“I Beat the Odds 

   From Homelessness to 

THE BLIND SIDE and Beyond”

 .....By Michael Oher, with Don Yaeger.....

2011 Book Review #79

      Book Cover

An offensive tackle for the Baltimore Ravens, Michael Oher is the young man at the center of the true story depicted in The Blind Side movie (and book) that swept up awards and accolades. Though the odds were heavily stacked against him, Michael had a burning desire deep within his soul to break out of the Memphis inner-city ghetto and into a world of opportunity.

While many people are now familiar with Oher's amazing journey, this is the first time he shares his account of his story in his own words, revealing his thoughts and feelings with details that only he knows, and offering his point of view on how anyone can achieve a better life.

Looking back on how he went from being a homeless child in Memphis to playing in the NFL, Michael talks about the goals he had for himself in order to break out of the cycle of poverty, addiction, and hopelessness that trapped his family for so long. He recounts poignant stories growing up in the projects and running from child services and foster care over and over again in search of some familiarity.

Eventually, he grasped onto football as his ticket out of the madness and worked hard to make his dream into a reality. But Oher also knew he would not be successful alone. With his adoptive family, the Touhys, and other influential people in mind, he describes the absolute necessity of seeking out positive role models and good friends who share the same values to achieve one's dreams.

My Thoughts:  It is the part of the story not told by the ‘The Blind Side’ movie and book.  Oher tries to inspire and give direction to those in need of assistance getting their lives on track.  He gives hope to those who have not had hope in the past!  There is a lot of repetition in the chapters of this book, but, I think it is because Oher wants, so earnestly, to get his point across.

Suggestion:  Get this book to anyone you know who might be inspired by it!   If you have not read the book, ‘The Blind Side’ or seen the movie…you might want to check it out!

“Teacher Man: A Memoir”

  By Frank McCourt

2011 Book Review #65

 Publishers Weekly Review

This final memoir in the trilogy that started with “Angela's Ashes” and continued in “ 'Tis”, focuses almost exclusively on McCourt's 30-year teaching career in New York City's public high schools, which began at McKee Vocational and Technical in 1958.

His first day in class, a fight broke out and a sandwich was hurled in anger.  McCourt immediately picked it up and ate it.  On the second day of class, McCourt's retort about the Irish and their sheep brought the wrath of the principal down on him. All McCourt wanted to do was teach, which wasn't easy in the jumbled bureaucracy of the New York City school system.

Pretty soon he realized the system wasn't run by teachers but by sterile functionaries. "I was uncomfortable with the bureaucrats, the higher-ups, who had escaped classrooms only to turn and bother the occupants of those classrooms… teachers and students. I never wanted to fill out their forms, follow their guidelines, administer their examinations, tolerate their snooping, and adjust myself to their programs and courses of study."

As McCourt matured in his job, he found ingenious ways to motivate the kids: have them write "excuse notes" from Adam and Eve to God; use parts of a pen to define parts of a sentence; use cookbook recipes to get the students to think creatively. A particularly warming and enlightening lesson concerns a class of black girls at Seward Park High School who felt slighted when they were not invited to see a performance of Hamlet, and how they taught McCourt never to have diminished expectations about any of his students.

McCourt throws down the gauntlet on education, asserting that teaching is more than achieving high test scores. It's about educating, about forming intellects, about getting people to think. McCourt's many fans will of course love this book, but it also should be mandatory reading for every teacher in America. And it wouldn't hurt some politicians to read it, too. 

My Thoughts:  I couldn’t wait to read this book!  Loved it!  

“ 'Tis: A Memoir”  

  By Frank McCourt

2011 Book Review #64

Booklist Review

The second installment in McCourt's fluent and bewitchingly candid memoir will be eagerly embraced by a reading public madly in love with the first, the award-winning and best-selling Angela's Ashes (1996).

Here McCourt, still simultaneously voluble and precise, chronicles his return to New York, the city of his birth. A high-school dropout with a thick brogue, terrible teeth and skin, and red and infected eyes, he is easy pickings for a priest who helps him get settled, then attempts to molest him.

This distressing introduction to the perversity of life in America kicks off an almost unbelievable series of humiliations and hardships as McCourt works soul-crushingly menial jobs for pittance and is confronted both with vicious anti-Irish prejudice and tedious Irish pride…nearly everyone he meets recounts their Irish genealogy and tells him to stick to his own kind.

 McCourt stubbornly dreams of becoming a teacher and writer but often retreats from the demands of college and work into the comforting haze of alcohol, the bane of his family. Finally, after a stint in the army and years of being mocked for his bookish ways, he succeeds in becoming a teacher, and his riveting accounts of his crazy classroom experiences in a Staten Island vocational high school at the height of McCarthyism are not to be missed.

His family is present, too, of course. His mother, Angela, remains depressed even under her sons' solicitous care. His father is impossible right up to the day he dies, and McCourt's brothers, Malachy (who has also written a memoir) and Mike, live "bright carefree" lives, while he does everything the hard way, the only way he knows how, and, frankly, the only approach to life he fully respects.

My Thoughts:  Again, I read this book last year and somehow did not review it.

I loved this book!  McCourt’s writing style makes this book easy to read and the story of his life enthralls!  

“Angela’s Ashes: A Memoir”  

     By Frank McCourt

2011 Book Review #63

Booklist Review

It is a wonder that McCourt survived his childhood in the slums of Depression-era Limerick, Ireland: three of his siblings did not, dying of minor illnesses complicated by near starvation.

Even more astonishing is how generous of spirit he became and remains. His family lived…barely…in a flat so miserable that every year they had to cram themselves into an upstairs room when winter floods made the place only half-habitable. That upstairs room was "Italy"…warm and dry.  Downstairs was Ireland…wet and cold.

Father sat up there drinking tea, while mother Angela often could not rise from bed, so depressed was she. Or mother sat by the fire, waiting for father to return; when he did, frequently drunk on their little money, he would line up the boys and extract promises that they would die for Ireland. Dying was what everyone seemed to do best: the little sister, the twins, the girl with whom Frank first had sex, the old man Frank read to, too many boys from school, too many neighbors, too many relatives.

McCourt spares us no details: the stench of the one toilet shared by an entire street, the insults of the charity officers, the marauding rats, the street fights, the infected eyes, the fleas in the mattress . . . Yet he found a way to love in that miserable Limerick, and it is love one remembers as the dominant flavor in this Irish stew. 

My Thoughts:  I loved this book!  It is a beautifully written life story of a very sensitive nature.  Please don’t miss it!  Actually, I read this book last year and just discovered I hadn’t reviewed it.

An Amazing True Story:
"same kind of different as me"  
by Ron Hall and Denver Moore with Lynn Vincent

2011 Book Review # 17

This is a true story written by two men, one black, one white.  One a homeless, ex-sharecropper held under plantation-style slavery until he fled Alabama in the 1960s…the other, a self made, very wealthy, art dealer whose Christian Mission wife was responsible for their meeting.

It is not just the story of how they met, but, about the “forever” friendship they formed and how they each changed the life of the other.  The story begins in the 1950’s and continues thru present day.

A simply written story, it serves to remind us of how we have the ability to affect everyone we meet.

I have a hard time explaining why I liked this book so much, but, I did!  I couldn’t put it down!  I highly recommend it to everyone!

“All by my selves: 
Walter, Peanut, Achmed, and me”
                   by Jeff Dunham

          2011 Review #2

         An Autobiography…

Synopsis:

All by My Selves is the story of one pretty ordinary guy, one interesting hobby, one very understanding set of parents, and a long and winding rode to becoming America's favorite comedian. With wit, honesty, and lots of great show business detail, Jeff shares all the major moments in his journey. From the toy dummy he spotted at a toy store when he was 8 years old to playing to arenas filled with screaming fans, Jeff takes readers behind the curtain to explain how he turned an old fashioned art form into something truly modern and hip. Best of all, Jeff's story is accompanied by asides and interruptions from his characters-who share all the hilarious details Jeff himself is too embarrassed to include.

"The most popular standup comic in the U.S." –Time

His YouTube videos have been viewed more than 400 million times by fans all over the world. He has played to sold-out venues across North America, Europe, South Africa and Australia. He has sold more than six million DVDs, Forbes has ranked him in their Celebrity 100 list of most powerful entertainers for two years running, and he has been the top touring comedian in the United States for the last two years. Whether he's breathing life into an old curmudgeon, an over- caffeinated purple maniac, or a screaming, skeletal, dead terrorist, Jeff Dunham is the straight man to some of the funniest partners in show business.

MY THOUGHTS:

I found this book extremely interesting, funny and heart touching in places.

My nephew gave me a copy of this book and one of Dunham’s DVD’s for Christmas.

One of my favorite gifts!