Hero: The Life and Legend of Lawrence of Arabia

Michael Korda. Hero: The Life and Legend of Lawrence of Arabia. New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 2010
As reviewed by Ted Odenwald

There are more than 50 biographies of British war hero, T.E. Lawrence, ranging from total adulation to sneering skepticism and debunking, from political and military analysis to psychoanalytic dissection. Historian/biographer Michael Korda, through his [...]

The Red Garden

Alice Hoffman. The Red Garden.
New York: Crown Publishers, 2011
as reviewed by Ted Odenwald

Through a collection of interwoven stories about the citizenry of rustic Blackwell, Massachusetts, Alice Hoffman has earned a place of honor on the bookshelf near Saroyan’s The Human Comedy, Anderson’s Winesburg, Ohio, and Joyce’s Dubliners. This fictional backwater is populated by [...]

Unbroken

Laura Hillenbrand. Unbroken: A World War II
Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption.
New York: Random House, 2010.
as reviewed by Ted Odenwald

He was unbroken, though beaten, starved, tortured, humiliated, cast adrift, diseased, and imprisoned. U.S. Army Air Force Lieutenant Louie Zampirini endured hardships that nearly destroyed him physically, mentally, and spiritually in the last [...]

Conversations with Cronkite

Walter Cronkite and Don Carleton. Conversations with Cronkite.
Austin, Texas: Dolph Briscoe Center for American History, The University of Texas at Austin: 2010
as reviewed by Ted Odenwald

Walter Cronkite, arguably the most respected, renowned, trusted, and influential newscasters in the twentieth century, reflects on his career in this edited collection of interviews. When Cronkite published [...]

The Autobiography of Mark Twain

The Autobiography of Mark Twain. The Complete and
Authoritative Edition. Volume 1. ed. Harriet Elinor Smith et al.
Berkeley, California: The University of California Press, 2010
As reviewed by Ted Odenwald

In 1906, after many unsatisfactory starts, Mark Twain finally “…hit upon the right way to do an autobiography.” His method was a type of stream-of-consciousness, [...]

Possessed:The Life of Joan Crawford

Donald Spoto. Possessed:The Life of Joan Crawford.
New York: William Morrow, 2010
as reviewed by Ted Odenwald
Donald Spoto, the renowned biographer of more than two dozen stars of stage and screen, believed that a new biography of Joan Crawford was required because “perhaps no other star…has been so underappreciated, misrepresented by rumor, innuendo, fabrication, unfounded allegation [...]

War

Sebastian Junger. War. New York: Twelve, 2010.
As reviewed by Ted Odenwald

In early November, President Obama presented Army Staff Sergeant Salvatore Giunta with the Medal of Honor in recognition for a series of heroic actions while under heavy fire from the Taliban in Afghanistan. There are several aspects of this story that are riveting: the [...]

The Death and Life of the Great American School System

Diane Ravitch. The Death and Life of the Great American School System: How Testing and Choice Are Undermining Education. New York: Basic Books, 2010.
As reviewed by Ted Odenwald
Diane Ravitch, a highly respected historian of education, has written an impassioned plea for sanity in the area of education reform. Ravitch, a noted researcher at NYU [...]

Mark Twain’s Other Woman

Laura Skandera Trombley. Mark Twain’s Other Woman:
The Hidden Story of His Final Years. New York:
Alfred A. Knopf, 2010.
As reviewed by Ted Odenwald

With the voluminous collection of information regarding Samuel Clemens/Mark Twain’s life, one would hardly expect any mysteries. Yet Professor Laura Skandera Trombley has dedicated sixteen years of research to an issue that had [...]

Teaching the Pig to Dance

Fred Thompson. Teaching the Pig to Dance: A Memoir
of Growing Up and Second Chances. New York:
Crown Forum, 2010
as reviewed by Ted Odenwald

Many fans of TV’s “Law and Order” will recognize Fred Thompson as the senior lawyer with southern roots; followers of politics may recognize him as the former US senator from Tennessee; still others may [...]

Mark Twain: Man in White

Michael Sheldon. Mark Twain: Man in White: The Grand
Adventure of His Final Years. New York: Random House, 2010.
As reviewed by Ted Odenwald

It’s not that there isn’t enough biographical material available on Mark Twain. Between his autobiography and his “official” biography, penned by Albert Bigelow Paine (but definitely orchestrated by Clemens/Twain), there is enough [...]

Scout, Atticus & Boo: A Celebration of 50 Years of To Kill a Mockingbird

Mary McDonagh Murphy. Scout, Atticus & Boo: A Celebration
of Fifty Years of To Kill a Mockingbird. New York:
HarperCollins, 2010.
As reviewed by Ted Odenwald

If a novel, first published 50 years ago, still sells nearly a million copies per year, a celebration to recognize its enduring appeal seems appropriate. Mary McDonagh Murphy has created a [...]

Lit: A Memoir

Mary Karr. Lit: A Memoir. New York:
HarperCollins, 2009
as reviewed by Ted Odenwald

Readers of Mary Karr’s memoirs, The Liar’s Club and Cherry, will not be surprised to find powerful elements running throughout this third work, which focuses primarily on her twenties and thirties. In the first book, she relived her painful youth in the [...]

Paul and Me

A.E. Hotchner. Paul and Me: Fifty-three Years of Adventures
and Misadventures with My Pal Paul Newman.
New York: Nan A. Talese, 2010.
as reviewed by Ted Odenwald

What had begun as a collaboration of screenwriter and performer progressed into a relationship of neighbors and fishing buddies, and eventually evolved into a business partnership of philanthropists. Hotchner, primarily [...]

Every Man Dies Alone

This fictional account of wartime Nazi Germany is unusual in many respects. The author clearly wants the reader to view the protagonists, Otto and Anna Quangel, as being heroic; yet they are ordinary working people in no position of influence and without connections or power to resist—much less to overturn– the deadly suppression of the [...]

Bill Moyers: Genesis and The Language of Life

Bill Moyers. Genesis: A Living Conversation.
New York: Doubleday, 1996.
and
Bill Moyers. The Language of Life: A Festival of Poets.
New York: Doubleday, 1995.
Reviewed by Ted Odenwald
Though both of these books have been around for 15 years, neither is outdated. Though both are companion pieces to a series of broadcasts on public television, each work stands on its [...]

Ted Kennedy - Memoir vs. Biography

Kennedy, Edward M. True Compass: a Memoir. New York:
Twelve, 2009.
and
Team at the Boston Globe: Last Lion: The Fall and Rise
of Ted Kennedy. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2009.
as reviewed by Ten Odenwald

Here is an interesting choice: the memoir of the late Massachusetts Senator or an interpretive biography compiled and edited by several [...]

Yankee for Life

Yankee for Life by Bobby Murcer with Glenn Waggoner
New York: Harper, 2008.
Bobby Murcer’s Yankee for Life is a refreshingly simple memoir of the late outfielder/sportscaster’s passion for baseball, a passion overshadowed only by his love of his family. In an age where many headline stories about professional athletes are filled with marital infidelities, cheating [...]

All Hands Down

Ted Odenwald reviews All Hands Down: The True Story of the Soviet Attack on the USS Scorpion, By Kenneth Sewell and Jerome Preisler.

As They See ‘Em

Ted Odenwald reviews Bruce Weber’s 3 year study of the “land of umpires”