Bold and sassy, Pierpont and Thapp’s “little” collection of secular “saints” stands tall: required reading for any seeking...
From novelist Pierpont (Among the Ten Thousand Things, 2015) and British illustrator Thapp, an enticing collection of biographical portraits of extraordinary women.
The author models her richly varied collection of 100 “feminist saints” on the “Catholic saint-of-the-day book,” offering one-page inspirational snapshots that aim to capture the spirit of her path-breaking subjects versus history’s fuller remembrance of them. Pierpont’s pithy write-ups are accompanied by Thapp’s funky, wonderfully expressive color illustrations, making for an engaging picture-book experience for adults. From Sappho to Malala to Pussy Riot, Pierpont tracks well over two millennia of women’s achievements ranging from the likes of artists, politicians, and scientists to athletes, screen stars, and comics. Though loosely organized around the calendar year, the portraits may be read consecutively or piecemeal; each offers a glimpse of one of Pierpont’s “matron saints” in her respective element. Thus, March 26 contains a spirited anecdote from Sandra Day O’Connor, “Matron Saint of Justice,” who, in October 1983, wrote to admonish the New York Times, noting that “for over two years now SCOTUS has not consisted of nine men. If you have any contradictory information, I would be grateful if you would forward it as I’m sure the POTUS, the SCOTUS and the undersigned (the FWOTSC) [first woman of the Supreme Court] would be most interested in seeing it.” April 1 is for Wangari Maathai, “Matron Saint of Sustainability,” who started the Green Belt Movement in her native Kenya, planting 50 million trees and training “thirty thousand women in forestry and food processing, allowing them to make their own incomes.” Matthai became the first African woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize. July 15 features signature quips from powerhouse mother-and-daughter duo Ann and Cecile Richards; says Ann: “I get a lot of cracks about my hair, mostly from men who don’t have any.” Other trailblazers include Virginia Woolf, Billie Jean King, and Ada Lovelace.
Bold and sassy, Pierpont and Thapp’s “little” collection of secular “saints” stands tall: required reading for any seeking to broaden their historical knowledge.Pub Date: March 6, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-399-59274-4
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Dec. 23, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
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
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