Biographies & Memoirs Books - Page 2

Breaking Through (Edition 001)

Francisco Jiménez

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 20 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

book review on Breaking Through 4 out of 5 stars.
3 of 3 people found this review helpful.

Book Review on Breaking Through


Hi, this book Breaking Through by Francisco Jimenez is a sad book. Why is it a sad book? A boy named Francisco struggles through life trying to keep his family together. He works and goes to school, also trying to keep his grades up. This book is a good book because of the Theme, believable charters, and a nice setting.

The theme is, heart breaking. It's heart breaking since a boy and his family have to face many difficult obstacles. The obstacles are not easy for Francisco and his family. They have to pay bills but they don't have any money. So the whole family except mom and the youngest ones have to work.

Besides the heart breaking theme there are nice believable charters. The charters sometimes where confused. They where confused because they didn't have money. No one to help them, and struggled to keep food on the table.

There also was a very good setting. The setting took place in many different places. Like school, fields, gas company, Twitchel and Twitchel. There are many different places. So that means that the family is all over the places.

So this book has a great theme. Wonderful setting that makes you feel like your there watching it all happing. Also nice believable charters that do things that you could relate to. So if you like heart breaking novels then this is the book for you.


The End

Editorial Review:

At the age of fourteen, Francisco Jiménez, together with his older brother Roberto and his mother, are caught by la migra. Forced to leave their home, the entire family travels all night for twenty hours by bus, arriving at the U.S. and Mexican border in Nogales, Arizona. In the months and years that follow, Francisco, his mother and father, and his seven brothers and sister not only struggle to keep their family together, but also face crushing poverty, long hours of labor, and blatant prejudice. How they sustain their hope, their goodheartedness, and tenacity is revealed in this moving sequel to The Circuit. Without bitterness or sentimentality, Francisco Jiménez finishes telling the story of his youth.

Lemony Snicket: The Unfortunate Life of the Author of 'A Series of Unfortunate Events'

Lemony Snicket

By: Egmont Books Ltd Amazon Marketplace: 15 new & used starting at $5.28

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 137 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

A good book 5 out of 5 stars.
2 of 2 people found this review helpful.

You should read this book if you are done reading the A Series of Unfortunate Events books. You know how the Series of Unfortunate Events is sort of mysterious? Because Lemony Snicket the Unauthorized Autobiography unlocks some of the secrets in the books. Like it tells you who Beatrice is, and other secrets like that. It is a good book.

An absurd, entertaining read. 4 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

I read this whole book the day that I got it. It doesn't entirely make sense, nor is it supposed to, but it's full of Snicket's satirical sense of humor and made me laugh out loud on numerous occasions. If you expect it to give you some answers about the Baudelaire orphans, it won't. It'll merely open up a whole new vista of unanswered questions.

Editorial Review:

Finally, the definitive - and only - book for anyone interested in learning more about the alarmingly elusive author. Here is a collection of evidence - writings, annotated photographs, mysterious diagrams, and several disorientating maps, accompanied by captions, an introduction, and an extensive index. Together, these pieces will shed light on a life that until now has been unfortunately shrouded in darkness, and will finally answer the questions on everyone's mind: what do we really know about Lemony Snicket? And why is he so interested in the lives of the Baudelaire orphans?

Annie's Baby: The Diary of Anonymous, a Pregnant Teenager

Anonymous

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 150 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Poorly-written propaganda 2 out of 5 stars.
9 of 9 people found this review helpful.

Maybe it's because I'm now past the target age for this book, and because I now know about how Dr. Sparks in all probability just makes up these books instead of using real teen journals, but I didn't believe for one blessed moment that this book was a real teen journal, nor that Annie was a real person. I was a teenager of the Nineties myself, and am a nearly-lifelong journaller, and nothing about Annie (her personality, thought process, writing style, etc.) rang true. She and everyone else in this book come across as one-dimensional stereotypes and clichés, like they're all characters in some over the top morality play or afterschool special. It's so suspicious how the teens in all of Dr. Sparks's "real-life diaries" have the exact same writing style and moral preachiness, holding rather conservative views in line with her own. I don't begrudge her her sincerely held beliefs even though they're radically different from mine, but it's just morally irresponsible to push these beliefs on impressionable teens by pretending they're from peers instead of some over-the-hill ultra-conservative psychiatrist. There are far better ways to teach teenagers to not do drugs, have unprotected sex at young ages, get eating disorders, have an affair with a teacher, or join a gang than lying to them and trying to scare them straight.

I find it hard to believe that Dr. Sparks is that respected of an adolescent shrink, since she seems so profoundly out of touch with how real teens write, behave, talk, and think. But chances are, if she'd used a real diary from a pregnant teen she had worked with, it wouldn't have had the desired holier than thou moral preachiness, anti-abortion and anti-welfare rants, childish writing style, stereotypical characters, sense of shame and guilt for something like having sex or lying to one's mother, or depiction of all teen moms as terrible parents who are just setting their kids up for a lifetime of problems unless they do the responsible thing and place the babies for adoption. Teenagers are a lot smarter, more mature, articulate, and self-aware than she gives them credit for. Real teen journallers also don't over-analyse everything, use babyish expressions worthy of a six year old, use excessive italics and exclamation points, FREQUENTLY WRITE IN ALL CAPS (those sections were so annoying, irritating, and distrating I found myself just skimming over them), feel guilty for engaging in normal teen behaviors (like going to parties or lying to one's parents about their whereabouts), or apologise for having used the occasional curse word in their own journals. Annie also acts really bipolar, the way she's all happy, excited, and bubbly one moment, then depressed, angry, frustrated, and confused the next. The way she often talks to her journal like it's an actual person, even going so far as having entire back-and-forth conversations, arguments, and tantrums with it, would also seem to suggest a serious mental problem.

While there are a few things about her character that ring true, such as how many teen girls are in abusive relationships and how many young teen moms do feel overwhelmed when the baby arrives, those details are cancelled out by all of the over the top clichés and stereotypes littered throughout the rest of the book. The "relationship" with Danny develops way too fast, for instance, and she's already acting like he's her soulmate before she even knows his name, and then thinks they have some serious relationship when they've only had a couple of dates and hung out at school a few times. As the relationship wears on, she seems to deliberately put herself in bad situations and do the most foolish things possible, like going back to him after he first tries to rape her and then actually rapes her. I could see if this were a longer-term relationship, but making excuses, blaming herself, and wanting to stay with him for the sake of some minor fling at age fourteen? I never felt anything for anyone in this book, not even at the supposedly dramatic moments, like when Annie stages some elaborate ruse to trick her mother into thinking she was hit by a car instead of raped, or when she tries to abandon her baby. The characters and situations were just too unbelievable.

A real teen journal would also have a lot more mundane chit-chat, like about hanging out with friends, a movie she just saw, schoolwork, that sort of thing, not this obsessive focus on the "problem." And where are all of the details a normal teen girl would make sure to write about, like how she got the birth control pills or just how Danny was roughing her up during sex? How are we supposed to get accurate mental images of these people and things if all we're given are generalities? Unless of course this were deliberately written as a fictional teen journal about a specific issue and not really drawn from the pages of a real teenager's journal, something she never dreamt would be published. I also found it really hard to swallow how Annie is switched to an "unwed mothers' home" in her town. Such places do still exist, but they're far and few between anymore. How convenient one of the few still in existence is in her area. And what American teen of the Nineties would actually use the term "unwed mother"? What is this, the Fifties? Annie also looks down her nose on most of the "unwed mothers" in the school, particularly because they're planning to use welfare. I found the anti-welfare rhetoric to be even more offensive than the anti-abortion rhetoric. (And how is her baby allowed to leave the hospital after only about two weeks when she's two months premature? Don't most babies born at seven months need to spend at least a month in the hospital?)

The only real thing going for this work of fiction are the supplemental sections in the back. There are quizzes to find out if one is in an abusive relationship, a Q&A on birth control and teen pregnancy (which continues with the anti-welfare rhetoric and the downright offensive view that teens are automatically sub-par parents who are putting their kids at risk for all sorts of problems if they don't do adoption), and some resources for things like STDs and rape. Funny how the writing style in this section, as well as in the author's note, is the exact same one used by Annie all throughout the book, down to the FREQUENT CAPS. So it's not totally useless. I don't know whether to feel more sad, amused, or scared that apparently many teen girls believe this book was written by one of their own instead of an elderly shrink pretending to be some whiny immature self-absorbed holier than thou teenager.

Editorial Review:

When Annie discovers she's pregnant by her boyfriend, she's devastated. She has never felt so alone. With no one she can talk to, she pours her heart out to her diary, confiding her feelings of panic, self-doubt, and the desperate hope that some day she can turn her life around. She decides she wants to keep her baby and dreams of loving and caring for this little person. But after the baby is born, it's in her diary that she faces the agonizing question: Can she really raise this child on her own?

Pavilion of Women

Pearl S. Buck

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 25 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

better than the movie 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

The movie was good but it doesn't follow the book and the book is much better.

Choices Can Have Unforeseen Consequences 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

I love Pearl Buck's books. She is so adept at taking the reader right into a foreign world and making it understandable. One begins to see how we are all really the same underneath our outward appearances and social customs. In this book, wealtlhy Madame Wu changes the course of her entire family's lives because of her strong desires to ultimately satisfy self. At first, her actions appear to be somewhat self-sacrificing in a certain way. Some readers may find her attitudes and actions quite modern, but there are far-reaching consequences to those actions and one wonders how selfless those actions really are in the end. I found the surprise turn in Madame Wu's relationship/feelings for the exiled priest to be a bit far-fetched for a wealthy Chinese woman of her time, but life can take odd twists and turns. To me this book is a moral tale of actions and consequences. I do not belive she or her family were better off in the end in spite of her taking over the care of the priest's orphans. Very interesting reading...food for thought.

Editorial Review:

A Pulitzer Prize-winning Author
A Nobel Prize-winning Author

Many of Pearl Buck's award-winning novels dealt largely with the peasants, the plain people of China, whose lives - though sturdy and dramatic - were rarely complex, whose thoughts and words were simple and direct. In Pavilion of Women, the story is of a great family of the landed gentry, well-to-do, cultivated, aware and in the midst of the variety of human experience.

Tony Hawk: Professional Skateboarder

Tony Hawk

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 16 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

"Tony Hawk : Professional Skateboarder" A Skater's Point of View 5 out of 5 stars.
4 of 4 people found this review helpful.

Tony Hawk: Professional Skateboarder was a great autobiography. Tony Hawk is the main person. He talks about his life from when he was a baby through his adult hood with ups and downs of his skateboarding career.
Tony Hawk wouldn't be a successful pro skateboarder if it weren't for his brother. He introduced Tony to skating at age 9. Once Tony was really into skateboarding, he became pro. In the summer of 1999 Tony Hawk landed the 900.He was the fist person to ever land that. You have to spin fully around 2 ½ times. Tony made history in skateboarding. He is a great role model and gives skateboarding a good name.
I thought this book was great and if you are smart about skateboarding history, you will connect to a lot of things in this novel. This book is for all ages. I enjoyed it, and if you like skateboarding, you will like it too. If you don't like skateboarding, you might learn stuff about skating. Also, you might get interested in skateboarding. Now enough about the book review, read Tony Hawk: Professional Skateboarder.

Editorial Review:

In this young adult autobiography, Tony Hawk shares the stories from his life that have helped him become a skateboarding hero.

Hawk speaks of being a super–competitive 'demon' child who found peace while on a skateboard. Classmates teased him because of his interest in an 'uncool' sport. Instead of retaliating with violence, he practised even more. With his story, he will inspire a younger generation of fans to stand up for what they believe in and follow their dreams.

Ages 8–12

Bad Boy: A Memoir

Walter Dean Myers

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 58 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Bad Boy 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

Bad Boy
By Walter Dean Myers
Review by Kareem Joey



Bad Boy .Hoops .Fly jimmy fly, what do all of these great
Books have in common? They were all written by Walter dean Myers a high school dropout!

Bad you are a thrilling book full of suspense and hard ships. IT starts while Walter was just a little boy. Even though his life was hard he somehow mad it through. The hardest part of waters life was probably his home town. Life in Harlem in the 1940s was rough. There was always crime and fights. The neighborhood was dirty and thee houses were rigtty.But Walter somehow made it thought. His main problem while he was growing up was his love for reading and writing. This is a problem because his bad and friends do not approve of his hobbies they begin to make fun of him and he begins to grow a hard outer shell.


He than becomes a bully. Towards the end of the story his anger calms and he starts to not care what people think of him. He then follows and becomes a famous writer. Though his father still doesn't approve his mother tries to keep him inspired. This Book teaches you to follow your dreams no matter what people think about you. They should not a have a say in you're future because only can decide what you do in life

Editorial Review:

Into a memoir that is gripping, funny, heartbreaking, and unforgettable, Walter Dean Myers richly weaves the details of his Harlem childhood in the 1940s and 1950s: a loving home life with his adopted parents, Bible school, street games, and the vitality of his neighborhood. Although Walter spent much of his time either getting into trouble or on the basketball court, secretly he was a voracious reader and an aspiring writer. But as his prospects for a successful future diminished, the values he had been taught at home, in school, and in his community seemed worthless, and he turned to the streets and his books for comfort. Here in his own words is the story of one of the strongest voices in children's and young adult literature today.

The Dark Side of Camelot

Seymour M. Hersh

List Price: $26.95 By: Little Brown and Company Amazon Marketplace: 422 new & used starting at $0.01

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 100 Average rating: 3.5 of 5

Slimeball proffering slimeballs telling stories about slimeballs 2 out of 5 stars.
8 of 9 people found this review helpful.

Seymour Hersh, the man according to whom we have to thank for the Church Commission (which led to idiotic government intelligence "reforms" that, in turn, contributed to the intelligence failures that permitted 9-11), presents his best shot in this book at smearing the Kennedy clan. John especially, but also Joe and even to a certain extent Bobby. In most of the book, he succeeds in this task only to the extent we can trust mobsters, convicted felons, former madams, self-professed ex-lovers, hustlers, disgruntled employees and bankrupt, disbarred attorneys to tell us the truth.

However, Mr. Hersh does present some very compelling testimonies from JFK's secret service agents, who describe JFK's White House adolescent hijinks in rhyparographic detail. Believe me, that section alone (pp 226-246) is enough to take the shine off Camelot -- permanently.

Hersh is perplexing. He has impeccable anti-American and Democratic Party credentials, yet he savages JFK, a fellow Democrat, in a way that no one had done before, or in the eleven years since the book was published. Why? I can only conclude that Hersh's anger stems from his view that JFK was responsible for Vietnam. Hersh addresses Vietnam in the last two chapters of the book, and although these chapters are better sourced than some of the more salacious sections, the chapters seem disjointed, meandering, and tied together only by rage towards JFK.

Editorial Review:

Written by one of America's premier investigative reporters--and five years in the making--The Dark Side Of Camelot is a monumental work that is certain to change the popular view of the Kennedy family forever. A two-hour ABC-TV special hosted by Peter Jennings on the writing of this book is planned.

Anne Frank: Beyond the Diary - A Photographic Remembrance

Ruud Van der Rol, Rian Verhoeven

List Price: $18.99 By: Viking Juvenile Amazon Marketplace: 28 new & used starting at $0.75

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 33 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Anne Frank the Diary of a Young Girl 5 out of 5 stars.
2 of 2 people found this review helpful.

I rated this book a five because while you read it makes you relize that you are so lucky you weren't born in those very tragic times.It made me think about how easy I, and others have it.I love this book because it teaches me about other peoples lives and how hard it was for them.I also think that it was well written and easy to understand.I'm not positive that you will like this book because of how sad and frightning the tale is, but if you are anything like me you will have your face stuck in a book 'till your done.

Anne Frank 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 2 people found this review helpful.

This is one of the most tragic stories i have ever heard, ever!
I first read the story when i was in the second grade.Now i'm in the fifth grade and i still love the story!I think that this book is for everyone.And i hope you want to read this book, wether it is for a report or fun i am sure you will love this book almost as much as i did!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
P.S.

So not possible!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Editorial Review:

A complement to Anne Frank's famed diary, this volume contains brief essays on topics such as the Jewish ghettos and more than one hundred photographs taken during Anne's brief lifetime. 50,000 first printing. $30,000 ad/promo. BOMC.

Going Solo

Roald Dahl

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 33 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Going Solo 3 out of 5 stars.
2 of 2 people found this review helpful.

Going Solo (the sequel to Boy) is a collection of Roald Dahl's most interesting stories of his time in Africa. These include: meeting a man you gives himself dandruff, teaching an African boy to read and write, seeing a lion attack a cook, learning to fly without a teacher, crashing in the African desert, leading a unit of R.A.F. soldiers to stop a caravan of German people from leaving Dar es Salaam, becoming temporarily blind, meeting the girl of his dreams then falling out of love when he sees her and living on a Greek airfield soon before he was grounded. Roald Dahl's style of writing changes each time slightly changes to fit the story. Basically, you get the idea that you have known Roald for years and he is just telling you an amusing story. Going Solo was not as interesting as some of his other fiction stories. For some readers it may not be interesting enough to keep you in the book; but it is not boring, thrills and adventure are always happening. To compare this to Boy would be a little difficult because even though they are the same writer, Boy is about his childhood and is for younger readers. Going Solo is probably for older readers. Even it you do not like one of the chapters the next will bring you back in. So if you want a lot of good anecdotes to read then or if you really liked Boy, you should pick up Going Solo.

Editorial Review:

This is the second part of Roald Dahl's remarkable life story that tells of his time working in Africa and his wartime exploits.

It's a Jungle Out There (The Rani Adventures; Bk. 1) (The Rani Adventures Series : Vol 1) (The Rani Adventures Series : Vol 1)

Ron Snell

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 9 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

Book One of the Rani Adventures begins with Ron Snell's birth as the eldest child of missionary parents living in the rainforests of Peru. Colorfully depicting what growing up in such surroundings was like, Snell has captured a wide-ranging audience ranging from homeschool children to senior citizens. "I wouldn't trade my childhood for any other," Snell writes. "Conceived in the Amazon rainforest, I learned to walk and talk among the Machiguenga Indians who, to this day, call me 'Rani'. "The 'Machis' were my first babysitters and friends. From them I learned to tie a house together, eat monkeys and macaws, and make dugout canoes. They laughed at my log rides down rampaging rivers and caught exotic pets for me. "Life was one great adventure after another. After all, what could be more fun than perching in thorn trees at night to escape a herd of stampeding pigs? "The Machiguengas adopted me and my family into theirs. As they touched our lives we discovered what it would cost us to touch theirs. "I hope this first book of the Rani Adventures will bring you laugher, tears and a new perspective on the old cliche: 'It's a jungle out there!' " The second edition (5 1/2 inches by 8 1/2 inches) is larger than the first edition (4 1/4 inches by 7 inches. You are currently viewing the larger, second edition.