Funky, fun, and occasionally naughty, with a meaningful message about embracing creativity and living life to the fullest.
A large dose of creative inspiration served up in an irreverent self-help package.
When he’s not writing books, Leisawitz composes and produces music, makes films, and teaches at Pacific Lutheran University, among other things. In a debut that’s full of cheeky attitude, he encourages creative types “to rev up, keep it on the road, and step on the gas.” The underlying messages—find your passion, do what you love, visualize a successful outcome, learn from failure, take risks, pursue your dreams, and, above all, have fun—are fairly typical of self-improvement books. The difference here is the author’s delightful delivery: Leisawitz writes with clarity and honesty, employing contemporary cadence and hip phraseology. He peppers his prose with insights and quirky humor: “As you may have noticed, humans are delicate creatures with oversized brains that tend to get themselves into trouble.” In addition, the book offers an intriguing mix of philosophy (“The Universe will guide you towards your highest good”) and psychology (“The one who puts the most time and effort into sabotaging our lives is ourselves”). The author effortlessly strings these one-liners throughout the text, creating a reading experience that’s a bit startling at times but always exhilarating. The book’s design is equally engaging; the type is unusually large, headlines emphasize key points and frequently break up pages, and cartoon illustrations enhance and effectively augment the text. In the end, the process promulgated by Leisawitz celebrates untethered creativity and freedom of spirit in the broadest sense: “Although it may not seem like it at times,” he writes, “every moment that you’re alive on this planet is a big deal. It’s also an opportunity. An opportunity to learn, to grow, to do stuff.” The author’s reverence for the creative process is evident throughout, and he writes with a passion that’s nothing if not infectious.
Funky, fun, and occasionally naughty, with a meaningful message about embracing creativity and living life to the fullest.Pub Date: June 21, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-692-89996-0
Page Count: 169
Publisher: Electron Unlimited LLC
Review Posted Online: Sept. 7, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.
The legendary booze-addled metal rocker turned reality-TV star comes clean in his tell-all autobiography.
Although brought up in the bleak British factory town of Aston, John “Ozzy” Osbourne’s tragicomic rags-to-riches tale is somehow quintessentially American. It’s an epic dream/nightmare that takes him from Winson Green prison in 1966 to a presidential dinner with George W. Bush in 2004. Tracing his adult life from petty thief and slaughterhouse worker to rock star, Osbourne’s first-person slang-and-expletive-driven style comes off like he’s casually relating his story while knocking back pints at the pub. “What you read here,” he writes, “is what dribbled out of the jelly I call my brain when I asked it for my life story.” During the late 1960s his transformation from inept shoplifter to notorious Black Sabbath frontman was unlikely enough. In fact, the band got its first paying gigs by waiting outside concert venues hoping the regularly scheduled act wouldn’t show. After a few years, Osbourne and his bandmates were touring America and becoming millionaires from their riff-heavy doom music. As expected, with success came personal excess and inevitable alienation from the other members of the group. But as a solo performer, Osbourne’s predilection for guns, drink, drugs, near-death experiences, cruelty to animals and relieving himself in public soon became the stuff of legend. His most infamous exploits—biting the head off a bat and accidentally urinating on the Alamo—are addressed, but they seem tame compared to other dark moments of his checkered past: nearly killing his wife Sharon during an alcohol-induced blackout, waking up after a bender in the middle of a busy highway, burning down his backyard, etc. Osbourne is confessional to a fault, jeopardizing his demonic-rocker reputation with glib remarks about his love for Paul McCartney and Robin Williams. The most distinguishing feature of the book is the staggering chapter-by-chapter accumulation of drunken mishaps, bodily dysfunctions and drug-induced mayhem over a 40-plus-year career—a résumé of anti-social atrocities comparable to any of rock ’n’ roll’s most reckless outlaws.
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.Pub Date: Jan. 25, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-446-56989-7
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2009
IN THE NEWS
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
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