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Here's the Story CD: Surviving Marcia Brady and Finding My True Voice

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 67 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

And that's the way she became part of the Brady Bunch... 3 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

An interesting read that any fan of the Brady Bunch should most certainly check out. I got this book because I too, like so many others became a fan of this show due to all the repeats shown on cable networks throughout the years as well as local syndication. I don't know what it is about this silly show from the 70's but the characters and even the actors portraying them have always been of interest to me.

So of course when I found out that our very own Maureen "Marcia, Marcia, Marcia!" McCormick was going to do an autobiography and give the scoop on what went on behind the scenes and in her life I had to check it out.

For the most part it was a fun read. Surprisingly, its not just a book about what happened on the set of the Brady Bunch or the usual stories we all know to death by now of how much Robert Reed hated to be on the show and how he was in the closet the whole time, (but there is a lot of that too truth be told) its more of a story of , well a story of Maureen the person. Not just her portraying Marcia, but how she is and always has been a real person behind the character.

Its very revealing. You almost feel like Maureen is letting out everything she has been holding in for some 50 years, freely and openly. Just putting it out there in chronological order of her life. And some of it is interesting actually but a lot of it is typical of a lot of child star actors who are big on the show they were on but never quite make it out of the shadow of said show.

She battles drugs, relationship problems, family problems, trying to build a career in Marcia's shadow and her trying to find herself again after all seems lost. Its interesting to learn about the actress who played one of the most well known TV teenage girls of all time. And see that yes, she is very human and not at all what we would expect Marcia if she were real to be like.

The real drawbacks with this book are that:
Firstly its way too short. 50 years of your life is a long time, especially when you are on a hit show and all that followed after. The book is only 274 pages and is a quick read. I really was hoping for more as there is so much to know and find out about that you know could have been in there.

Secondly not enough on her Brady Bunch experiences are mentioned. I really did enjoy learning of her life and her trials and tribulations and even some of the more shocking aspects of things going on in her family, but at the same time she is known as being Marcia on the Brady Bunch. What was her favorite episode? What did she think of every co actor she worked with? What did she think of the Brady Bunch Movie? What about the actress who played her in the Brady's? She skips over her experience on Brady Brides due to personal problems she was having. But honestly I would have loved to hear what it was like being in her state while doing the episodes of Brady Brides. The focus just became more of her co Star trying to save her which is nice and all but not what I personally was interested in as much. She could have even talked of what her relationship with Eve Plumb and the other actors on the spin off show were like. Again we are reading the book to find out more of her Brady Bunch connections and it just seemed quickly skimmed over. Even the Brady Christmas gets just a quick mention before its back to more about unrelated situations. This book could have been double the size easily if she just devoted more to her experience with the show as well as what we have now. It would have been a really great read then.

Lastly the complaint I have is that Maureen cries, a lot. And I feel her pain but its something you should be ready for if reading this book. A lot of emotional stress and some may feel for her or others may not. But I became not too surprised after awhile when every chapter had a crying moment that she had suddenly.

The book is still very good. I can't say its better than other Brady related books, as they told the fun things I wanted to know about. Learning about the actor is good, but lets face it, you wouldn't have a book at all if it weren't for the show you are trying to escape from. Lets hear more about the stuff going on the TV set and fights and fun moments and more about spin off series you did. It is a very fine little book but you almost wish she spent just another few months getting more details into it and devoting more to the behind the scenes aspects.

Finding religion, love and getting rid of a drug habit are nice reads and honestly not too shocking given that a lot of actors go through the same situations but if you are going to do a book like this make sure a lot more of it is devoted to the show experiences itself as I really felt it lacked in that department.

Its a good start and I'm sure it was really a weight off of Mrs. McCormick's shoulders to tell all, but a lot of fans of the show who were looking for more may be a little bit disappointed.

Editorial Review:

Marcia Brady, eldest daughter on television's The Brady Bunch, had it all. But what viewers didn't know about the always sunny, perfect Marcia was that off-screen, her real-life counterpart, Maureen McCormick was living a very different—and not-so-wonderful—life. Maureen tells the shocking and inspirational true story of the beloved teen and the woman she became.

Maureen takes us behind-the-scenes of America's favorite television family. But the real story begins after The Brady Bunch ended. Maureen found herself tangled in a fast-paced, drug-fueled, Hollywood existence that ultimately lead to the biggest battle of her life.

There is no question: Maureen McCormick is a survivor. Here's the Story is the empowering, engaging, shocking, and emotional tale of Maureen McCormick's courageous struggle over adversity and her lifelong battle to come to terms with the idea of perfection—and herself.

FDR

Jean Edward Smith

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 51 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

One of today’s premier biographers has written a modern, comprehensive, indeed ultimate book on the epic life of Franklin Delano Roosevelt. In this superlative volume, Jean Edward Smith combines contemporary scholarship and a broad range of primary source material to provide an engrossing narrative of one of America’s greatest presidents.

This is a portrait painted in broad strokes and fine details. We see how Roosevelt’s restless energy, fierce intellect, personal magnetism, and ability to project effortless grace permitted him to master countless challenges throughout his life. Smith recounts FDR’s battles with polio and physical disability, and how these experiences helped forge the resolve that FDR used to surmount the economic turmoil of the Great Depression and the wartime threat of totalitarianism. Here also is FDR’s private life depicted with unprecedented candor and nuance, with close attention paid to the four women who molded his personality and helped to inform his worldview: His mother, Sara Delano Roosevelt, formidable yet ever supportive and tender; his wife, Eleanor, whose counsel and affection were instrumental to FDR’s public and individual achievements; Lucy Mercer, the great romantic love of FDR’s life; and Missy LeHand, FDR’s longtime secretary, companion, and confidante, whose adoration of her boss was practically limitless.

Smith also tackles head-on and in-depth the numerous failures and miscues of Roosevelt’s public career, including his disastrous attempt to reconstruct the Judiciary; the shameful internment of Japanese-Americans; and Roosevelt’s occasionally self-defeating Executive overreach. Additionally, Smith offers a sensitive and balanced assessment of Roosevelt’s response to the Holocaust, noting its breakthroughs and shortcomings.

Summing up Roosevelt’s legacy, Jean Smith declares that FDR, more than any other individual, changed the relationship between the American people and their government. It was Roosevelt who revolutionized the art of campaigning and used the burgeoning mass media to garner public support and allay fears. But more important, Smith gives us the clearest picture yet of how this quintessential Knickerbocker aristocrat, a man who never had to depend on a paycheck, became the common man’s president. The result is a powerful account that adds fresh perspectives and draws profound conclusions about a man whose story is widely known but far less well understood. Written for the general reader and scholars alike, FDR is a stunning biography in every way worthy of its subject.


From the Hardcover edition.

The Warren Buffett Way, 2nd Edition

Robert Hagstrom

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 89 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Oracle of Omaha 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

Amidst the current market chaos, this book is more relevant than ever. Robert Hagstrom offers a largely historical overview of Warren Buffets exploits in the market over the past several decades - both good and bad ones, attempting to explain the guiding principles for each investment.

As you make your way through the book, it doesn't take long to grasp the recurring themes of value investing, good management, and competence in the area you invest in. The discussion on index, passive, and active investment strategies was especially interesting in the context of speculative vs. ownership viewpoints.

I have to admit, I've stayed away from the stock market, largely due to my own general ignorance of all the variables - even though I've taken courses, read and listened to books on strategies and numerous case studies. At times I've wondered if I was just being too risk averse for my own good, but I'm glad I've not given in because what implicitly held be back is exactly what Warren Buffet warns against: speculative investment.

Great read and highly recommended. I'm looking forward to learning more about Warren Buffet and Berkshire Hathaway.

Editorial Review:

First published in 1984, The Warren Buffet Way gave investors their first in-depth look at the innovative investment and business strategies behind this living legend's spectacular success. Tracing Warren Buffett's career from the beginning, Hagstrom revealed to listeners exactly how, starting with an initial investment of only $100, Buffett built a business empire worth $19.4 billion. The second edition of The Warren Buffet Way completely updates this classic audiobook on its tenth anniversary with new material on Buffett's recent acquisitions, debt deals, and approaches to fixed income and technology.

Lincoln: The Biography of a Writer

Fred Kaplan

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Total reviews: 7 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

For Abraham Lincoln, whether he was composing love letters, speeches, or legal arguments, words mattered. In Lincoln, acclaimed biographer Fred Kaplan explores the life of America’s sixteenth president through his use of language as a vehicle both to express complex ideas and feelings and as an instrument of persuasion and empowerment. Like the other great canonical writers of American literature – a status he is gradually attaining – Lincoln had a literary career that is inseparable from his life story. An admirer and avid reader of Burns, Byron, Shakespeare, and the Old Testament, Lincoln was the most literary of our presidents. His views on love, liberty, and human nature were shaped by his reading and knowledge of literature.

Since Lincoln, no president has written his own words and addressed his audience with equal and enduring effectiveness. Kaplan focuses on the elements that shaped Lincoln’s mental and imaginative world; how his writings molded his identity, relationships, and career; and how they simultaneously generated both the distinctive political figure he became and the public discourse of the nation. This unique account of Lincoln’s life and career highlights the shortcomings of the modern presidency, reminding us, through Lincoln’s legacy and appreciation for language, that the careful and honest use of words is a necessity for successful democracy.

Illuminating and engrossing, Lincoln brilliantly chronicles Abraham Lincoln’s genius with language.

Up Till Now: The Autobiography

David Fisher

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Total reviews: 57 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

This is the story of William Shatner’s half-century career and private life. The audio will take readers from the streets of Montreal to regional theatre, where Shatner was once called upon to replace Christopher Plummer as Henry V— in a role he had never rehearsed, with actors he had never met. It will describe his early TV work and movies, among them Roger Corman’s The Intruder, a movie about racism filmed in the south in 1961; Kingdom of the Spiders, in which he costarred with 30,000 tarantulas; and Incubus, the only film ever made in the language of Esperanto.

It will include his private life, including the complete story of the drowning death of his third wife. It will include stories from three other series, T.J. Hooker, Rescue 911—which saved more than 240 lives—and Boston Legal, as well as his work on Third Rock from the Sun, for which he won his first Emmy for playing “the Big Giant Head.”

And of course, it will include the story of Star Trek; how it came about and how it affected him—and fans—concluding with the story of a taxi driver who told Shatner he’d been a prisoner in Vietnam and that pretending they were the Star Trek crew kept him and his fellow inmates sane. And yes, it will include his singing and commercials and quiz show hosting and award show hosting and the greatest practical joke ever played, Invasion, Iowa, not to mention the story about Shatner being invited into a cage with Koko the Gorilla—who wanted to take him back to her bedcage.

After almost 60 years, William Shatner has become one of our most beloved entertainers. And as evidenced by Comedy Central’s roast, “The Shat Hits the Fan,” Shatner gets the joke. For the first time, William Shatner shares with listeners the remarkable, full story of his life.

Alexander Hamilton

Ron Chernow

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 256 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

Building on biographies by Richard Brookhiser and Willard Sterne Randall, Ron Chernow’s Alexander Hamilton provides what may be the most comprehensive modern examination of the often overlooked Founding Father. From the start, Chernow argues that Hamilton’s premature death at age 49 left his record to be reinterpreted and even re-written by his more long-lived enemies, among them: Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, and James Monroe. Hamilton’s achievements as first Secretary of the Treasury, co-author of The Federalist Papers, and member of the Constitutional Convention were clouded after his death by strident claims that he was an arrogant, self-serving monarchist. Chernow delves into the almost 22,000 pages of letters, manuscripts, and articles that make up Hamilton’s legacy to reveal a man with a sophisticated intellect, a romantic spirit, and a late-blooming religiosity.

One fault of the book, is that Chernow is so convinced of Hamilton’s excellence that his narrative sometimes becomes hagiographic. Nowhere is this more apparent than in Chernow’s account of the infamous duel between Hamilton and Aaron Burr in 1804. He describes Hamilton’s final hours as pious, while Burr, Jefferson, and Adams achieve an almost cartoonish villainy at the news of Hamilton’s passing.

A defender of the union against New England secession and an opponent of slavery, Hamilton has a special appeal to modern sensibilities. Chernow argues that in contrast to Jefferson and Washington’s now outmoded agrarian idealism, Hamilton was "the prophet of the capitalist revolution" and the true forebear of modern America. In his Prologue, he writes: "In all probability, Alexander Hamilton is the foremost figure in American history who never attained the presidency, yet he probably had a much deeper and more lasting impact than many who did." With Alexander Hamilton, this impact can now be more widely appreciated. --Patrick O'Kelley

Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light: The Private Writings of the "Saint of Calcutta"

Mother Teresa of Calcutta

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 120 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

This historic work reveals the inner spiritual life of one of the most beloved and important religious figures in history.

During her lifelong service to the poorest of the poor, Mother Teresa became an icon of compassion to people of all religions; her extraordinary contributions to the care of the sick, the dying, and thousands of others nobody else was prepared to look after has been recognized and acclaimed throughout the world. Little is known, however, about her own spiritual heights or her struggles. This collection of her writing and reflections, almost all of which have never been made public before, sheds light on Mother Teresa's interior life in a way that reveals the depth and intensity of her holiness for the first time.

Compiled and presented by Fr. Brian Kolodiejchuk, M.C., who knew Mother Teresa for twenty years and is the postulator for her cause for sainthood and director of the Mother Teresa Center, MOTHER TERESA brings together letters she wrote to her spiritual advisors over decades. A moving chronicle of her spiritual journey—including moments, indeed years, of utter desolation—these letters reveal the secrets she shared only with her closest confidants. She emerges as a classic mystic whose inner life burned with the fire of charity and whose heart was tested and purified by an intense trial of faith, a true dark night of the soul.

Published to coincide with the tenth anniversary of her death, MOTHER TERESA is an intimate portrait of a woman whose life and work continue to be admired by millions of people.

Called Out of Darkness: A Spiritual Confession

Anne Rice

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 35 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

4.5 stars - Fascinating on several levels 4 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

With the release of "Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt" the reading world discovered that Anne Rice, queen of Vampire and occult fiction, had undergone a profound religious conversion returning to her Catholic roots. So profound was her conversion that she has set the goal of only writing about Jesus, in one way or another, for the remainder of her life. This spiritual confession is about her journey away from Him and back to Him.

In the rich and sensuous prose her fans are familiar with Rice writes of her childhood in Catholic New Orleans, her early devotion to Christ and the Catholic Church, and the events that led her to abandon her faith early in college. She write about her years as an atheist and how her struggle with meaning in life came out in her fiction. Lastly, you will learn why, after forty years of staunch atheism, she was able to believe again.

Although a bit wordy (this is Anne Rice after all), this is a beautifully written, fascinating account of inner life and faith. You will not find torrid details or in depth accounts of many things that fans typically want to know about their favorite authors. What you will find is far more rewarding. Rice examines what her faith was founded on as a child, why it foundered, and how she made it back to God and Jesus. For those who do not believe this could be a great explanation of religious conversion. For those who do believe, Catholic or Protestant, you will see yourself in Mrs. Rice as she struggles with the most difficult questions while still loving her God and Savior.

Editorial Review:

In 2005, Anne Rice startled her readers with her novel Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt, and by revealing that, after years as an atheist, she had returned to her Catholic faith.

And now, in her powerful memoir, Rice tells the story of the spiritual transformation that produced a complete change in her literary goals. She begins with her girlhood in New Orleans as the devout child in a deeply religious family. She writes about her years in Berkeley, where her career as a novelist began with the publication of Interview with the Vampire. She writes about loss and tragedy (her mother’s drinking; the death of her daughter and, later, her beloved husband); about new joys; about the birth of her son. She tells how after an adult lifetime of questioning, she experienced the intense conversion and consecration to Christ that lie behind her most recent novels.

Wins, Losses, and Lessons CD: An Autobiography

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 3 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

When I die and people realize that I will not be resurrected in three days, they will forget me. That is the way it should be. For reasons known only to God, I was asked to write an autobiography. Most people who knew me growing up didn't think I would ever read a book, let alone write one.—Lou Holtz

Few people in the history of college sports have been more influential or had a bigger impact than Lou Holtz. Winner of the three national Coach of the Year honors, the only coach ever to lead six different schools to season-ending bowl games, and the ninth-winningest coach in college football history, Holtz is still teaching and coaching, although he is no longer on the gridiron.

In his most telling work to date, the man still known as "Coach" reveals what motivated a rail-thin 135-pound kid with marginal academic credentials and a pronounced speech impediment to play and coach college football, and to become one of the most sought-after motivational speakers in history. With unflinching honesty and his trademark dry wit, Holtz goes deep, giving us the intimate details of the people who shaped his life and the decisions he would make that shaped the life of so many others.

His is a storied career, and Holtz provides a frank and inside look at the challenges he overcame to turn around the programs at William and Mary, North Carolina State, Arkansas, and Minnesota. From growing up in East Liverpool, Ohio, to his early days as a graduate assistant at the University of Iowa, to his national championship runs at Notre Dame and his final seasons on the sidelines in South Carolina, Lou Holtz gives his best, a poignant, funny, and instructive look into a life well lived.

Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who RIsked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II

Robert Kurson

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 291 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

In the tradition of Jon Krakauer’s Into Thin Air and Sebastian Junger’s The Perfect Storm comes a true tale of riveting adventure in which two weekend scuba divers risk everything to solve a great historical mystery–and make history themselves.

For John Chatterton and Richie Kohler, deep wreck diving was more than a sport. Testing themselves against treacherous currents, braving depths that induced hallucinatory effects, navigating through wreckage as perilous as a minefield, they pushed themselves to their limits and beyond, brushing against death more than once in the rusting hulks of sunken ships.
But in the fall of 1991, not even these courageous divers were prepared for what they found 230 feet below the surface, in the frigid Atlantic waters sixty miles off the coast of New Jersey: a World War II German U-boat, its ruined interior a macabre wasteland of twisted metal, tangled wires, and human bones–all buried under decades of accumulated sediment.
No identifying marks were visible on the submarine or the few artifacts brought to the surface. No historian, expert, or government had a clue as to which U-boat the men had found. In fact, the official records all agreed that there simply could not be a sunken U-boat and crew at that location.

Over the next six years, an elite team of divers embarked on a quest to solve the mystery. Some of them would not live to see its end. Chatterton and Kohler, at first bitter rivals, would be drawn into a friendship that deepened to an almost mystical sense of brotherhood with each other and with the drowned U-boat sailors–former enemies of their country. As the men’s marriages frayed under the pressure of a shared obsession, their dives grew more daring, and each realized that he was hunting more than the identities of a lost U-boat and its nameless crew.

Author Robert Kurson’s account of this quest is at once thrilling and emotionally complex, and it is written with a vivid sense of what divers actually experience when they meet the dangers of the ocean’s underworld. The story of Shadow Divers often seems too amazing to be true, but it all happened, two hundred thirty feet down, in the deep blue sea.


From the Hardcover edition.