A legally intriguing memoir, but its good-versus-evil framing strikes occasional discordant notes.
A high-profile attorney discusses several of his more famous cases, mixing in assorted highlights of personal adventures.
Debut author Harder was born in 1969 and raised in the Los Angeles neighborhood of Encino. By his own account, his childhood was happy and relatively carefree, and included Hollywood-connected friends and classmates. His father, a business manager, maintained a credo that Harder still lives by: “Never give up, and find a way!” This motto got the author through the case that brought him national fame: Bollea v. Gawker. Gawker, a popular online tabloid, had obtained an explicit sex tape of professional wrestler and actor Terry Bollea, aka Hulk Hogan, which had been made without his knowledge, and the site published part of the video online. It would take four years of court battles, and millions of dollars in legal fees, for the case to reach resolution in 2016. Bollea had a wealthy backer to fund his lawsuit and hired Harder and his team, who scored an enormous monetary award for their client; this had the effect of putting Gawker out of business. Another victory came when Harder and his partners, working on behalf of celebrity Halle Berry, contributed to the development of California legislation to protect the children of the famous from paparazzi. Harder is at his best when he shares the behind-the-scenes drama of these cases, as well as the intricacies of legal arguments. His client roster of Hollywood celebs peppers the book with enjoyable glitter. His mission, he declares, is to fight for victims of unscrupulous media, both print and electronic, and in 2017, he successfully handled first lady Melania Trump’s defamation case against the British Daily Mail. The author’s clear admiration for her and her husband, President Donald Trump, seems to fuel Harder’s broader criticism of the New York Times and the Washington Post, and his attacks call to mind familiar partisan claims of “fake news.” He also criticizes the lack of positive media coverage of Melania Trump’s “Be Best” anti-bullying campaign, but without addressing common accusations that her husband engaged in prolific Twitter bullying himself.
A legally intriguing memoir, but its good-versus-evil framing strikes occasional discordant notes.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 191
Publisher: Manuscript
Review Posted Online: March 29, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.
A former New York City dancer reflects on her zesty heyday in the 1970s.
Discovered on a Manhattan street in 2020 and introduced on Stanton’s Humans of New York Instagram page, Johnson, then 76, shares her dynamic history as a “fiercely independent” Black burlesque dancer who used the stage name Tanqueray and became a celebrated fixture in midtown adult theaters. “I was the only black girl making white girl money,” she boasts, telling a vibrant story about sex and struggle in a bygone era. Frank and unapologetic, Johnson vividly captures aspects of her former life as a stage seductress shimmying to blues tracks during 18-minute sets or sewing lingerie for plus-sized dancers. Though her work was far from the Broadway shows she dreamed about, it eventually became all about the nightly hustle to simply survive. Her anecdotes are humorous, heartfelt, and supremely captivating, recounted with the passion of a true survivor and the acerbic wit of a weathered, street-wise New Yorker. She shares stories of growing up in an abusive household in Albany in the 1940s, a teenage pregnancy, and prison time for robbery as nonchalantly as she recalls selling rhinestone G-strings to prostitutes to make them sparkle in the headlights of passing cars. Complemented by an array of revealing personal photographs, the narrative alternates between heartfelt nostalgia about the seedier side of Manhattan’s go-go scene and funny quips about her unconventional stage performances. Encounters with a variety of hardworking dancers, drag queens, and pimps, plus an account of the complexities of a first love with a drug-addled hustler, fill out the memoir with personality and candor. With a narrative assist from Stanton, the result is a consistently titillating and often moving story of human struggle as well as an insider glimpse into the days when Times Square was considered the Big Apple’s gloriously unpolished underbelly. The book also includes Yee’s lush watercolor illustrations.
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.Pub Date: July 12, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-250-27827-2
Page Count: 192
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: July 27, 2022
A juicy story with some truly crazy moments, yet Anderson's good heart shines through.
The iconic model tells the story of her eventful life.
According to the acknowledgments, this memoir started as "a fifty-page poem and then grew into hundreds of pages of…more poetry." Readers will be glad that Anderson eventually turned to writing prose, since the well-told anecdotes and memorable character sketches are what make it a page-turner. The poetry (more accurately described as italicized notes-to-self with line breaks) remains strewn liberally through the pages, often summarizing the takeaway or the emotional impact of the events described: "I was / and still am / an exceptionally / easy target. / And, / I'm proud of that." This way of expressing herself is part of who she is, formed partly by her passion for Anaïs Nin and other writers; she is a serious maven of literature and the arts. The narrative gets off to a good start with Anderson’s nostalgic memories of her childhood in coastal Vancouver, raised by very young, very wild, and not very competent parents. Here and throughout the book, the author displays a remarkable lack of anger. She has faced abuse and mistreatment of many kinds over the decades, but she touches on the most appalling passages lightly—though not so lightly you don't feel the torment of the media attention on the events leading up to her divorce from Tommy Lee. Her trip to the pages of Playboy, which involved an escape from a violent fiance and sneaking across the border, is one of many jaw-dropping stories. In one interesting passage, Julian Assange's mother counsels Anderson to desexualize her image in order to be taken more seriously as an activist. She decided that “it was too late to turn back now”—that sexy is an inalienable part of who she is. Throughout her account of this kooky, messed-up, enviable, and often thrilling life, her humility (her sons "are true miracles, considering the gene pool") never fails her.
A juicy story with some truly crazy moments, yet Anderson's good heart shines through.Pub Date: Jan. 31, 2023
ISBN: 9780063226562
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Dey Street/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Dec. 5, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2023
SEEN & HEARD
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