Customer Reviews

Radios: Short Takes on Life and Culture

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is a beautifully written book. It's lovely. And it's short, made up of a number of small, tight, very nice mini-essays. Mark Twain once sent a long letter to a freind with an apology, that he did not have time to write a short letter. Short and good takes a lot more time than long and boring. This is a well crafted collection worth reading.

Jerome Stern was a commentator for National Public Radio and well respected by the audience for his short and concise takes on life. Radios, published posthumously, is a selection from these short radio essays (hence "Radios") that highlights the efforts of his career.

Whether waxing eloquently about a childhood memory, relating his experiences in family dynamics, or including us in the very personal aspects of the illness that ultimately brought about his untimely death, Stern's prose is able to do what most writers cannot: paint a vivid picture in the reader's (or listener's) head in a brief timespan and a concise manner.

And, that is one of the aspects of this collection that makes it so valuable - it is a great example of that most difficult art, the short essay.

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A Guide to my Book Rating System:

1 star = The wood pulp would have been better utilized as toilet paper.

2 stars = Don't bother, clean your bathroom instead.

3 stars = Wasn't a waste of time, but it was time wasted.

4 stars = Good book, but not life altering.

5 stars = This book changed my world in at least some small way.