Prolific West (A Stroke of Genius, 1995; The Tent of Orange Mist, 1995) strikes again, this time with an affectionate but characteristically showy paean to his mother. West calls her ``an orchid who doubled as a gardener,'' aptly describing a woman of fragile health but redoubtable will and demonstrating his own reverent amazement at her strength. The only daughter of an English butcher, Mildred Noden West ran her father's shop while three brothers went to war, then sacrificed a promising career as a concert pianist when one died. She endured extensive surgery in order to bear children and, having paid dearly for fertility, seemed determined to make the most of child-rearing. Mildred instilled in the young Paul a love of music and literature, and West credits her ``fierce, harrying love'' and goading ambition for his development as a man of letters. He pays tribute with his trademark high-octane prose and with dense (and distracting) allusion-studded riffs that detail his intellectual coming-of-age under Mildred's direction. Possessed of a restless intellect more impressive than entertaining, West mars his storytelling with a constant need to dazzle, and he indulges in wordplay and digression at the expense of clarity. He often abandons his mother's story to tell his own (as when he relates the rigorous preparation for exams at Oxford) but insists that she is always in his thoughts, if not his narrative. The most affecting moments are when the two are alone in the dark at the cinema during the Blitz; listening to cricket matches on a portable radio in the backyard; and in later years, enacting a touching, ten-minute ritual of waving goodbye. West's affection for his mother grows with age, and he watches with some bemusement when she embraces television and, in her nineties, moves to a new home and befriends a motley crew of eccentrics. A taxing, distracted read whose tender mercies are too few and far between.
Pub Date: May 1, 1996
ISBN: 0-670-86757-8
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 1996
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
This autobiography might almost be said to supply the roots to Wright's famous novel, Native Son.
It is a grim record, disturbing, the story of how — in one boy's life — the seeds of hate and distrust and race riots were planted. Wright was born to poverty and hardship in the deep south; his father deserted his mother, and circumstances and illness drove the little family from place to place, from degradation to degradation. And always, there was the thread of fear and hate and suspicion and discrimination — of white set against black — of black set against Jew — of intolerance. Driven to deceit, to dishonesty, ambition thwarted, motives impugned, Wright struggled against the tide, put by a tiny sum to move on, finally got to Chicago, and there — still against odds — pulled himself up, acquired some education through reading, allied himself with the Communists — only to be thrust out for non-conformity — and wrote continually. The whole tragedy of a race seems dramatized in this record; it is virtually unrelieved by any vestige of human tenderness, or humor; there are no bright spots. And yet it rings true. It is an unfinished story of a problem that has still to be met.
Perhaps this will force home unpalatable facts of a submerged minority, a problem far from being faced.
Pub Date: Feb. 28, 1945
ISBN: 0061130249
Page Count: 450
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1945
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
© Copyright 2024 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.
