Amish Confidential by “Lebanon” Levi Stoltzfus and Ellis Henican

I wasn’t expecting much from Amish Confidential, a tell-all memoir, by Amish mafia reality television star, Lebanon Levi Stoltzfus. Despite my expectations, it was quite good.

I picked it up because watching The Amish Mafia is one of my guilty pleasures. It is a reality, cultural, crime-syndicate show with horses.

The Amish, like other insular communities, have plenty to teach the outside world about they live their lives. Levi definitely has the inside scoop, having been raised Old Order Amish, a more conservative branch of the culture.

I loved learning about how the Amish were formed and the historical background of his people. I ate up the bits about Amish marriage ceremonies and the social customs surrounding the party afterwards. Celery, apparently, is huge. Who knew, right?

I wish he had talked more how he fell into the world of “Amish mafia” itself. It’s clear from his narrative that he feels the Amish are taken advantage of because of their religious pacifism. He believes that they desire to deal with potentially criminal matters among themselves rather than going to the authorities. That is the basis of the mafia. For legal reasons, he probably couldn’t be that transparent. But it would have been excellent if he had.

If you enjoy the television show, you may not like this as much because it lacks some of the moment to moment tension and drama that one gets from watching the show. But, if you go into it with an open mind to learn more about the Amish in general, it certainly accomplishes that.

If you enjoyed Amish Confidential, I’d recommend The Terrorist’s Son: A Story of Choice (a Muslim boy is raised one way but chooses to live another) or License to Pawn: Deals, Steals, and My Life at the Gold & Silver (a memoir by a pawn shop owner who has his own reality television show).

Thanks for reading!

Year of Yes: How to Dance It Out, Stand In the Sun and Be Your Own Person by Shonda Rhimes

Shonda Rhimes’ heartfelt memoir about the power of embracing who you are and having the courage to set aside what you are not.

Though outwardly successful, Shonda was miserable. Between over-working and her introverted tendencies, she turned down every invitation and social event. The ones that she was forced to accept were anxiety inducing trials or complete blanks because of panic attacks.

Shonda didn’t even realize she was unhappy until, one Thanksgiving, her sister tells her that she doesn’t say yes to anything. Something clicks and Shonda embarks on a Year of Yes. Her results are astonishing and so is this memoir.

I have never watched a single episode of Grey’s Anatomy. I didn’t even realize that that was her show. You don’t need to be an aficionado to appreciate this book.

Shonda begins with some crushingly honest passages about her discomfort at sharing her life and her passion for writing. “Making stuff up is responsible for everything-everything I’ve done, everything I am, everything i have. Without the tales, the fiction, the stories I’ve spun, it is highly likely that right now, today, I’d be a very quiet librarian in Ohio.” pg 6, ebook. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. 🙂

The first part of this book was actually hard for me to get through because she was so obviously uncomfortable at creating a window into her heart and mind. She gets over it and so did I. “When it was first suggested to me that I write about this year, my first instinct was to say no. Writing about myself feels a lot like I have just decided to stand up on a table in a very proper restaurant, raise my dress and show everyone that I’m not wearing panties. That is to say, it feels shocking.” pg 12, ebook.

Shonda is just so relatable. Take this confession about motherhood: “I don’t know about you, but the mistakes and missteps I have made since becoming a mother… before kids, my confidence could not be dented. Now it’s shattered on a daily basis. I don’t know what I am doing.” pg 63, ebook. I know, right! Nobody knows what they’re doing. I take comfort in that.

Throughout her year of challenging herself, Shonda discovers that she’s uncomfortable in her own skin because of her weight. This next passage is for anyone out there who has body image issues: “I believe everyone’s body is theirs and everyone has a right to love their body in whatever size and shape and package it comes in. I will fight for anyone’s right to do so. I will kick ass and take names if I have to. Your body is yours. My body is mine. No one’s body is up for comment. No matter how small, how large, how curvy, how flat. If you love you, then I love you.” pg 85, ebook. End of story.

I also liked how she came to a new understanding about how life works: “I’ve started to think we are like mirrors. What you are gets reflected back to you. What you see in yourself, you may see in others, and what others see in you, they may see in themselves.” pg 120, ebook. I’ve started to think that too.

The Year of Yes is recommended for readers who enjoy memoirs or for those folks out there whose lives are in need of an awakening- a shaking of the snow globe of your reality, if you will. Shonda said yes to things that scared her and discovered, on the other side of fear, a life truly worth living. I hope that we can all be as fortunate and as brave on our journeys.

Thanks for reading!

Stronger by Jeff Bauman, Bret Witter

I am not a big news watcher. I try to keep up on current events, so I knew about the bombing at the Boston Marathon, but I didn’t watch the news broadcasts as they occurred nor did I see the (now famous) picture of Jeff Bauman being wheeled away from the bomb site. So, this whole book was a revelation and learning experience for me.

In a straight forward and honest manner, Jeff describes his life, what happened to him that tragic afternoon, and then how he and his family picked up the pieces of their lives and began to move on.

He also describes what happened at the shootout between Tsarnaev and the police from the officers’ point of view (he heard multiple first hand accounts from the men who were there). He details the trauma to his body and mind- some of it is very graphic, but that’s how he experienced it.

I think this was a very intimate memoir.

In addition to sharing his inner most thoughts and emotions, he doesn’t try to make the people in his life look better than they really are. For example, the portrait he paints of his mother is very unflattering. She tends to drink to excess and then vent her emotions while under the influence.

Apparently she has behaved this way Jeff’s entire life, so he doesn’t think much of it. It’s very dysfunctional, at best, and alcoholic, at worst. But, it’s real and not something that he had to share with the world.

Jeff chose to share it.

At multiple points in the book, Jeff denies that he’s a hero, but he is. He’s demonstrated the resiliency of the human spirit and sheer determination to move on with his life by learning to walk with his new legs a mere six months after the bombing.

I sincerely hope that his life continues to move forward and that he finds more peace than is detailed in his memoir. He deserves that, at least.

I received a free copy of this book through Goodreads First Reads. Thanks for reading!

Nerd Do Well by Simon Pegg

Nerd Do Well is Simon Pegg’s life story interspersed with the tale of a fictional alter ego, Pegg, a James Bond figure with a robotic sidekick. His coming of age stories and fictional bits are hilarious but once Pegg gets into his movie making period, the book loses it’s momentum.

I preferred the nostalgia of the first time he saw Star Wars to the actuality of meeting his hero, George Lucas and finding him stand-offish. There’s something heart breaking about seeing childhood hero worship crumble in the face of cold hard reality.

Pegg’s education in film appreciation and critique make for truly fascinating observations about pop culture films. I took his thoughts about how the Anakin/Frankenstein scene in the third Star Wars movie could have been made into a memorable and fitting theatrical moment instead of the joke that it was (pg 328-329) to my husband, who is the most ardent Star Wars fan that I know. Husband said in response, “His way would have made it much better.” You’ll have to trust me when I say that that’s very high praise.

Another of my favorite parts in Nerd Do Well was Pegg’s explanation for American readers about why the pub occupies a prominent place at the center of British social life. I’d never really understood what the attraction was until he painted the scene.

I mean, in my hometown, we have all sorts of dive-bars lining main street where, any night of the week, I could roll in there and meet up with the prematurely aged classmates of mine who will never get out of that place. But, who wants to do that. The bar is the epitome of failure rather than community.

With his homemade quizzes, neighborhood regulars, and music, Pegg’s pub seems to be somewhere warm and inviting where I would actually enjoy hanging out. It makes much more sense to me now why Shaun of the Dead was based around a pub and also why most DnD campaigns begin in taverns.

If you enjoyed Nerd Do Well, you may want to read My Booky Wook (less Star Wars, more drugs, fairly funny) or Just a Geek: Unflinchingly honest tales of the search for life, love, and fulfillment beyond the Starship Enterprise (more Star Trek, more angst-filled than funny).

Thanks for reading!

The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch

The Last Lecture is Randy Pausch’s last hurrah- a final note to the world and his family about how to live, love and let go. It is beautiful.

I think that we’re all here for a reason and have stories to tell. How fortunate for us all that Randy had the time and ability to tell his particular story.

I recommend this book for fans of memoirs, computer engineering and heart-felt narratives. I listened to the audiobook and it was excellent.

Then, once I finished the book, I looked up Randy’s actual last lecture on YouTube. Bring your kleenexes, friends.

See it yourself:

Thanks for reading!

How Not to Hate Your Husband After Kids by Jancee Dunn

This book gave me so many “ah-ha” moments that after a hundred pages I started to feel like an idiot. Why did I assume that so many of these little “life after baby” marital frustrations had only ever happened to me?

How Not to Hate Your Husband After Kids made me feel like I was part of a larger group called ‘mothers who try to do it all and feel secretly guilty that they can’t and wonder how everybody else does it.’ What a relief to know it wasn’t just me.

Photo by Andreas Wohlfahrt on Pexels.com

Dunn weaves her personal stories in with interviews from experts in fields as diverse as couples’ counseling to organizational gurus on a quest to save her sanity and her marriage from the hole that it had fallen into post-baby.

She is largely successful and gives plenty of tips that readers can incorporate immediately into their lives.

But, I was bothered by the, what I interpreted as, straight-up manipulation of her husband. Yes, Dunn is simply following expert advice, but reading about her self-satisfied crowing as she changes some of his more irritating behaviors felt disrespectful.

I mean, husband Tom is going to read this book.

I would feel devastated if my spouse wrote those sorts of things about me for millions of people to read and dissect. Granted, he was clued in that things were being recorded in a tell-all book, but still.

Photo by Public Domain Pictures on Pexels.com

“When I was six months pregnant with my daughter, I had lunch with a group of friends, all of whom were eager to pass along their hard-won scraps of parental wisdom. … ” … get ready to hate your husband,” said my friend Lauren. … Wrong, I told her calmly… But my friend Lauren was right.” locs 115-140 ebook.

We joke about how babies change lives but it’s not really funny, is it. It is a legit problem that marital happiness decreases because of less sleep, less money, less time, less sex… no need to go on.

Dunn begins her efforts to change her situation when she realizes that she’s reached a breaking point.

“Our daughter is now six, and Tom and I still have endless, draining fights. Why do I have the world’s tiniest fuse when it comes to the division of childcare and household labor? I am baffled that things have turned out this way.” loc 158.

In cringe-inducing honesty, Dunn admits to being verbally abusive to her spouse. My stomach actually churned when I read the sorts of things that she’d call him during fights.

That part of the memoir made me very glad that she decided she didn’t want to live like that because I know that I wouldn’t have wanted that either.

I learned a lot about “maternal gatekeeping,” a pernicious practice where a mother discourages fathers from interacting with their children because of an internal belief that she knows better how to do EVERYTHING. And also, I learned about the importance of blocking time on weekends for personal rejuvenation and rest.

“And must we be compulsively busy every second of the day, briskly doing something “useful”? Nonstop activity can be addictive, but it’s a mistake, warns the University of Houston’s Brene Brown, a mom of two.” loc 1697.

Word. Everybody needs to chill out, calm down and unwind.

We also need to appreciate each other more.

At the end of the day and on the other side of all of the experts, Dunn comes to a dozen important realizations. One of which, appreciation, seems to be the magic bullet for most of her formerly-insurmountable marriage woes. It isn’t a new message but it is one that is worth repeating.

Recommended for parents of all ages, How Not to Hate Your Husband After Kids contains wisdom for just about every troublesome situation that one may find themselves in after children. Let’s hope the book can live up to its title.

Thank you to NetGalley and Little, Brown and Company for a free digital copy of this book. And thank you for reading!

Blood Plagues and Endless Raids: A Hundred Million Lives in the World of Warcraft by Anthony R. Palumbi

Anthony R. Palumbi’s memoir is about video games, relationships and play/life balance.

Blood Plagues and Endless Raids took a chapter for me to warm up to it. Palumbi begins his homage to World of Warcraft with an icky story about driving to meet his guild mates for the first time. But once I got past that part, I enjoyed this gaming memoir quite a lot.

I’ve mentioned in previous reviews that I am, or used to be, a very dedicated player of Everquest, both one and two. Though it never had the mammoth popularity of WoW, Everquest had quite a few things in common with the mega-hit including some game dynamics and gamer-speak. So, I found myself nodding along most of the time.

You don’t have to be a gamer to appreciate this memoir. Palumbi explains every slang term and technique that pops up. He also delves deeply into game morality, relationships in MMORPGs (massive multiplayer online role playing games), addictions, game burnout, the notable players and even how WoW entered popular culture. It is an informative and, for readers like me, a nostalgic treat.

Even though, in-game, Palumbi and I would have moved in entirely different circles. He’s a raider, you see. This means he’s into end-game content which in the old days took 40 or so players coordinating, in sometimes very complex ways, to master. I, on the other hand, prefer to wander around and see what there is to see. I like to fish and chat and have fun. Palumbi likes to PvP, strut his stuff in his rare gear and order the main tank around.

Beneath these differences though, there runs a love for gaming and the social-ness of it. He, and I, don’t have that anymore. People have moved on, had families and gone to different games. When I log onto EQ2, there’s not a single person on that I know anymore. It is very sad in some ways.

“Those who match up through games have come to know each other very well long before meeting in person. … WoW romance served, ironically, as a kind of return to romantic tradition, with separation or impossibility as a core component.” loc 467. Have I mentioned that I met my spouse in-game? Let me tell you the tale.

So, I was wandering beneath the trees of Kelethin (a newbie zone for wood elves) and I was stuck in a perpetual corpse run loop. This was back when death had a cost- you’d die and lose every piece of equipment on your body unless you could go back to the scene and click your corpse. My friend had made me a nice leather piece of armor and I didn’t want to admit to him that I died and lost it, so I was looking for myself, literally. But, I was near Orc Hill and, well, I had died maybe half a dozen times looking for that tunic.

In the midst of this bloodbath, I get this ‘tell’ out of the blue (in WoW they’re called ‘whispers’) by this guy who goes “Hey, do you need some help?” And I experienced a moment of utter panic because I had always been told that people online were dangerous. But I threw caution, and my pride really, to the wind and said, “Yeah, I do.”

So these random guys helped me find most of my corpses and, as I logged on over the next couple of weeks, I met the rest of their friends. One of whom is the man I ended up marrying.

As many people as the games brought together, they also drove people apart. “Choosing a game over another person’s feelings felt strange enough on its own; to have one of my best real-life friends applauding this decision was disconcerting. At the same time, it was rewarding to hear that kind of praise from someone who’d always been so much better at games.” loc 661. I knew people who dropped out of college because of MMORPGs, lost their jobs or their relationships. Another sad reality, but true.

Palumbi also delves briefly into the gender divide on video games and how females are treated differently than their male counterparts. I honestly think that most people assumed I was a guy playing because it was more common. The last thing my future husband said before he flew out to meet me was “You are really a girl, right?” and I had to laugh. Because, REALLY, I am. So, I dealt with some harassment and discrimination because of my gender, but not a horrific amount. Sometimes it seems like I was in the lucky minority.

Highly recommended for current or former gamers or anyone who wants to understand a spouse who plays. Some further reading: You’re Never Weird on the Internet or Fantasy Freaks and Gaming Geeks: An Epic Quest for Reality Among Role Players, Online Gamers, and Other Dwellers of Imaginary Realms.

Thank you to NetGalley and Chicago Review Press for a free digital copy of this book. And thanks for reading!

On the Move: A Life (Oliver Sacks’ memoirs #2) by Oliver Sacks

I knew nothing about Dr. Oliver Sacks before I read this book other than the fact that he was a prolific writer. Now I know much, much more.

I loved that Dr. Sacks didn’t hesitate to jump into the nitty gritty details of his life. One line that really stuck out to me: “It was just as well that I had no foreknowledge of the future for after that sweet birthday fling I was to have no sex for the next thirty-five years.” pg 203 Boom. It’s the last line of a chapter section, he neither explains it nor dwells on it. How extraordinary.

I also liked reading about the dramatic parts of his life like his early drug addiction, love of motorcycling, wild nights at the Y, and stint with the American truckers. I found myself dragging through his reminiscing about research or intellectual friends. I think the problem is that I don’t find the inner workings of the mind nearly as fascinating as he did.

Dr. Sacks lists his research pursuits in page after page of case studies, reading, and memories and it wasn’t very fun to slog through. I would probably enjoy the books that he wrote during these times more than this one that was about the writing of them. Another problem, sometimes during the narration, he moves backwards and forwards in time without noting that he is doing so other than writing the date. That was frustrating for me.

Despite some slow portions, Dr. Sacks does have some very beautiful writing in On the Move. Take this passage, where he’s thinking about why he lived so many years of his life on the East coast of the US when he really loved the West coast: “I suspect my nostalgia may be not only for the place itself but for youth, and a very different time, and being in love, and being able to say, “The future is before me.” pg 131

He also struck a chord with me in this line where he’s talking about his love of journaling: “My journals are not written for others, nor do I usually look at them myself, but they are a special, indispensable form of talking to myself.” pg 383 I feel that way too. I pour myself out on written pages in ways that I feel unable to do in the rest of my life through conversations or whatever else.

Dr. Sacks was extraordinarily bright, interested in life and all of its internal mechanisms. At least, after reading this memoir, one can say that he lived fully and well.

I received a free copy of this book through the Goodreads First Reads program. Thanks for reading!

Orlean Puckett: The Life of a Mountain Midwife by Karen Cecil Smith

The Life of a Mountain Midwife is an interesting, but sometimes meandering, biography about a midwife named Orlean Puckett who lived and worked in rural Appalachia.

This reminded me of Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House on the Prairie books in that Karen Cecil Smith takes great care to detail the day-to-day chores, food, clothing, and lives of the people of Appalachian Mountains in the 1800’s to 1900’s. I loved those intimate details, many of which are completely gone from the modern lifestyle like chopping wood, lighting the stove, and cleaning laundry by hand.

Also, I am a big fan of BBC television show, Call the Midwives so the chapter detailing Puckett’s extraordinary midwifery skills was fascinating to me. Take this gem: “Aunt Orlean continued to ask, ‘Don’t you think it’s about time to feather her?’ Dr. Cundiff finally said, ‘Okay,’ at which point Aunt Orlean produced from her bag a goose feather. She stuck it into the fire and then placed the smoking feather beneath the mother’s nose. The mother started coughing and sneezing and the baby was born immediately.” pg 101 Can you believe that!

Astoundingly, Orlean Puckett delivered over 1000 babies with almost zero training and never lost a mother or child.

Karen Cecil Smith utilizes actual interview tidbits from many of the people who knew Orlean Puckett for this book and that was also enjoyable. She maintained their improper grammar and local accent which lent real flavor to the narrative. For example, many of the children that Orlean helped deliver said that she “borned” them. Here’s a memory from a relative: “Now I was gonna stay up there one night with Granny (Orlean) and she was gonna learn me how to bake wheat bread the next mornin’ and Uncle Stewart he had to go to work and they waked me up and wanted to know if I wanted to put on bread.” pg 57

My only complaint about this book is that it wanders in places and the reader is led into extended stories about ancillary people to Orlean’s life when, this reader at least, just wanted to know more about the Orlean herself.

If you are mainly interested in local history, this book is like a casual conversation with an elderly friend. I’d even go so far as to compare it to an unedited Story Corp interview. It can be charming but also frustrating when the story goes on and on but doesn’t seem to go anywhere.

If you enjoyed this book, I’d suggest any of the Laura Ingalls Wilder series. They have the same sort of detail oriented focus but with more of a story line.

I received a free copy of this book through Goodreads First Reads program. Thank you for reading!

The Help Desk Book Blog

Sharing reviews and deep thoughts about life.

Tag: Memoir

Year of Yes: How to Dance It Out, Stand In the Sun and Be Your Own Person by Shonda Rhimes

Stronger by Jeff Bauman, Bret Witter

Nerd Do Well by Simon Pegg

The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch

How Not to Hate Your Husband After Kids by Jancee Dunn

Blood Plagues and Endless Raids: A Hundred Million Lives in the World of Warcraft by Anthony R. Palumbi

On the Move: A Life (Oliver Sacks’ memoirs #2) by Oliver Sacks

Orlean Puckett: The Life of a Mountain Midwife by Karen Cecil Smith

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