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radmusikitty 's review for:
It took me a long time to read this book. I had to renew it twice at the library. I had friends notice I was still reading the same book and make comments about, "you're still reading that?" I have a pretty good idea why that is. I have trouble with memoirs in this format. Each chapter is a new story. In this book in particular, Sheffield ties in each chapter with a particular song from the '80s and what it meant to him in his life. Sometimes this meant an in depth analysis of the music (the chapters I enjoyed the most; this man knows music and writes about it well), and in some chapters it meant less than a paragraph's mention of the song (the chapters I enjoyed less). This is a difficult format for me to continue reading since there is no "page turner" element, and once I finish a chapter there's nothing encouraging me to go on to the next one. It's the same reason I've never finished a David Sedaris book despite generally enjoying his writing.
I love love loved Sheffield's first book, Love is a Mixtape, so I had pretty high hopes for this book. In comparison to the former, it falls flat. There are some good chapters, but they were all pretty hit or miss. As I mentioned, I more enjoyed the chapters than focused more on the music. I didn't check out this book because I wanted to learn about the author's high school wrestling career, and yet somehow I still did.... because there was a chapter about it.
My other main complaint is the heavy reliance on gender role stereotypes. I suppose I should have been prepared for this with the title of the book, but I didn't expect it to be such a reoccurring theme. The way Sheffield views Duran Duran as being different for men vs. women might have some validity to it, but he extends this belief into other music and other gender roles throughout the book, and it gets tiresome. I might feel differently if I, too, were a man with three sisters and no brothers. However, I'm not, so the constant "girls look at such-and-such THIS way while guys look at it THAT way" in such matter-of-fact black and white statements rubbed me the wrong way.
All this being said, I did finish the book. I didn't have to return it to the library incomplete, so there was something that kept me going. Maybe it was the fact that it almost always sparked conversation with people when I was reading it in public, maybe it was that I found myself in a lot of situations where I needed a book to read this summer and this was the one I had, maybe it was that I loved the author's previous book so much that I hoped it would live up to the high standards I had for it, or maybe I still just really enjoy his writing in general. Whatever the reason may be, I read it, and then I wrote four paragraphs about it when I haven't written a lengthy review on goodreads in years, so that must mean something :o)
I love love loved Sheffield's first book, Love is a Mixtape, so I had pretty high hopes for this book. In comparison to the former, it falls flat. There are some good chapters, but they were all pretty hit or miss. As I mentioned, I more enjoyed the chapters than focused more on the music. I didn't check out this book because I wanted to learn about the author's high school wrestling career, and yet somehow I still did.... because there was a chapter about it.
My other main complaint is the heavy reliance on gender role stereotypes. I suppose I should have been prepared for this with the title of the book, but I didn't expect it to be such a reoccurring theme. The way Sheffield views Duran Duran as being different for men vs. women might have some validity to it, but he extends this belief into other music and other gender roles throughout the book, and it gets tiresome. I might feel differently if I, too, were a man with three sisters and no brothers. However, I'm not, so the constant "girls look at such-and-such THIS way while guys look at it THAT way" in such matter-of-fact black and white statements rubbed me the wrong way.
All this being said, I did finish the book. I didn't have to return it to the library incomplete, so there was something that kept me going. Maybe it was the fact that it almost always sparked conversation with people when I was reading it in public, maybe it was that I found myself in a lot of situations where I needed a book to read this summer and this was the one I had, maybe it was that I loved the author's previous book so much that I hoped it would live up to the high standards I had for it, or maybe I still just really enjoy his writing in general. Whatever the reason may be, I read it, and then I wrote four paragraphs about it when I haven't written a lengthy review on goodreads in years, so that must mean something :o)