of Steve Jobs success with Apple), I also really enjoyed listening to the rise to the top of two computer geeks who loved what they did and created an empire.

Gamers will love the behind the scenes insight of how the games were developed.  Non gamers will enjoy the amazing story of friends who were just having fun and stumbled on to something bigger than they ever could have imagined.

He or she goes by the name of A.  A lives an unusual life.  Every day that A wakes up in the morning, A is in a new body.  A may be a teenage boy or A may wake up as a teenage girl. No matter who he/she is, the only constant is that A will be 16.  A is not sure why life is this way but it is and because of this A has set up a few ground rules:

1.  Never get attached

2.  Live low… do not do anything that will draw attention to you

3.  Do not do anything that will disrupt the life of the person he/she is for the day

And all of that is working out swell until one morning A wakes up as a boy named Justin, and A meets Justin’s girlfriend Rhiannon.  Rhiannon is sweet and kind and way to good for this boy named Justin who A can tell does not value her.  And now things are all messed up.  A’s rules no longer apply… all A does is think about Rhiannon and want to be with her.

As A continues to “body jump” , A spends his time trying to find where Rhiannon is… and this is dangerous as A is taking the person he/she is inhabiting, male or female, out of their own routine to be with Rhianon.

How do you love someone who is never the same person on the outside – but always the same person in the inside?  How do you have feelings for someone who is one day a boy, and possibly the next day a girl?

Oofta.  When I picked up Every Day on audio at our library I had no idea what I was about to listen to.  David Levithan truly has a gift of thinking outside the box as it was a struggle for me to keep up with who A was next.  Defining a character as neither male or female was brilliant on Levithon’s part (even writing this review was hard not to refer to “A”as either he or she), but tricky for me, as my mind automatically made “A” male because of his love for Rhiannon.

Tricky stuff her Mr. Levithan…. tricky tricky…

Because of all of this I have a hard time saying how I feel about this book. The ending to me felt like I needed something more solid even though A had nothing solid to hang on to him, errr… herself.  It felt as though there should be a second book but I do not see any mention of this being part of a series of books. It definitely fits into my love of books that are completely different than anything I have read before.  I still am struggling to come up with a good solid response here.

So -I can say this.  If you are looking for something completely different, give Each Day a try.  David Levithan was co author of the book Will Grayson, Will Grayson (which I loved!) and he also wrote the books Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist and Two Boys Kissing which I have heard good things about but have not read.

Did you ever imitate your parents when you were a kid?  Or better yet, imitate your parents imitating someone else?  Or try to win favor by pretending to be well-behaved children talking in tones like, “yes father, I would be delighted to pick up the common area of all of my things”? 

“Real love amounts to withholding the truth, even when you’re offered the perfect opportunity to hurt someone’s feelings”

“I won’t put in a load of laundry, because the machine is too loud and would drown out other, more significant noises – namely, the shuffling footsteps of the living dead.”

“She’s afraid to tell me anything important, knowing I’ll only turn around and write about it. In my mind, I’m like a friendly junkman, building things from the little pieces of scrap I find here and there, but my family’s started to see things differently. Their personal lives are the so-called pieces of scrap I so casually pick up, and they’re sick of it. More and more often their stories begin with the line “You have to swear you’ll never repeat this.” I always promise, but it’s generally understood that my word means nothing.”

I fell in love with David Sedaris’ writing when I listened to his book Let’s Explore Diabetes With Owls.  I then went on to list to Me Talk Pretty One Day and his line about the youth in Asia (euthanasia) still cracks me up when I think about it.

It was only natural for me to crave his style of funny humor again.  And trust me – David makes anything funny.  He talks about anything from what to eat for dinner to doing laundry and I find myself giggling.  Be warned though – nothing is sacred.  NOTHING.  You never quite know what David will say next.

While Dress Your Family In Corduroy and Denim is funny, it is not my favorite f the three I have listened to.  It is good, and it filled my David fix.  I will  definitely be listening to him again. 

If you are planning to give his books a try I highly recommend to listen to them on audio.  David narrates them himself and he has just the right tone and pause in his voice that makes it all the better.