A memoir in stories contextualizes the author’s striking experiences throughout his adventuresome life.
A collection of stories illuminates Koubourlis’ travels, beliefs, and experiences with love and pain in this memoir.
Buried within the self-described “eclectic” author and academic’s collection of intimately autobiographical stories are the truths that have made him “fortunate in many respects.” The physical violence he and his brother endured at the hands of his punishing father, whom he dubs “my family’s beater-in-chief,” inspires the difficult opening story (“The Beating”), in which he describes the abusive episodes that occurred with regularity throughout their youth and the “profound effect” it had on them both, mostly in the form of “undesirable cultural baggage” carried into and throughout early adulthood. Despite this enduring trauma, Koubourlis remains compassionate and forgiving, openly admitting that he is “incapable of holding a grudge.” Instead, he offers absolution and exoneration with descriptions of the negative effects of war and his father’s own childhood status as an orphan as probable explanations for his parents’ harsh, stern child-rearing style. A series of “first-times” lifts the collection with vivid history and a touch of levity as the author shares experiences such as the first awakening of his consciousness (at age 3) when Italian biplanes bombed his Greek city in 1940. Other firsts include the discovery of his very own toy balloon, which he excitedly discovered at the beach. His first experience with youthful, unbridled, amorous infatuation in his hometown of Rio-Patras in 1953 is also luminously realized. The stories progress to the 1970s: in “Ephemeral Fame,” which takes place when Koubourlis was a young (and homesick) university professor in North Carolina, he reconnected with a favorite childhood musician who, by happenstance, was performing at a Greek restaurant in Chicago. The love of a stray cat in the resonant and sentimental “A Message from Afar” ends up inspiring a deeper connection between the author and his female companion, Lena. Other stories have more contemporary settings yet still enchant as Koubourlis strums a guitar melody to a garden snake before concluding with a lyrical meditation on the messages found in dreams.
The collection’s strength lies in its diversity. The stories move from early incidents of scarring pain and sadness to memorable experiences with love, animals, partnership, music, and death. The author takes care to embed his opinions and seasoned perspective into each story, framing and informing them with personal insights and life lessons, all placed in historical context; “My First Memory” describes the harrowing bombing of his hometown in “war-soaked Greece” at the opening of World War II and how the citizens of the area scattered in horror. Koubourlis also offers considerations of the nature of evil, the dynamics of “what a civilized society should be,” and our propensity to cater to the forces of outside control. Thoughtful, lucid, and emotionally aware throughout, this assemblage of cathartic stories is a powerful testament to memory and meaning, written with passion, intensity, dark humor, frank honesty, and immense heart.
A memoir in stories contextualizes the author’s striking experiences throughout his adventuresome life.Pub Date: June 6, 2023
ISBN: 9798394500619
Page Count: 156
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: Sept. 1, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
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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