Twenty Minutes in Manhattan Review

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Twenty Minutes in Manhattan ReviewMichael Sorkin has written the best book on architecture and cities I have read in thirty years.
The groaning tables of books on architecture and its vulgar opposite, real estate, have been near collapse from useless piles of theories, career promotions, trashing old houses, freezing relics, flipping toxic properties, making tidy fortunes by deceiving yearning home buyers, and most of all boosting the pathetic dreams of new urbanists out to out-do Disneyesque fantasists.
Sorkin shows that cities are far better than they have been made out to be by defilers of the landscape who want to ruin them in order to sell new, improved cleansing soapsuds.
By walking daily from his home to studio along a small chunk of lower Manhattan, historicized Greenwich Village to tonified Tribeca, Sorkin has gestated thousands of eye-widening insights about what works in cities and what doesn't.
He gives little credit to aggressive professional planners in thrall to rich developers, instead he bestows awards on street entrepreneurs and neighborhood believers. He wonderfully and informatively describes details of large failures and small successes in New York City, the United States, Europe, Asia and elsewhere he has traveled to lecture and study -- many sure to start as headshaking before erupting as in belly-laughs.
Incivil discourse -- urban warfare -- gets special attention, the worst and the best, the enduring homicidal threat of infernal vehicles against pedestrians fighting for their lives. The cellphone yakkers, the widebody baby strollers, the second-hand smokers, the Formula 1 jerks in from Jersey, the national security bollards, the the homeland security aggressors, the corporate haters of trees, the venal, cruel, landlords at home and work, the fancy architects without scruple, what else have you always wanted somebody to challenge, ridicule and perfectly plan for extinction.
Sorkin handily provides tips for winning exclusive use of an elevator, what to enjoy in cities no tour guide knows, who to be forever angry at for damaging our habitats, what each of us can do to contribute to -- demand of our elected representatives, designers and educators -- places to live and thrive under our own guidance, free of orchestrated interference by exploiters of cities and their covert lobbyists and financiers.
Get this heart-warming, mind-stretching book, take a hike with Sorkin, dodge insane traffic, dump garbage in front of your landlord's office, pray for rent control to spread around the world.
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Fired: Tales of the Canned, Canceled, Downsized, & Dismissed Review

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Fired: Tales of the Canned, Canceled, Downsized, & Dismissed ReviewIf you're a regular person who got fired from normal full-time job looking to get inspiration or find the humor from others suffering the same, this book is not for you. This book is mostly collection of anecdotes from show biz people, people who are routinely unemployed between gigs for whom getting hired and fired is a huge fact of life. So...cute stories, a good light read. There's still an opportunity out there for someone to really write this book.Fired: Tales of the Canned, Canceled, Downsized, & Dismissed Overview

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Ramblings of a Lowcountry Game Warden: A Memoir Review

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Ramblings of a Lowcountry Game Warden: A Memoir ReviewI got my first camera 4 decades ago.I've developed a love for capturing "the moment".My love of adventure combined with my curiosity have put me in some unbelievable places.In the early eighties I became involved with environmental issues.Over time I became the spokesman for all the Sierra Club Groups in my home state of South Carolina.My connections got me pointed down an ever increasing number of wilderness pathways.Traveling by plane,auto,sail,canoe,kayak and on foot I have learned to sneak up on scenes from Death Valley California to The Western Isles of Scotland.My camera is always with me.
The necessity of earning a living keeps me primarily in The Lowcountry of South Carolina.My photography puts me in many of the same places that this Author writes about.Scouting in the daytime ,I take for granted getting up in the dark,traveling in the dark and getting in position early. Having read the book I realize the Author is an hour ahead of me and in waiting.We have never met in the field.I'm staying away from Humans,he is observing and outsmarting them.What we share is an incredible amount of joy from the scenes that have unfolded in front of our eyes because we were out there.
In this book you will hear of incredible places that anyone can visit.I have not seen half the places mentioned here.Can you imagine my happiness to read about so many more adventures all around me,just waiting for me ?
This book is about much more than Law Enforcement.It is The memoir of A Quintessential Southern Gentleman.It is a guide to conservation,history,human psychology,personal responsibility and how you bring your personal values and leadership to the general public for the good of all.
The book is riveting.Not since James Dickie's "Deliverance" have I sped through such an enjoyable book. You will laugh,wonder and keep turning pages.If the account of the last hunt of The Santee Gun Club doesn't bring a tear ,you have ice water in your blood.The eloquence of his writing combined with the seldom described events he is recounting,will keep you spellbound.Your minds eye will be activated and you will have a new perspective on many things.
If you want to take a nice trip without leaving the house,read this book.If you want to plan a nice adventure,the ideas here are plentiful.If you like romance and dogs , this book is for you.Would someone Please make this into a movie?Ramblings of a Lowcountry Game Warden: A Memoir Overview

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Trailer Trashed: My Dubious Efforts Toward Upward Mobility Review

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Trailer Trashed: My Dubious Efforts Toward Upward Mobility ReviewHollis has wacky friends, a fascinating life, and wild and embarassing stories that she fortunately does not mind sharing. Her writing style and family stories remind me some of the Sedaris clan and a little of Terry Ryan, the woman who wrote The Prize Winner of Defiance, Ohio. I enjoy her musings about Grant/Lary/Daniel, faking her way through German translations, hell-fire cats, waiting for the neighborhood prostitute to claim her discarded go-go boots, or spilling the dirt on her sister who owns a bar in Nicaragua. Also, if you get the chance, go see Hollis speak in person - her quick wit will have you guffawing. I saw her with a standing room only crowd and she had 'em belly laughing. (full disclosure: I know and like Hollis. But she's funny, I'm telling you!).Trailer Trashed: My Dubious Efforts Toward Upward Mobility Overview

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Radio Shangri-La: What I Learned in Bhutan, the Happiest Kingdom on Earth Review

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Radio Shangri-La: What I Learned in Bhutan, the Happiest Kingdom on Earth ReviewI tend to enjoy travelogues that focus on weird things, like French Dirt: The Story of a Garden in the South of France or A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail, and Radio Shangri-La was no exception. This was a book that was as entertaining as it was educational and inspirational and it convinced me to take a trip to Bhutan myself.
The entire book is about the life and times of Lisa Napoli when she decided to leave her public radio job in Los Angeles and go work for a radio station in the tiny Asian kingdom of Bhutan. There she regales us with stories about the people there, gives us comparisons and contrasts with Bhutan and the Western World, shows us how the country is rapidly changing and becoming Westernized (for good and for bad) and most of all, we see her fall in love with this obscure, almost unknown country. You also get to see the madness that ensues when one of her Bhutanese friends comes to visit her and the drama that unfolds there.
Overall, the entire book is one that is hard to put down. My only complaints is that Lisa Napoli starts to be really candid with aspects of her life such as being raped or hooking up with a guy, but then completely shuts the reader out regarding why a relationship ended. Twice she hooks up with someone that came into her life because of Bhutan and she spends a great deal of time talking about her attraction to them and the slow burn to actually becoming involved with them. Then right after she hits that climax...she says "and it just didn't work out." Then it's never mentioned again. This is poor writing on Napoli's part, as the author either needs to stay to keep the same level of candidness consistent throughout the entire story being told.
One other note - at the end of the book, Napoli gives a list of books and websites to learn more about Bhutan. I went to several of them but was disappointed to see that the website for what this book revolves around (Kuzoo FM) hasn't been updated in over two years. I'm surprised neither Napoli nor the editor/publisher of the book caught that and that nothing was made of this.
Overall, in spite of a few minor writing/researching errors, I really enjoyed this book and I know I'll be picking it up again as the years go by. As I've said, it inspired me to take a trip to Bhutan myself before its culture and charm are completely destroyed by Westernization/modernization, and that's how I know a book has really caught me.Radio Shangri-La: What I Learned in Bhutan, the Happiest Kingdom on Earth Overview

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We Tell Ourselves Stories in Order to Live: Collected Nonfiction (Everyman's Library) Review

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We Tell Ourselves Stories in Order to Live: Collected Nonfiction (Everyman's Library) ReviewThis book came up while I was buying "Political Fictions" for a friend of mine, and I was worried I'd missed something, but actually it's every nonfiction book she's written up through 2003. I've savored every word of Didion's nonfiction since reading "Goodbye To All That" (the final essay of Slouching Toward Bethlehem) in a nonfiction class in college , and she's never let me down. It's not simply that Didion is one of our greatest writers, its that her style is so incisive and unforgettable because she works with only a whisper of the incredible effort and vision she creates, she undoes the reader with observations that don't appear to be observations - she makes her conclusions about culture, nature, and humanity the only conclusions, and she can devastate, over and over again, in a single sentence. It's crazy to think of all of the nonfiction books I've bought of hers fitting concisely into under 1200 pages, but how lucky for the people that own this book to be able to do what took me years to do - track down each piece and appreciate it separately (except for the uber-successful Year of Magical Thinking, which still requires its own purchase). I hope readers take the time to appreciate the differences in each work, to consider how time and how Didion's consciousness adjusted from one book to the next, but the important thing is that she continue to be read and enjoyed. Here, you can read a piece like "Goodbye to All That," or "Quiet Days In Malibu," or that devastating final chapter of Where I Was From to hear that beautiful, plaintive, liberating sad voice, and then follow it up with Salvador or "In The Realm of the Fisher King" or "Vichy Washington" and appreciate a cunning that rips into politics and the culture at large. One strange review on here stated that it was unlikely Didion's work would outlast her life much, and while I don't know that to be untrue (I mean, she's still alive), one thing I've loved about her is that any contextual writing she does - writing about Joan Baez in the 60's, say, or seeing Georgia O'Keefe in the 70's, or Miami, or El Salvador, or Reagan or Hawaii - feels current because it speaks to the human observation watching it occur, and because the culture we make up (the "stories we tell ourselves") around whatever's occuring always remain the same. I wasn't alive or cognizant when much of what she writes about occurs, but to me, Didion's one of the great writers that made me feel connected to the world, feel less alone, and feel thrilled at every topic she's discussed.We Tell Ourselves Stories in Order to Live: Collected Nonfiction (Everyman's Library) Overview

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A Course Called Ireland: A Long Walk in Search of a Country, a Pint, and the Next Tee Review

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A Course Called Ireland: A Long Walk in Search of a Country, a Pint, and the Next Tee ReviewTom Coyne has not added to the landfill of ho-hum Irish travel and golf books. Rather, he has penned 300 pages of interesting, and often hilaroius, insights gleaned from walking more than 1,000 miles in the land of his great-grandparents with golf clubs strapped to his back.
While golfers will find plenty to love in Coyne's four-month quest to play every one of the Emerald Isle's links courses, the rest will laugh at his run-ins with mountain goats, Irish sausage and the British Army while gaining a better understanding for a people who have drawn the short straw throughout much of history.
Whether he's negotiating a sideways rain with a 6 iron in his hands beside the Irish Sea or sitting at a dinner table with distant cousins he has never met, Coyne relays all the redeeming and regretful aspects of his journey with disarming honesty and great feeling.
"A Course Called Ireland" is a pleasure to read and I recommend it highly.A Course Called Ireland: A Long Walk in Search of a Country, a Pint, and the Next Tee Overview

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