Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.93 AVERAGE
3.93 AVERAGE
emotional
funny
fast-paced
A little about her career, a lot about her loves, and a touchibg story of being reunited with her daughter she gave up for adoption 20 years earlier.
Captain Janeway is my favorite Starfleet captain, so when I saw this book I knew I had to read it. Kate Mulgrew has lead an interesting life. Impulsive, a bit crazy. Pretty much what you would imagine an actress's life to be like.
She shares the stories of her childhood, stories of getting stared as a young actress, and stories of her marriage and family. Entertaining and interesting, but I feel like it was very surface. While she let us catch glimpses of her world, she didn't actually let us in. Even during her story of giving her daughter up for adoption, a heart wrenching tale, she kept the reader at arm's length. The ending was abrupt, as well, and I actually thought I was missing chapters in my book at first.
I was expecting more, but enjoyed what I read. 3 stars.
She shares the stories of her childhood, stories of getting stared as a young actress, and stories of her marriage and family. Entertaining and interesting, but I feel like it was very surface. While she let us catch glimpses of her world, she didn't actually let us in. Even during her story of giving her daughter up for adoption, a heart wrenching tale, she kept the reader at arm's length. The ending was abrupt, as well, and I actually thought I was missing chapters in my book at first.
I was expecting more, but enjoyed what I read. 3 stars.
I really enjoyed reading this book, well listening to it. Kate Mulgrew's voice is very distinctive and when added to the lyrical writing style, this book was just a pleasure to listen to.
She saves the bit about being Cpt. Janeway until the end, and doesn't touch on Orange is the New Black, but I really enjoyed the quick behind the scenes glances at Voyager (which I really want to go watch now).
Worth a read.
She saves the bit about being Cpt. Janeway until the end, and doesn't touch on Orange is the New Black, but I really enjoyed the quick behind the scenes glances at Voyager (which I really want to go watch now).
Worth a read.
I couldn't put this book down. Mulgrew is a talented writer and a captivating storyteller, which she seemed to have learned the latter from both her craft and her family. I enjoyed reading a memior about a woman who makes no apologies about her passion for her career, the sacrifices that took (even if she had emotional regrets and unhappiness), and her talents and success. She had talent, put herself out there, worked hard, and was successful. Mulgrew makes no excuses and lives life to the fullest. Even if there are a few stories where you want to say "What? Can we get a few more details? Or I have some questions?"
I know some fellow Star Trek fans complained there wasn't enough about the show or anything recent in her life, as the book ends timeline-wise before Voyager wrapped up, but this book is more about the woman who worked her way to taking on the role of Janeway.
I know some fellow Star Trek fans complained there wasn't enough about the show or anything recent in her life, as the book ends timeline-wise before Voyager wrapped up, but this book is more about the woman who worked her way to taking on the role of Janeway.
Mulgrew is a good storyteller, and has some compelling ones to tell. She glosses over some details, when I would've liked more info, but there's a lot to satisfy in this memoir.
I'm going to donate this to my local little library and hope someone finds it more interesting than I did.
Mulgrew is an actress—a successful one—but that's not where the strength of her story lies. My mother was never one for conventional boundaries, she says (15), and her mother's influence seems to have had a substantial impact on Mulgrew's life...not least because her mother suggested acting in the first place. Were Mulgrew not famous, she might have focused her memoir entirely on her family, and in particular her relationship with her mother. There's material for it, in spades. Her mother's 'pickled' ovaries (20)—the moment when her mother asked Mulgrew, then 15, to reverse roles and be the mother (page 33: I was flattered, I was appalled, and accustomed as I was to her eccentricities, I was rendered temporarily speechless... I shook my head in disbelief. My mother laughed. A short laugh, devoid of mirth, followed by a keening sigh. Oh, I said to myself as my heart sank, my mother's in trouble. Big trouble.)—her mother's clear ambivalence towards motherhood—the loss of Mulgrew's younger sister—even the possibility (which Mulgrew does not raise) that her mother experienced some sort of mental illness.
But Mulgrew is famous, and she's had quite a career. She doesn't have to prove to the reader that she has acting chops—even to someone like me, who basically has no idea who she is outside the context of this book, it's clear. In her first pregnancy (as an unmarried woman) the TV show she was acting on worked pregnancy into the plot so she didn't have to quit; in her third pregnancy, the play she was in did the same: When, each night, Alceste kneeled between my legs and slowly, sensually cut my corset up the front with the tip of his knife, and my swollen stomach was suddenly revealed in all its protuberant glory, the audience as a collective audibly gasped... (173)
If that doesn't say actress worth accommodating, I'm not sure what does.
I am less interested in the career, though. Mulgrew had an interesting career trajectory, yes, and she writes about it well, but the career sometimes overshadows the more interesting (to me, anyway) and more universal themes of family and loss. Mulgrew's writing is thoughtful and precise—describing her mother's approach to dinner (and the results), for example, she says that one small chicken divided among five starving children did not the trick do (15). It's considerably better writing than I usually expect from 'industry' memoirs—funny, often wry, disarmingly direct.
Nancy Addison's apartment was like an oversized hothouse orchid. Everything in it was meant to look exquisite, but to me it was preposterous. No item of furniture was authentically functional, so my sleeping quarters were confined to a corner of the diminutive dining room, where Nancy had contrived to convert an air mattress into an eighteenth-century bed, replete with expensive linens, satin neck rolls, and at least six pillows of various sizes, none of which were practical. (I do not risk offending my dear friend, because she has been dead now for many years. Besides, had I given voice to this opinion then, she would merely have rolled her eyes and said, dismissively, "Oy, and the shiksa from Iowa should talk.") (221)
I picked this up largely because I've read a few other books recently about adoption in the same time period that Mulgrew gave birth to her daughter, and I was curious about her experience. It's a significant hook in the book description, and I think I expected more attention to go that way. And it is interesting—perhaps because her star was on the rise (and because her mother was relatively unconventional), Mulgrew got better treatment than she might have; on the other hand...well, she didn't get the support she needed to do the thing her heart was telling her to do, she was still pressured to make the decision she did, and once she'd signed the papers she no longer had options. Mention of this daughter lost fades in and out of the story, but I wished I'd seen more of that...more adoption, more family, less career, less romance.
Incidentally, the book ends on a high relationship note, but Wikipedia suggests that things have since taken a downturn—was it an intentional choice to end on that note nonetheless, or just poor timing? For her sake, I'd hope for the former.
But Mulgrew is famous, and she's had quite a career. She doesn't have to prove to the reader that she has acting chops—even to someone like me, who basically has no idea who she is outside the context of this book, it's clear. In her first pregnancy (as an unmarried woman) the TV show she was acting on worked pregnancy into the plot so she didn't have to quit; in her third pregnancy, the play she was in did the same: When, each night, Alceste kneeled between my legs and slowly, sensually cut my corset up the front with the tip of his knife, and my swollen stomach was suddenly revealed in all its protuberant glory, the audience as a collective audibly gasped... (173)
If that doesn't say actress worth accommodating, I'm not sure what does.
I am less interested in the career, though. Mulgrew had an interesting career trajectory, yes, and she writes about it well, but the career sometimes overshadows the more interesting (to me, anyway) and more universal themes of family and loss. Mulgrew's writing is thoughtful and precise—describing her mother's approach to dinner (and the results), for example, she says that one small chicken divided among five starving children did not the trick do (15). It's considerably better writing than I usually expect from 'industry' memoirs—funny, often wry, disarmingly direct.
Nancy Addison's apartment was like an oversized hothouse orchid. Everything in it was meant to look exquisite, but to me it was preposterous. No item of furniture was authentically functional, so my sleeping quarters were confined to a corner of the diminutive dining room, where Nancy had contrived to convert an air mattress into an eighteenth-century bed, replete with expensive linens, satin neck rolls, and at least six pillows of various sizes, none of which were practical. (I do not risk offending my dear friend, because she has been dead now for many years. Besides, had I given voice to this opinion then, she would merely have rolled her eyes and said, dismissively, "Oy, and the shiksa from Iowa should talk.") (221)
I picked this up largely because I've read a few other books recently about adoption in the same time period that Mulgrew gave birth to her daughter, and I was curious about her experience. It's a significant hook in the book description, and I think I expected more attention to go that way. And it is interesting—perhaps because her star was on the rise (and because her mother was relatively unconventional), Mulgrew got better treatment than she might have; on the other hand...well, she didn't get the support she needed to do the thing her heart was telling her to do, she was still pressured to make the decision she did, and once she'd signed the papers she no longer had options. Mention of this daughter lost fades in and out of the story, but I wished I'd seen more of that...more adoption, more family, less career, less romance.
Incidentally, the book ends on a high relationship note, but Wikipedia suggests that things have since taken a downturn—was it an intentional choice to end on that note nonetheless, or just poor timing? For her sake, I'd hope for the former.
Fascinating.
This was a really enjoyable listen (audiobook). Mulgrew has a diamond-hard sense of self and a thousand weird stories to tell. Her life has been quirky, difficult, beautiful, heart-breaking. I wanted to put some CWs in this review, but how do you put warnings on life? I'll throw some things under a spoiler tag down below because I always appreciate the warnings myself, but this is a life lived and brings with it all the trappings and heartbreak that implies.
At first I was a little bemused by how swiftly she glossed over a couple of affairs she had, but that's not out of the ordinary for her style of storytelling, I think. She focuses on many events in her life, but will offhandedly mention something that left me going, "wait, WHAT?" only to never return to it.
She follows a couple of throughlines in her own life, especially romance and motherhood. She spends a great deal of time remembering her own mother and discusses at length her love for her children as well as how at odds motherhood is with acting. She points out, with no small amount of bitterness I think, how fatherhood does not carry the same expectations with it. She was the breadwinner, and yet was resented for her absence and criticized for her choices. She speaks a lot about a decision made when she was in her early 20s that she deeply regretted, and how that grief and shame moved with her throughout her life. I felt the relief in my own body when TH came on scene and there finally was a man who didn't turn away from her grief with discomfort and embarrassment, but who took it gently in his hands and held it with care. And what a wonderful experience to have, 20 years later, in finding peace and reconciliation at last with the actions she had taken when she had been so young.
The audiobook was followed by an interview with Mulgrew hosted by Rosie O'Donnall. It was an interesting thing to listen to, though there were moments, things that O'Donnall said more than Mulgrew, that made me physically cringe. It was illuminating though.
I don't agree with all of Mulgrew's beliefs. I can see places where her bitterness shines bright, though I know that bitterness was well earned. Still, I finish this book believing that she is a woman of incredible strength who bends her will to temper herself with kindness. In many ways she reminds me of the people I grew up around, was raised by, and I recognize a great deal of hardness in her that I felt as a child. In the interview after the book, she talks about that, talks about wanting to move past that, wanting to be able to access sympathy and bestow it on others having keenly felt its denial for herself.
Overall and excellent book.
This was a book I read for my 2020 reading goal of finally getting around to books I've owned for ages and never actually read.
This was a really enjoyable listen (audiobook). Mulgrew has a diamond-hard sense of self and a thousand weird stories to tell. Her life has been quirky, difficult, beautiful, heart-breaking. I wanted to put some CWs in this review, but how do you put warnings on life? I'll throw some things under a spoiler tag down below because I always appreciate the warnings myself, but this is a life lived and brings with it all the trappings and heartbreak that implies.
At first I was a little bemused by how swiftly she glossed over a couple of affairs she had, but that's not out of the ordinary for her style of storytelling, I think. She focuses on many events in her life, but will offhandedly mention something that left me going, "wait, WHAT?" only to never return to it.
She follows a couple of throughlines in her own life, especially romance and motherhood. She spends a great deal of time remembering her own mother and discusses at length her love for her children as well as how at odds motherhood is with acting. She points out, with no small amount of bitterness I think, how fatherhood does not carry the same expectations with it. She was the breadwinner, and yet was resented for her absence and criticized for her choices. She speaks a lot about a decision made when she was in her early 20s that she deeply regretted, and how that grief and shame moved with her throughout her life. I felt the relief in my own body when TH came on scene and there finally was a man who didn't turn away from her grief with discomfort and embarrassment, but who took it gently in his hands and held it with care. And what a wonderful experience to have, 20 years later, in finding peace and reconciliation at last with the actions she had taken when she had been so young.
The audiobook was followed by an interview with Mulgrew hosted by Rosie O'Donnall. It was an interesting thing to listen to, though there were moments, things that O'Donnall said more than Mulgrew, that made me physically cringe. It was illuminating though.
I don't agree with all of Mulgrew's beliefs. I can see places where her bitterness shines bright, though I know that bitterness was well earned. Still, I finish this book believing that she is a woman of incredible strength who bends her will to temper herself with kindness. In many ways she reminds me of the people I grew up around, was raised by, and I recognize a great deal of hardness in her that I felt as a child. In the interview after the book, she talks about that, talks about wanting to move past that, wanting to be able to access sympathy and bestow it on others having keenly felt its denial for herself.
Overall and excellent book.
Spoiler
SIDs, cancer, child death (siblings), rape, miscarriage, unplanned pregnancy and a baby given up for adoption, a relationship that MIGHT have trended towards emotional abuse had Mulgrew not been so incredibly hard to break?This was a book I read for my 2020 reading goal of finally getting around to books I've owned for ages and never actually read.
Audioread that I fully enjoyed. I didn't know Mulgrew by name---but I heard her interview on Diane Rehm a couple years ago, and realized I knew her work well. As a young Irish Catholic girl with a mother who watched All My Children, I was aware of Ryan's Hope, and I loved Mrs. Columbo (because I was madly in love with Peter Falk as a young girl), which I think I must have watched as a 10 year old because I don't think it was on long enough for reruns. And after hating Star Trek most of my childhood, Voyager was the series that Brian used to pull me in. I haven't seen OITNB yet.
But this isn't a memoir about Hollywood---it is a fully-formed memoir about identify and daughter-hood as well as motherhood, about passion and responsibility and the vicissitudes of life.
But this isn't a memoir about Hollywood---it is a fully-formed memoir about identify and daughter-hood as well as motherhood, about passion and responsibility and the vicissitudes of life.