PositiveThe Dallas Morning NewsI'm a feminist — something Joan Rivers refused to label herself, fearing it would cut into ticket sales — and her trashing of other women made me reluctant to review Leslie Bennetts' biography of the comedy legend. But what I learned from its 432 revelatory pages is that Rivers, who played for years on sleazy stages where, as she said, 'they passed the hat but the hat didn't come back,' was an angry, driven, insecure but inspiring survivor ... Oddly, some of the material appears more than once. And do we really need a dozen people to weigh in on Rivers as a controversial plastic surgery connoisseur?
Amy Stewart
PositiveThe Dallas Morning NewsStewart takes us on an atmospheric walk on the wild, sometimes sleazy side of early 20th-century New York and New Jersey. Her graphic accounts of Kopp's manhunt adventures and jail matron job are redolent of Dickens ... She's readying a third novel, and fans are going to be waiting, eagerly, again.
Paulette Jiles
RaveThe Dallas Morning News...a joy to read: haunting, transporting and full of historical grit ... Just as readers who completed the book Lonesome Dove started up the trail again with Gus and Call, the author's strong, atmospheric writing invites a return to this period when Texans were not allowed to carry handguns outside the home and the characters, even Kidd's horses Fancy and Pasha, seem like living presences ... [a] poignant, affecting and humorous journey.
Susan Faludi
RaveThe Dallas Morning News...a stunning, poignant, often humorous account of the renowned writer's reunion after 25 years with wild, shape-shifting cipher Stefan Faludi, who absconded from Susan's life after her parents divorced when she was a teen ... this is a marvelous work, fascinating, heartfelt and rewarding. More than just a character study rich as the tortes topped with whipped cream that Stefanie loved, In the Darkroom is a timely, provocative meditation on sexuality, the search for identity and the dark history of a nation, whose people turned on their friends and neighbors and let them die.
Anton DiSclafani
PositiveThe Dallas Morning NewsIf The Big Secret, when it comes, is a letdown, the contrasting connective tissue DiSclafani weaves between Cece and Joan — their scions, mothers, choices and men — is the work of a compelling writer and keeps our attention to the end.
Jean Stein
MixedThe Dallas Morning News...the brief notes often give only scant information, and we want to know more about the speaker. Also, dating the quotes would have put them in historical context. Missing, too, is the elegant hand of the late George Plimpton, who artfully edited Stein’s books about Edie Sedgwick and Robert Kennedy.
