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20 of 21 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Pulled out all the stops for this one, May 13, 2007
I got an early copy through Barnes & Noble, and let me tell you: this book is awesome. It is filled with extremely high quality photographs ranging from portraits of the cast members to pictures from the episodes to VERY nice pictures of the interiors of buildings (the Soprano house, the Bada Bing, Nuovo Vesuvio, etc.). It is also filled with a wealth of knowledge, talking about numerous aspects about the show from the look of Jersey (compared to "New Jersey") to the music used on the show to a breakdown of where the Soprano Family gets its income to even the types of nail designs that Carmela and Adriana had over the years. The major cast members all wrote their own essays about their characters, which contain descriptions interspersed with their own insights on their characters. There is also a section devoted to each character highlighting that character's most distinctive trait (such as Paulie's hair, Artie's mustache, etc.) and giving insider secrets about it (ex: Tony Sirico wakes up at 3am every shoot day, uses an entire can of hairspray, and emerges 3 hours later with Paulie's distinctive hairdo). Finally, the book includes an episode guide up through Season 6A to help refresh your memory of the gist of what happened in each episode. All told, this is an incredible book, and as I said, it is extremely high quality, which you can tell right from the front cover. I highly recommend it to anybody who has watched even one episode and enjoyed what they saw.
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18 of 19 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Well designed book, but you need a magnifying glass to read the print., June 9, 2007
I guess you can call this a mini coffee table book, measuring 9" x 11" and sporting a bright red cover with the familiar logo. It's only 190 pages long and an easy read, but I doubt if many people who purchase this book will read every word (as I did). Mostly, it's about the photos and each page is a great example of excellent design and eye-catching typefaces. I'm for all that, of course. I love the way the book looks. I give it 100% for design.
However, this is a difficult book to read. First of all the type is tiny. And then there are often large red or gray titles superimposed on top of the words. This is distracting and the words beneath the red letters were particularly difficult to read. Also, the author expects that everyone who picks up the book will be as familiar with the actors' names as he is and, with the exception of some of the major characters, it was sometimes hard to figure out who he was talking about. This could have been easily resolved with a cast list in either the front or the back of the book. I missed that.
In spite of the difficulty of the design I did read the book. I found much of it fascinating, especially the parts about the painstakingly detailed "behind-the-scenes" preparations for each episode. Everything from the choice of music to authenticity of the props to the New Jersey setting was very interesting. As a native New Yorker who often doubts everything, I found the whole series extremely real and absorbing. I'm sorry to see the series end.
Yes, I definitely recommend the book. It's great to leaf through and the photos will bring a smile of remembrance to your face. But you might just need to use a magnifying glass if you try to read it.
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12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Inchoate Masterpiece, June 17, 2007
Want the good news or the bad news?
The good news: this book is exceptionally well-done. The pictures are wonderful, and bring back each season in living detail. The text is helpful, especially in understanding more about gabagool...
The bad news: it did not extend all the way to the end of the series. Thus, it will always suffer from not being a complete study of the whole Sopranos catalog. I wonder whether there will be a revised edition of this book now that the whole series is complete...it might be worth waiting for.
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