Review by Library Journal Review
Sixteen essays, many written "simply for the pleasure of the act," are gathered and introduced by author and poet Grealy. "Mirrorings," from Harper's magazine, describes her childhood cancer and disfigurement, the subject of her critically acclaimed Autobiography of a Face (selected as one of LJ's Best Books of 1994). In another essay, she is shocked to find herself face to face on a talk show with a fan who had been stalking her and whom she was supposed to surprise. Other pieces deal with the rootlessness of immigrants (her family came from Ireland and England), the physical nature of love for animals and the competition for a dog's attention at a friend's house, and her lack of closeness with her twin sister. The author struggles with tango lessons, and she falls in love with the boots on a model in an advertisement in spite of their impracticality. Although she's sometimes guilty of "interrupting myself and going off on tangents and including extraneous information," her observations are fresh and laced with humor. For public, academic, and medical libraries.DNancy P. Shires, East Carolina Univ., Greenville, NC (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
A funny, imaginative, and intelligent collection of essays that incorporate memoir, cultural observation, philosophy, sex, death, disease, and drag queen fashion. These stories--for they are more stories than formal essays--take the reader for a ride along streams of consciousness that glide from relatively calm reflections on poetry and prose to the rapids of a ride in a New York City taxi, where every encounter is with a would-be author. That includes the passenger, the cabbie, and a traffic cop. Those familiar with Grealy's well-received Autobiography of a Face (1994), the story of two decades spent growing up with and battling facial cancer, will recognize some of the circumstances and the characters. Her twin sister, Sara, brother Sean, and the stable of broken-down horses that was her refuge during her early adolescence reappear. Also starring are tango lessons, God, immigration, and a yellow house near the Tappan Zee bridge en route to college. But the ostensible subjects of the various chapters are mere launch pads for hard-won, clear-headed thoughts on what it means to be alive. Take her friends the drag queens (the opening act in a short chapter titled "The Girls"): pitch-perfect dialogue and descriptions of attitude segue into considerations of a terrifying Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale and the concept of femininity. A chapter on religion moves from Mr. Ed (TV's talking horse) to Christ on the cross; later, her fantasy of the authentic yellow house collides with her memories of the boxy ranch with the fake shutters where her family really lived. By the merest chance, she saw the yellow house demolished by a wrecking ball. The house with the fake shutters survived, but "What kind of storms did we think those shutters would keep out?" Relaxed, honest, and illuminating, Grealy achieves her goal: if life is the answer, "start finding the questions worthy of it." Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
