In a crowded life that ended this June, Connally was aide and confidant to Lyndon Johnson, businessman, secretary of the navy, governor of Texas, secretary of the treasury under Nixon, and presidential candidate. But he understood that he would be ``identified forever as the man who was wounded by the gun that killed John Kennedy,'' as he acknowledges matter-of-factly in this memoir (written with Herskowitz, coauthor of autobiographies of Dan Rather and Bette Davis). Two chapters here recount Connally's version of November 22, 1963, as he takes up arms against conspiracy theorists (including Oliver Stone) for ``renewing the nation's most haunting ordeal'' (ironically, the author's death from complications caused by his Dallas wounds have led conspiracy theorists to call for an autopsy). But even aside from the ``six seconds in Dallas,'' the rest of Connally's life still would be enough to merit his reminiscences—which, besides his stints in public office, cover his 1973 switch from the Democratic to the Republican Party; his 1974 indictment and acquittal on bribery charges in connection with the Watergate-era ``milk fund''; and his 1987 bankruptcy. Yet despite his distance from these events, Connally is seldom forthcoming about them—for instance, thanking Barbara Jordan for testifying on his behalf at his trial despite her disagreement ``with several of my political beliefs,'' but never explaining what those beliefs are (though they must relate to Connally's lukewarm stance on civil rights, a convulsive issue on which he's totally silent here). The best chapters detail the author's relationship with LBJ, whom Connally characterizes with affectionate exasperation as a kind of political older brother—impossible to work for but desperately craving to be liked. Like two other rangy Texans, Sam Houston and LBJ, Connally became a major controversial national figure by transforming his state. But while bristling with self-confidence and energy, his memoir tells little about the source of his Texas Tory beliefs. (Sixteen pages of b&w photographs—not seen)
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1993
ISBN: 1-56282-791-X
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Hyperion
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1993
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.
The legendary booze-addled metal rocker turned reality-TV star comes clean in his tell-all autobiography.
Although brought up in the bleak British factory town of Aston, John “Ozzy” Osbourne’s tragicomic rags-to-riches tale is somehow quintessentially American. It’s an epic dream/nightmare that takes him from Winson Green prison in 1966 to a presidential dinner with George W. Bush in 2004. Tracing his adult life from petty thief and slaughterhouse worker to rock star, Osbourne’s first-person slang-and-expletive-driven style comes off like he’s casually relating his story while knocking back pints at the pub. “What you read here,” he writes, “is what dribbled out of the jelly I call my brain when I asked it for my life story.” During the late 1960s his transformation from inept shoplifter to notorious Black Sabbath frontman was unlikely enough. In fact, the band got its first paying gigs by waiting outside concert venues hoping the regularly scheduled act wouldn’t show. After a few years, Osbourne and his bandmates were touring America and becoming millionaires from their riff-heavy doom music. As expected, with success came personal excess and inevitable alienation from the other members of the group. But as a solo performer, Osbourne’s predilection for guns, drink, drugs, near-death experiences, cruelty to animals and relieving himself in public soon became the stuff of legend. His most infamous exploits—biting the head off a bat and accidentally urinating on the Alamo—are addressed, but they seem tame compared to other dark moments of his checkered past: nearly killing his wife Sharon during an alcohol-induced blackout, waking up after a bender in the middle of a busy highway, burning down his backyard, etc. Osbourne is confessional to a fault, jeopardizing his demonic-rocker reputation with glib remarks about his love for Paul McCartney and Robin Williams. The most distinguishing feature of the book is the staggering chapter-by-chapter accumulation of drunken mishaps, bodily dysfunctions and drug-induced mayhem over a 40-plus-year career—a résumé of anti-social atrocities comparable to any of rock ’n’ roll’s most reckless outlaws.
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.Pub Date: Jan. 25, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-446-56989-7
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2009
IN THE NEWS
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
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