A mostly moving text in which writing is therapeutic and family trauma is useful material. Most readers will root for Danler.
A writer’s memoir of familial dysfunction and addiction.
Despite the breakthrough success of her debut novel, Sweetbitter (2016), Danler's life remained very much up in the air in her early 30s. Her mother was an alcoholic and never quite recovered from a brain aneurysm that nearly killed her. The author's father was a drug addict, frequently relapsing and largely unemployable. He had left the household when she was a toddler, and she had lived with her increasingly alcoholic and abusive mother until she was 16, when she was shipped to the father, who provided no supervision. In college and early adulthood, Danler did all she could to sever ties with both of them and entered a marriage that seemed doomed from the start. She cheated on him, and when the marriage ended, she explained to her friend Carly, “I just want more....Once Carly figured out that I was self-destructing with no plan, nerves frayed by lust, she was concerned." Will this “stray" ever find some sort of stability? “There is nothing falser to me than a story that ends with catharsis,” she writes. “Loving liars, addicts, or people who abuse your love is a common affliction....No one taught us how to trust the world, or that we could, so we trust no one. We’ve never developed a sense of self.” Danler's first memoir is as well-written as her novel was, but it can be as frustrating for readers as it was for her friends and family—indeed, as it was for the author herself—to watch her going back and forth with the married lover she calls the “Monster,” with whom she ended things for good countless times. She seems to have a more stable, somewhat tepid relationship with another man, referred to as “the Love Interest.” Toward the end, she tells herself, “You have to make a change,” and perhaps she will.
A mostly moving text in which writing is therapeutic and family trauma is useful material. Most readers will root for Danler. (first printing of 100,000)Pub Date: May 19, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-101-87596-4
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Feb. 25, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
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
An engrossing and ominous chronicle, told by a master of the form.
Documenting perilous times.
In his most recent behind-the-scenes account of political power and how it is wielded, Woodward synthesizes several narrative strands, from the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection and Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel to the 2024 presidential campaign. Woodward’s clear, gripping storytelling benefits from his legendary access to prominent figures and a structure of propulsive chapters. The run-up to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is tense (if occasionally repetitive), as a cast of geopolitical insiders try to divine Vladimir Putin’s intent: “Doubt among allies, the public and among Ukrainians meant valuable time and space for Putin to maneuver.” Against this backdrop, U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham implores Donald Trump to run again, notwithstanding the former president’s denial of his 2020 defeat. This provides unwelcome distraction for President Biden, portrayed as a thoughtful, compassionate lifetime politico who could not outrace time, as demonstrated in the June 2024 debate. Throughout, Trump’s prevarications and his supporters’ cynicism provide an unsettling counterpoint to warnings provided by everyone from former Joint Chief of Staff Mark Milley to Vice President Kamala Harris, who calls a second Trump term a likely “death knell for American democracy.” The author’s ambitious scope shows him at the top of his capabilities. He concludes with these unsettling words: “Based on my reporting, Trump’s language and conduct has at times presented risks to national security—both during his presidency and afterward.”
An engrossing and ominous chronicle, told by a master of the form.Pub Date: Oct. 15, 2024
ISBN: 9781668052273
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Oct. 15, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2024
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