Biblio Reviews

Should I be embarrassed to share that until I recently read Michelle Obama's memoir  Becoming (2018), I hadn't really known too much about her history? Or that I didn't fully understand others' obsession and deep admiration of her? Like many Americans, I reveled in the election of Barack Obama as 44th President of the United States, though I remained fearful and prayed for the family's safety throughout their eight years in the White House. While I admired the Obamas for what they symbolized, I wasn't obsessed with them. Other than a now defunct website dedicated to Mrs. O's fashion, I hadn't kept up with many of the articles or biographies that populated many shelves and websites since they first stepped into the national spotlight. Most of my perception of the Obamas came from reading 2/3 of Dreams from My Father  (2007) way back when and whatever had made it in the headlines during their initial presidential campaign. Having read  Becoming , I...

The first time I read Thi Bui's The Best We Could Do (2017), I was caught up not only by the evocative and tragic aspects of her illustrated memoir but also the commonality among seemingly disparate groups. At the time, I worked in a community consisting of a large group of Haitians and Vietnamese, two groups I had not considered as sharing much in common other than their immigrant status. However, through this memoir, I learned that both groups historically share a language because both had been colonized by the French. For some reason, the knowledge that my French-speaking Haitian students could theoretically hold a conversation with my French-speaking Vietnamese students' grandparents intrigued me. The idea that language served as both a barrier (for my Vietnamese-American students who couldn't communicate with their grandparents) and an opening because of a shared language uniting two generations from different cultures really struck me. Similar to Celeste Ng's E...

"Wait. Why is Stephen A. Smith of ESPN writing the Foreword to a soap opera actor's autobiography?" The answer is clear upon learning the important role that sports has played in Eric Braeden's life, as detailed in his autobiography,  I'll Be Damned  (2017). Braeden is the star and figurehead of television's number 1 daytime drama,  The Young and the Restless . He stars as Victor Newman, a role he originated in 1980 intended to be for a 26-week run and has parlayed it into one of nearly four decades. Born Hans Jorg Gudegast in Bredenbek, Germany, Braeden's career as an actor was quite the unlikely story. However, a curious mind and an adventurous, independent spirit takes him from a war-torn hospital basement in Kiel to the sound stages of Hollywood. I'll Be Dammed  is Braeden's first book. As such it covers the span of his life, career, and humanitarian efforts to a level of detail and name dropping that may not appeal to the masses. Fans of B...

What would China's population be today if the government had not stepped in to control the population's growth? In 1979, China faced a problem: With one billion people, the country made up 25% of the world's population. In 1980, to combat this problem, China instituted its population-control program: the one child per family policy, an unprecedented, radical take on population control. Mei Fong's  One Child: The Story of China's Most Radical Experiment  (2016)   details the unintended consequences of that policy. Part memoir and more investigative journalism, Fong does a serviceable job of providing context for understanding the why and how of the policy before examining its short and long-term consequences: An estimated 13 million people live as undocumented children because they were born out of "plan." China is a bachelor society creating an imbalance of young men who feel aimless, hopeless, sad, and lonely. China has more than 40% of the world...

The premise seems compelling: Two boys, same name, same background, same neighborhood. However, one becomes a Rhode Scholar and the other becomes an inmate serving a life sentence. What led to these boys' diverging paths? A reporting and analysis would be presented. Only, the final product did not deliver on that premise. Wes Moore's The Other Wes Moore: One Name, Two Fates (2010) is a New York Times  bestseller that is now common on many schools' summer reading list. That's how I came about purchasing it. In the end, I found the book stylistically bland, socially relevant, and politically irresponsible. In short, The Other Wes Moore does not deliver on its premise, for other than sharing the same name and being black, the two Moores have very little in common. This is because Wes Moore, the writer, comes from an environment rich in resources that enabled him to succeed: he was born from college-educated parents whose married partnership was intact, who had their ...

Pearl Cleage: sassy, seemingly self-assured and wise, I enjoyed her appearance on  The Oprah Winfrey Show  to promote her 1998 Oprah Book Club selection,  What Looks Like Crazy on an Ordinary Day  (1997), which I also enjoyed. Edwidge Danticat: a fellow compatriot, I've taken personal pride in her publishing success. James McBride: Winner of the 2013 National Book Award for Fiction for  The Good Lord Bird  (2013), his candidness during his acceptance speech and his interview with Anna Sale for her WNYC podcast  Death, Sex, & Money (one of my favorites)   drew me in. Cheryl Strayed: Best known for her memoir-turned-into-feature-film, Wild (2012), I mostly know of her wisdom and forthrightness in sharing thoughtful and empathic advice (along with co-host Steve Almond) on another of the best podcasts around, WBUR's  Dear Sugar Radio . What do these authors have in common--other than being published, successful writers? They are...

A few years ago, I was very surprised when a few of my eighth graders listed A Child Called "It"  (1995) by Dave Pelzer as their favorite book read independently from the previous year. They highly recommended that I read it, too, but when I found out about its subject matter--parental child abuse--I was in no rush to add it to my "To Read" pile. Last January, I came across the Kindle Edition to Sarah Burleton's Why Me?  (2010) and purchased it for $2.99. Up until last month, I avoided reading the book because of its subject matter. When I realized that it was under 120 pages, I decided to read it to remain somewhat on track with CBR8 goals. As a story of abuse, the book fulfills its purpose, for Burleton chronicles a few of the more extreme cases of verbal and physical abuse at the hands of her mother while her step-father stood by. As a story meant to inspire other survivors, I'm not sure that goal was accomplished. This is because Burleton's escap...

When I was about thirteen or fourteen, I told my much older sister that she could look forward to holding in her hands  my own published    book . I spoke with such confidence that she said she believed that I would achieve that goal. Nearly twenty years later, I am no closer to attaining that goal than when I first boldly made my claim. It isn't because I lost the desire to. No, my lack of progress is more of a result of self-realization. To write--realistic fiction, in my case--would require me to do something that I have struggled to do seemingly all my life so far: be emotionally open and accessible. In other words, be willing to share my fears and insecurities, be vulnerable. Despite claims that fiction is created from a writer's imagination, I understand that there is always some personal truth in all writing. As such, there are certain levels of risk involved for the writer in every story s/he writes. Writing is, after all, personal. Like any other creative fo...