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A review by octavia_cade
Born with Teeth by Kate Mulgrew
4.0
Three and a half stars, rounding up to four. It really is very readable, though I do think the first half is significantly better than the second - I was all ready to give it four stars, but the lyricism of the writing trailed off a bit. The first half seemed a lot more polished, anyway, and was less burdened with what I found to be the least interesting theme of the lot: Mulgrew's romantic encounters. I mean, they're interesting enough, but the sparkling relationship here isn't with any of the men. It's with her mother. I understand her mother was ultimately diagnosed with Alzheimer's, and although that diagnosis isn't reached in this book, it's clear by the end that her mental state was deteriorating. Very sad, especially as she was such a strong and appealing (if not always comfortable) personality.
I'm shelving this under television, as although Mulgrew is also a stage and film actress (and these do get mentions here) much of the career described in Born With Teeth comes from Mulgrew's two main tv roles, in Ryan's Hope (which I've never seen) and Star Trek: Voyager, which I'm a long-time fan of. It's basically because of Voyager that I chose to read this in the first place, as Janeway is one of my favourite characters from that franchise. There is some coverage of the show in the latter half of the book, but it's not actually in-depth. In some ways that's a little disappointing, but in others it isn't - I went into this knowing it was an autobiography, and for all I love Voyager it was a part of Mulgrew's life and not the whole of it.
I've heard there's a follow-up volume that looks more closely at her mother's deterioration, and I'm looking forward to reading that, as the most interesting prose here came from family relationships, and I'd like to read more of that from Mulgrew.
I'm shelving this under television, as although Mulgrew is also a stage and film actress (and these do get mentions here) much of the career described in Born With Teeth comes from Mulgrew's two main tv roles, in Ryan's Hope (which I've never seen) and Star Trek: Voyager, which I'm a long-time fan of. It's basically because of Voyager that I chose to read this in the first place, as Janeway is one of my favourite characters from that franchise. There is some coverage of the show in the latter half of the book, but it's not actually in-depth. In some ways that's a little disappointing, but in others it isn't - I went into this knowing it was an autobiography, and for all I love Voyager it was a part of Mulgrew's life and not the whole of it.
I've heard there's a follow-up volume that looks more closely at her mother's deterioration, and I'm looking forward to reading that, as the most interesting prose here came from family relationships, and I'd like to read more of that from Mulgrew.