This book may not boldly go where no man has gone before, but Shatner fans will relish the opportunity to learn from the...
The galaxy’s most famous starship captain offers a mostly tongue-in-cheek guide to his rules for living, complete with anecdotes and life lessons.
Eighty years old and still going strong with multiple TV shows, films, books and appearances (all of which he promotes tirelessly within these pages), Shatner’s lust for life shines through in this lightweight, amusing effort. The book apes the familiar self-help format, with the rules (“Say Yes,” “Stay Hydrated,” etc.) used as starting points for funny and poignant anecdotes from his “unique, strange, and wonderful” life, and instructions to the reader on “how to live a Shatneresque existence… [and] experience the essence of Shatner in its purest form.” In addition to the rules, there are frequent asides in the form of “Notes” and “Fun Factners,” basically one-liners playing off the narrative. Shatner is a true raconteur, and in between the jokes there are surprisingly profound ruminations on life and death, from someone whose career in the spotlight stretches from the early days of TV to the age of Twitter. Much of the ground covered here will be familiar to readers of his autobiography, Up Till Now (2008), including Shatner’s feelings about his former Trek cast-mates’ public criticisms and the tragic 1999 drowning death of his wife Nerine. However, his legions of fans probably won’t mind, or be put off by his outsized personality, though they may think twice about shouting “beam me up, Scotty!” when they encounter him. Whatever the situation—be it an awkward dinner with Charlton Heston or a fight to the death with a wild boar—Shatner applies his rules as only he can.
This book may not boldly go where no man has gone before, but Shatner fans will relish the opportunity to learn from the master.Pub Date: Oct. 18, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-525-95251-0
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Dutton
Review Posted Online: Sept. 19, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2011
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.
