A split decision, then, though lawyers-in-training and close students of current events should find value in Cochran’s pages.
The most well-known African-American attorney (and perhaps most well-known attorney, period) of our time spins tales of courtroom drama, racism, and the good life.
Many readers, it seems fair to say, will want the answer to just one question: “Did O.J. do it?” Cochran, the captain of O.J. Simpson’s Dream Team, provides a suitably elusive answer in several parts, which boils down to this: Simpson always insisted, in privileged conversations with his attorney, that he didn’t; the jury found Simpson innocent of the charge of murdering his wife because the state did not prove its case beyond any reasonable doubt; a neo-Nazi cop (who, Cochran alleges, though apparently a “reasonably articulate professional, in fact . . . was a lying thug”) was after Simpson for his own reasons. Granted, Cochran writes of the post-verdict Simpson, “it is fair to say that some of the things he’s said and some of the schemes in which he’s gotten involved were probably not as well thought out as they should have been”—well, that’s no reason to torment the guy or suspect him of doing evil. On O.J., though, Cochran offers less meaningful detail than he does on the celebrated cases of Amadou Diallo and Abner Louima, along with many other less widely reported trials, even though it was l’affaire Simpson that made him a household name—and apparently added greatly to his wealth, even if Cochran has trouble deciding from one page to the next whether he’s rich or merely comfortable. This hurried memoir may frustrate readers seeking insight into Cochran’s inarguably brilliant legal mind, as there is little here on his education, influences, and formative experiences. Still, Cochran does give some accounting of his working methods, which emphasize “preparation, preparation, and then additional preparation.” As well, he ably explores the depth of racism in American society and the consequent difficulty of African Americans and members of other minority groups to find justice. In doing so, Cochran rises to impassioned eloquence—and Americans who do not know firsthand the truth of his arguments may well feel ashamed after reading this.
A split decision, then, though lawyers-in-training and close students of current events should find value in Cochran’s pages.Pub Date: Oct. 14, 2002
ISBN: 0-312-27826-8
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Dunne/St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2002
The author's youthfulness helps to assure the inevitable comparison with the Anne Frank diary although over and above the...
Elie Wiesel spent his early years in a small Transylvanian town as one of four children.
He was the only one of the family to survive what Francois Maurois, in his introduction, calls the "human holocaust" of the persecution of the Jews, which began with the restrictions, the singularization of the yellow star, the enclosure within the ghetto, and went on to the mass deportations to the ovens of Auschwitz and Buchenwald. There are unforgettable and horrifying scenes here in this spare and sombre memoir of this experience of the hanging of a child, of his first farewell with his father who leaves him an inheritance of a knife and a spoon, and of his last goodbye at Buchenwald his father's corpse is already cold let alone the long months of survival under unconscionable conditions.
Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2006
ISBN: 0374500010
Page Count: 120
Publisher: Hill & Wang
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2006
Well-told and admonitory.
Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.
Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.
Well-told and admonitory.Pub Date: June 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-074486-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
