Biography-Memoir – Page 9 – Scott J. Pearson’s Book Review

A Burning in My Bones: The Authorized Biography of Eugene H. Peterson

By Scott J. Pearson | April 17, 2021April 17, 2021 by Scott J. Pearson

An ascetic is someone who eschews physical comforts in favor of a vivid spiritual life. Eugene Peterson, a Presbyterian pastor whose books won him fame, fortune, and respect, was a modern-day ascetic. He sought to run his ministry and career in an attempt to live as a (Protestant) saint. He eschewed leading his church and his life like a business and instead favored a life away from the limelight. Collier’s biography – achieved with the…

Borrowed Time: An AIDS Memoir

By Scott J. Pearson | April 2, 2021April 2, 2021 by Scott J. Pearson

“What am I going to do without him?”…“Write about him Paul… That’s what you have to do.” In a world before triple-drug therapy (HAART) was enacted and allowed individuals to live a normal lifespan with HIV, Monette and his lover Roger Horwitz contracted HIV, which ineluctably progressed into AIDS. Professionally, Horwitz was a lawyer and a lover of literature; Monette was a writer. Both were educated at Ivy League schools. This work is the first…

Biography-Memoir

J.R.R. Tolkien: A Biography

By Scott J. Pearson | March 6, 2021March 6, 2021 by Scott J. Pearson

J.R.R. Tolkien is most well-known to the public as the author of the famous trilogy Lord of the Rings, surely one of the best works of art ever written in the English language. This work by Carpenter serves as his authorized biography. Tolkien’s professorial and academic life as an Oxford don dominates most of the narrative, but always lingering behind lies his unique love of language (philology) – particularly “sub-creating” worlds with language. Carpenter achieves…

Biography-Memoir Society

Black Boy out of Time

By Scott J. Pearson | February 23, 2021March 11, 2021 by Scott J. Pearson

Ziyad is a black, queer male writer from Cleveland, who now lives in New York City and uses the pronouns they/them (which shall be used in this review). They write about his struggles forming an identity in a world that seems violent and hostile to his health. While such an environment exists in some part for most children, Ziyad seems to have a particularly difficult time given a multi-religious home, public schooling that seemed to…

Biography-Memoir Politics Society

Becoming by Michelle Obama

By Scott J. Pearson | February 4, 2021February 4, 2021 by Scott J. Pearson

In this brilliantly deliberate memoir, Obama reflects on the journey that is her life. She shares how an educationally-driven, middle-class, African-American girl from the south-side of Chicago could become First Lady of the United States. With the highest decency, she shares how she raised two girls while in the public eye and how she joined with her husband in carrying a difficult nation. Through her words, she courageously fights for the soul of a country,…

Biography-Memoir History Leadership Politics

Leadership: In Turbulent Times by Doris Kearns Goodwin

By Scott J. Pearson | December 26, 2020September 24, 2024 by Scott J. Pearson

In this work, Goodwin charts the lives of four influential US Presidents – Abraham Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and Lyndon Johnson. Having written leading biographies previously of each of these, she combines her insights to profile the character of leadership, at least in an American form. She distills prior deep study of these presidents into an interwoven narrative that highlights how their personal narratives enabled them to meet the challenges of their times…

Biography-Memoir Healthcare History Science

Mr. Humble and Dr. Butcher

By Scott J. Pearson | December 5, 2020December 5, 2020 by Scott J. Pearson

The surgery of organ transplantation has taken off in the past fifty years. However, the ability to apply these gains to the nervous system has lagged behind due to the limitations of nerve regeneration. As told in this book, during this time, Robert White, MD/PhD, sought to pioneer head transplantation onto a new body. He was successful in transplanting a monkey’s head onto another’s body. However, he retired and died before his dream could come…

Biography-Memoir

The Year We Disappeared: A True Crime Memoir

By Scott J. Pearson | November 29, 2020November 29, 2020 by Scott J. Pearson

This book was billed as a “father-daughter memoir,” and my daughter expressed interest in reading it. Thus, we decided to read it together. Multiple narrators give voice in this work, and authors are cycled in chapters between Cylin (the daughter) and John (the father). This is no normal father-daughter relationship, however. The father John, a police officer in Massachusetts, was targeted in a shooting by a crime family. Over decades, he had his face surgically…

Biography-Memoir Healthcare History Research-Education

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

By Scott J. Pearson | November 20, 2020November 20, 2020 by Scott J. Pearson

This work will stand as one of the most interesting works in the genre of the history of medicine in our era. Not only does it tell the origin in life of a famous cell line (HELA, an abbreviation of the name Henrietta Lacks, taught about in college biology classes). But it also tells the story of a humble family who was seemingly forgotten by science. Skloot tells the story of Deborah Lacks, Henrietta’s daughter,…

Biography-Memoir Fiction-Stories History

My Dear Hamilton: A Novel of Eliza Schuyler Hamilton

By Scott J. Pearson | November 19, 2020November 19, 2020 by Scott J. Pearson

Thanks to Ron Chernow’s award-winning biography and Lin-Manuel Miranda’s award-winning musical, interest in the historical figure of Alexander Hamilton has experienced a rebirth in recent years. Many have also fallen in love with his wife Eliza who endured much for the birth of America – a revolutionary war, the country’s first sex scandal, deadly duels impacting her family, whispers and improprieties, a hostile post-revolution political environment, and fifty years of being a widow. However, the…