A well-told, often fascinating memoir of spiritual exploration.
Hoblitzelle describes her ever-evolving journey toward enlightenment in this spiritual memoir.
The author is a seeker: as she writes in the introduction, “I seem to have been born with an undying curiosity to understand the mystery in which we live: where we come from, including our ancestry; and the perennial questions of identity—who am I? Where am I going? And above all, what is the meaning of this life?” After experimenting with various charismatic strands of Christianity, the author met her future husband, Harrison “Hob” Hoblitzelle, while in graduate school at Columbia. Hob introduced her to Chinese Taoism, and, after they married, the couple together explored Transcendental Meditation, Zen Buddhism, the “insight meditation” practice of Vipassana, and eventually Siddha yoga. Informed by these philosophies, as well as by Western psychology, Hoblitzelle began a career as a therapist and instructor of behavioral medicine, helping pioneer a field that grew increasingly relevant as the 20th century passed into the 21st. Even now, in her 80s, the author is still seeking—though she has gathered enough knowledge about the world to set some of it down. With this memoir, Hoblitzelle recounts her journey and the many surprises along the way, including her spiritual and intellectual schism from Hob; her experiments with psilocybin and LSD; and the ley lines of her life, which seemed to continuously bring ideas and people from her past back into her present. The author’s bubbly narration combines the biographical and the philosophical in an appealing blend. Here, she discusses her thoughts as she attended a Ram Das talk in a Boston University gymnasium: “I had fallen into that perplexing space between the guru and the teachings. The depth of my inner life on this path had held me in my love of the practices.” The author’s story will be of greatest interest to fellow seekers, as it provides a front-row account of the last 70 years of syncretization of Eastern and Western thought.
A well-told, often fascinating memoir of spiritual exploration.Pub Date: March 25, 2024
ISBN: 9798989945207
Page Count: 294
Publisher: Green Fire Press
Review Posted Online: Feb. 19, 2025
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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