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scuba888's review against another edition
2.0
The professor for my autobiography course in college taught us that of the three components of an auto (self) bio (life) graphy (writing), the writing is the most important. Viola is a great person with an inspiring story, but the overall terrible writing made this one fall very short for me. I flew through the first half, but from there the writing quality deteriorated significantly. It was incredibly choppy, her thoughts kept dead-ending, and then the subject would change- it was all over the place. She kept giving opinions or statements like “the world and country wasn’t ready for The Help” or “acting culture is full of jealousies” but then wouldn’t explain at all or give context or examples, so those statements just floated there, independent of her storyline.
samparker18's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
tense
medium-paced
4.0
lyndipaige's review
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
sad
medium-paced
5.0
alexandra_ninelives's review against another edition
5.0
First of all, I want to say, if you have the opportunity, listen to this book on audio. Viola Davis narrates it and it is the best audiobook I ever listened to. I also want to mention that it the best memoir I’ve ever read. It had the perfect amount of memories, inner thoughts and wisdom in it.
It was painful but hopeful what she’s been through, especially early in her life, she is such a strong woman. I could relate to her in some instances but her experience is just so unique to me since I live in a different world basically. (I’m not from the US)
What an incredible woman! I already knew that by the way. It’s just that you need to understand it and read this book immediately!!
It is absolutely heartbreaking for me that even at the age of 47, she did not think herself beautiful or desirable enough. And the fact that everyone in the industry tells that to black women…. Look, me and my friends always thought she was so beautiful and talented. It’s true that we only saw film/tv roles, no theatre so we got to know her pretty late in her career but I think we’re still right. Anyone who ever said or did anything mean to her, come and fight me.
So back to the book. It was a well written memoir as I’ve said. No weird time jumps, everything she mentioned was in the perfect order for us to truly hear it. We now know enough about her life, her secrets that we feel connected to her but I’m guessing it’s not even half of her experiences. We don’t need to hear every single detail of her life and somehow she picked the most important ones. I would really like to know about the process of writing this book, how long did it take, etc. I’m going to look for interviews after this. (OK, tonight)
I’d like to mention those poor pets that got killed by someone crazy or by accident. I have cats and a dog so it was hard to hear. But the important thing is that these instances did not overshadow the feelings and happenings in HER mind/life. I know part of it was in for shock value, it always is but I still cared about her and not just the pets. I’m not sure I’m expressing what I want to so I’ll just stop here.
It was painful but hopeful what she’s been through, especially early in her life, she is such a strong woman. I could relate to her in some instances but her experience is just so unique to me since I live in a different world basically. (I’m not from the US)
What an incredible woman! I already knew that by the way. It’s just that you need to understand it and read this book immediately!!
It is absolutely heartbreaking for me that even at the age of 47, she did not think herself beautiful or desirable enough. And the fact that everyone in the industry tells that to black women…. Look, me and my friends always thought she was so beautiful and talented. It’s true that we only saw film/tv roles, no theatre so we got to know her pretty late in her career but I think we’re still right. Anyone who ever said or did anything mean to her, come and fight me.
So back to the book. It was a well written memoir as I’ve said. No weird time jumps, everything she mentioned was in the perfect order for us to truly hear it. We now know enough about her life, her secrets that we feel connected to her but I’m guessing it’s not even half of her experiences. We don’t need to hear every single detail of her life and somehow she picked the most important ones. I would really like to know about the process of writing this book, how long did it take, etc. I’m going to look for interviews after this. (OK, tonight)
I’d like to mention those poor pets that got killed by someone crazy or by accident. I have cats and a dog so it was hard to hear. But the important thing is that these instances did not overshadow the feelings and happenings in HER mind/life. I know part of it was in for shock value, it always is but I still cared about her and not just the pets. I’m not sure I’m expressing what I want to so I’ll just stop here.
codenameivy's review against another edition
emotional
inspiring
sad
medium-paced
5.0
what an incredibly strong woman viola is.
her story is so painful and raw, it shook me to my core.
this book made me so emotional that i actually cried on the train on my way home.
i feel extremely touched by her honesty and her sheer ability to push through everything that happened to her.
this was a very emotional journey.
her story is so painful and raw, it shook me to my core.
this book made me so emotional that i actually cried on the train on my way home.
i feel extremely touched by her honesty and her sheer ability to push through everything that happened to her.
this was a very emotional journey.