biography

Review: A Memoir of Friendship edited by Blanche and Allison Howard

November 13, 2007 admin 0

Today, in January Magazine’s biography section, contributing editor Cherie Thiessen reviews A Memoir of Friendship: The Letters Between Carol Shields and Blanche Howard. Says Thiessen: The two women met at a university women’s club meeting hosted by Shields when both were beginning their writing. Shields was 35 and Blanche, 47. It was to the older woman that Shields would turn when she needed advice on childrearing, wanted an expert eye to critique her writing, or […]

Review: … and His Lovely Wife by Connie Schultz

November 6, 2007 admin 0

Today, in January Magazine’s biography section, contributing editor Mary Ward Menke reviews … and His Lovely Wife: A Memoir from the Woman Beside the Man. by Pulitzer Prize winner Connie Schultz. Says Ward Menke: Connie Schultz and Sherrod Brown, middle-aged and divorced with two children each, married in 2004. A year later, the Democratic Congressman from Ohio decided to give up his Congressional seat to run against Mike DeWine, a two-term Republican Senator, in a […]

Review: The Tenth Muse: My Life in Food by Judith Jones

October 18, 2007 admin 0

Today, in January Magazine’s biography section, January contributing editor Diane Leach reviews The Tenth Muse: My Life in Food by Judith Jones. Says Leach: Judith Jones hails from another era, one where garlic-fearing bluebloods hired cooks who served fish on Fridays and no upright person consumed French food, a cuisine that, with all those sauces, surely had something to hide. Daughters, after educations at Spence and Barnard, were expected to make good marriages and carry […]

Review: Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver

June 21, 2007 admin 0

Today, in January Magazine’s biography section, Diane Leach reviews Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver, Steven L. Hopp and Camille Kingsolver. Says Leach: Animal, Vegetable, Miracle chronicles the Kingsolver-Hopp family’s resolution to step off the petroleum grid for one year, eating only local, sustainably produced meats, fruits, and vegetables either from or near their Kentucky farm. The journey begins literally, with the family — biologist Steven L. Hopp, Barbara, 19-year-old Camille, and nine-year old Lily […]

Review: Poster Child by Emily Rapp

June 14, 2007 admin 0

Today, in January Magazine’s biography section, contributing editor Andi Shechter looks at Poster Child by Emily Rapp. Says Shechter: It is difficult to develop empathy or sympathy for Rapp, even when she tells you that she was often the only female at the prosthetics office, talking only with far older men, often war veterans. No one there was her peer, no one had an understanding of her situation. She doesn’t seem to want any sympathy […]

Review: Julia Child by Laura Shapiro

May 8, 2007 admin 0

Today, in January Magazine’s biography section, Diane Leach reviews Penguin Lives: Julia Child by Laura Shapiro. Says Leach: Almost all foodies know some of the story … Child’s love affair with French food, and by extension, French life. Her training at Cordon Bleu, her pivotal friendships with Louise Bertholle and Simone Beck (Simca), relationships culminating in Mastering the Art of French Cooking, volumes that rescued American foodways from a wasteland of frozen stringbean casseroles. The […]

Review: Too Soon to Say Goodbye by Art Buchwald

March 28, 2007 admin 0

Today in January’s biography section, Mary Ward Menke considers Too Soon to Say Goodbye by Art Buchwald, published not long before the Pulitzer Prize-winning humor columnist passed away early this year. Buchwald was well aware of the challenge of writing a book about dying: death may be inevitable, but nobody wants to talk about it. He starts by explaining that the purpose of hospice is to make death easier for the dying person and their […]