Keith Herrell

NonfictionBiography

The contentious origin of a breakfast standard

Review by Keith Herrell

Sibling rivalries are as old as . . . well, you know. But if you like them with some extra snap, crackle and pop, your best bet is Howard Markel’s story of brothers John and Will Kellogg, who put Battle Creek, Michigan, on the map in the first half of the 20th century. In The Kelloggs: The Battling Brothers of Battle Creek, Markel tells their intertwined stories with a great deal of skill and flair, opening a window into both American societal history and the complications of familial relationships.

Born to a pioneer family in rural Michigan, the brothers ascended to the top of their chosen professions—medicine for John, business for Will. But with contrasting personalities and an eight-year age difference, they were at odds almost from the beginning—and certainly to the end. It makes for a sad family history, but entertaining reading.

John, interested in medicine from an early age, founded the famed Battle Creek Sanitarium, known as “The San,” which thousands of people flocked to, seeking relief from various ailments. Will, the younger of the two, bounced around a bit before finding his niche running the sanitarium—and, fatefully, helping John develop health foods, including a ready-to-eat cold cereal that would replace the hot mush most families consumed in those days. That’s where the fissure turned into a chasm, as Will went out on his own to found the Kellogg Company, today a multinational food behemoth. The sanitarium started going downhill during the Great Depression and eventually was converted into a federal center.

Markel, an NPR contributor and a physician himself, doesn’t take sides as he leads us through the family thicket, and there’s plenty of blame to go around, anyway.

 

This article was originally published in the August 2017 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Sibling rivalries are as old as . . . well, you know. But if you like them with some extra snap, crackle and pop, your best bet is Howard Markel’s story of brothers John and Will Kellogg.

NonfictionMemoir

Do no harm

Review by Keith Herrell

You may not have heard of Stephen Westaby, but in the medical world, he's internationally renowned as a brilliant heart surgeon. Based in Oxford, England, he's a pioneer in artificial heart technology and recently retired from active surgery after more than four decades in the operating theater.

Westaby's highly readable Open Heart: A Cardiac Surgeon's Stories of Life and Death on the Operating Table is part memoir, part how-to (perform open-heart surgery, that is) and part All Creatures Great and Small-style reflection, with stories throughout about cases he's encountered during his journey from eager medical student to seen-it-all senior physician.

Some vignettes tell of smashing successes, such as the chapter about Peter Houghton, the artificial heart recipient who lived for over seven years after becoming the first person to be given an artificial heart for permanent use rather than as a bridge to transplantation. Others recount tragic failures, such as the death of an 18-month-old patient followed almost immediately by his mother's suicide. Westaby relates these cases in a matter-of-fact tone—a tone that he makes clear is a necessary survival mechanism in a profession in which death is a constant companion.

The focus of this book is on the patients, and rightfully so, but Westaby allows us a few glimpses into the mind of a doctor at the top of the profession, “desperate to do some good.” He knows it's time to get out when not only is his hand gnarled from handling surgical instruments, but when he finds empathy taking over for that all-important objectivity. England's famed National Health Service is also a source of frustration, featuring countless bureaucratic battles and the necessity of relying on charitable funds for risky surgeries. But frustrations aside, Open Heart is a heart-tugger, and a fascinating read.

You may not have heard of Stephen Westaby, but in the medical world, he's internationally renowned as a brilliant heart surgeon. Based in Oxford, England, he's a pioneer in artificial heart technology and recently retired from active surgery after more than four decades in the operating theater.

NonfictionHistory

Stepping bravely into the unknown

Review by Keith Herrell

The “first mission to the moon”? Wasn't that Apollo 11? Not quite, as Jeffrey Kluger reminds us in Apollo 8: The Thrilling Story of the First Mission to the Moon. Seven months before Neil Armstrong's historic footsteps in July 1969, NASA astronauts Frank Borman, Jim Lovell and Bill Anders had actually flown to the moon, circled it 10 times and made it back to Earth, figuratively paving the way for Armstrong's crew.

Not only is Apollo 11 better known than Apollo 8, so is Apollo 13, the aborted mission Lovell flew on in 1970 that was the subject of a Best Picture-nominated movie. Kluger collaborated with Lovell on a bestselling book about that mission, Apollo 13 (originally published as Lost Moon), and here he sets out to tell the tale of a mission that is mostly remembered for a Christmas Eve broadcast in which the astronauts read from the biblical book of Genesis.

With the full cooperation of Lovell, Borman and Anders—particularly Borman, the mission commander—Kluger paints a detailed picture of a dangerous journey that included multiple maneuvers that had to go perfectly or the astronauts would crash on the moon or be literally lost in space. His access to NASA mission transcripts—the conversations inside the spacecraft and between the astronauts and controllers on the ground in Houston—proves particularly useful in bringing the reader inside the capsule. On the ground, Kluger expertly captures the intensity of the flight controllers and the anxiety of the astronauts' families watching from suburban Houston. For a book about science and exploration, there's plenty of emotion.

The “first mission to the moon”? Wasn't that Apollo 11? Not quite, as Jeffrey Kluger reminds us in Apollo 8: The Thrilling Story of the First Mission to the Moon. Seven months before Neil Armstrong's historic footsteps in July 1969, NASA astronauts Frank Borman, Jim Lovell and Bill Anders had actually flown to the moon, circled it 10 times and made it back to Earth, figuratively paving the way for Armstrong's crew.

NonfictionBiography

The king-in-waiting

Review by Keith Herrell

Were you on the edge of your seat for the Netflix series “The Crown”? Do you still have the Charles and Diana coffee mug you badgered a London friend to send you 36 years ago?

If so, you’ll have a jolly good time reading Prince Charles: The Passions and Paradoxes of an Improbable Life, billed as the first major biography of the Prince of Wales in over 20 years. If not, you’ll still enjoy it as a psychological case study of a man who’s spent almost his entire life waiting for a role that might never be his. (For one thing, Charles’ mother, Queen Elizabeth II, remains active in her 90s.)

Charles, 68, has lived a life in the spotlight, with some of his most intimate secrets exposed thanks to those pesky intercepted phone conversations. So author Sally Bedell Smith doesn’t claim to expose any great secrets, concentrating instead on writing a highly readable account of Charles’ life, with emphasis on what makes him tick. In this she succeeds admirably.

As for the passions mentioned in the title, rest assured that Charles’ disastrous marriage to Lady Diana Spencer is recounted along with his affair with Camilla Parker Bowles, whom he married eight years after Diana’s death. But—you must eat your broccoli, you know—Smith devotes equal weight to Charles’ more prosaic passions, such as alternative medicine and environmental sustainability.

And the paradoxes? That’s where the psychology comes in, and Smith makes it clear that Charles could provide full employment for a team of psychoanalysts. And that’s with many more chapters of his life still to be written, kingship or not.

This article was originally published in the April 2017 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Were you on the edge of your seat for the Netflix series “The Crown”? Do you still have the Charles and Diana coffee mug you badgered a London friend to send you 36 years ago? If so, you’ll have a jolly good time reading Prince Charles: The Passions and Paradoxes of an Improbable Life, billed as the first major biography of the Prince of Wales in over 20 years.

Nonfiction

The untold story of a classic

Review by Keith Herrell

You made it through the 1,000-plus pages of the epic historical novel Les Misérables by Victor Hugo? Congratulations—and in celebration, treat yourself to this enjoyable guide to how it was written, published and received.

Without a sprawling plot or a cast of characters best kept track of by writing the names on a large wall banner, The Novel of the Century: The Extraordinary Adventure of Les Misérables checks in at a more modest 300-plus pages. But author David Bellos’ feat is worthy of admiration, too, whether you’re a serious Francophile or just crave a good read peppered with cocktail party-ready factoids.

Does the book live up to the hype of the title? Well, consider that Hugo wrote his quintessentially French novel (which inspired the eponymous musical) while in exile on the Channel Island of Guernsey, or that its publication in Brussels meant that printers were at the whim of unreliable thrice-weekly boat service ferrying Hugo’s dispatches, constantly worrying that pirated (figuratively if not literally) versions would be leaked to the public and spoil the novel’s much-hyped release. As for the publishing deal that led to the book, Bellos makes the case that after 155 years it remains the biggest in history (at 240,000 francs cash, or about $3.8 million today) because of its limited eight-year term.

While Hugo famously had his “digressions” in Les Misérables, with all you ever wanted to know about the Paris sewer system and more, Bellos has his "Interludes": chapters on how the characters got their names, or the history behind France’s various revolutions, uprisings and insurrections. And yes, he’d still have a book if they were cut out, but it wouldn’t be as good.

Bellos has impeccable academic credentials, but he never talks down to the reader. From manuscript to musical, The Novel of the Century delivers on its promise.

 

This article was originally published in the March 2017 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

You made it through the 1,000-plus pages of the epic historical novel Les Misérables by Victor Hugo? Congratulations—and in celebration, treat yourself to this enjoyable guide to how it was written, published and received.

NonfictionMemoir

Utah’s unforgiving rapids

Review by Keith Herrell

The five stages of grief are a well-known reaction to loss, but Stéphane Gerson added a sixth when his 8-year-old son, Owen, died in a commercial rafting accident on Utah’s Green River: He decided to write about it, “in expiation, in homage, in remembrance.” The resulting book, Disaster Falls, is an excruciating read—and an invaluable emotional resource.

Few of us, fortunately, experience a loss comparable to that of Gerson and his wife, Alison, and surviving son, Julian. But as Gerson makes clear, no one wakes up in the morning anticipating disaster. Seemingly inconsequential decisions can have far-reaching ramifications, sometimes resulting in death. So it was with Owen, who was in a small craft known as a ducky with his father when it flipped.

The decision to take an 8-year-old through Class III rapids can and undoubtedly will be debated by parents who read Disaster Falls, but what of the countless other decisions we make? What constitutes crossing the line when it comes to protecting our children or letting them stretch their world? Or is there not really a line but a kaleidoscope of random, inexplicable occurrences?

Gerson, a cultural historian and professor of French studies at New York University, writes unflinchingly of the accident, its immediate aftermath and its effect on him and his family. If you wonder how couples stay together—or break apart—after a devastating loss, his insights are illuminating. And how should you respond to a family that’s going through such a tragedy? Gerson’s reactions to well-meaning attempts at connection might surprise you.

Not so surprisingly, a legal battle emerges toward the end of the book, bringing with it some of Gerson’s most powerful writing. For the Gersons, as with all families, the journey continues along life’s never-ending river.

 

This article was originally published in the February 2017 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

The five stages of grief are a well-known reaction to loss, but Stéphane Gerson added a sixth when his 8-year-old son, Owen, died in a commercial rafting accident on Utah’s Green River: He decided to write about it, “in expiation, in homage, in remembrance.” The resulting book, Disaster Falls, is an excruciating read—and an invaluable emotional resource.

NonfictionBiography

Giving away the Big Mac fortune

Review by Keith Herrell

BookPage Top Pick in Nonfiction, November 2016

As we are constantly reminded, all those quarter-pounders from McDonald’s add up—to billions and billions served. Not as well known but just as importantly, millions and millions in McDonald’s profits were doled out to charities by Joan Kroc, widow of longtime Chairman Ray Kroc, during her lifetime and beyond. Ray & Joan is Lisa Napoli’s highly readable account of the Krocs’ romance and marriage, the growth of the McDonald’s fast-food empire and how all that money came to be given away.

It wasn’t exactly a storybook relationship under the arches. Ray and Joan were married to others when they first met and later left their spouses to be together, with Ray detouring into yet another marriage before he finally tied the knot with Joan. Once they were wed, Ray’s volatile personality and persistent drinking ensured conflicts, and the couple flirted with divorce. They stuck it out, though, and upon Ray’s death in 1984, Joan was suddenly in control of a fortune estimated at $1.7 billion and growing. 

The Krocs were no strangers to philanthropy before Ray’s death, but Joan kicked things into high gear while still managing to live lavishly and patronize her favorite gambling casinos. Chief beneficiaries included Operation Cork (alcoholism education), the Salvation Army and National Public Radio (which Joan listened to only occasionally), with additional millions doled out as she wished. Pet causes such as nuclear disarmament got the full “St. Joan of the Arches” treatment as well.

Part corporate success story, part soap opera, this tale has a lot of territory to cover, and Napoli recounts it all in a breezy, amusing style. She’s at her best on the subject of Ray and Joan’s complicated relationship, but the backstories—Ray’s rise from milkshake machine salesman to titan of commerce and Joan’s journey from a difficult childhood to beloved philanthropist—are just as riveting.

 

This article was originally published in the November 2016 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

As we are constantly reminded, all those quarter-pounders from McDonald’s add up—to billions and billions served. Not as well known but just as importantly, millions and millions in McDonald’s profits were doled out to charities by Joan Kroc, widow of longtime Chairman Ray Kroc, during her lifetime and beyond. Ray & Joan is Lisa Napoli’s highly readable account of the Krocs’ romance and marriage, the growth of the McDonald’s fast-food empire and how all that money came to be given away.
NonfictionBiography

Play it again, Van

Review by Keith Herrell

Looking for some appropriate piano accompaniment to that multi-part documentary on the Cold War you’re planning? It’s an easy call—just check out the musical archives of Van Cliburn, who became synonymous with the saber-rattling U.S.-Soviet Union standoff when he won the first International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow in 1958. 

Historian and journalist Nigel Cliff takes us back to the ’50s to recount that triumph, then follows Cliburn’s remarkable career through the ensuing decades against the backdrop of tension, relative calm and eventual empire breakup. (Coincidentally, when Cliburn died in 2013, tensions were entering another chilly period that persists today.) 

Cliff devotes half of Moscow Nights to the piano competition itself, and rightfully so. Many baby boomers got their first exposure to classical music (not counting  Warner Bros. cartoons) from the breathless media coverage of Cliburn’s triumph in Moscow, where the fix was presumably in for a Soviet pianist to win. With ordinary Muscovites and contest judges alike smitten with the 23-year-old Texan, Premier Nikita Khrushchev himself signed off on the winner. Such a musical high note was difficult to sustain, and Cliff pulls no punches in chronicling the professional and personal highs and lows that accompanied Cliburn for the rest of his career, inextricably tied to Cold War diplomacy.

That’s good news for the reader, as Cliff deftly weaves in such iconic moments as the pre-competition Sputnik launch, Khrushchev’s shoe-banging visit to the United Nations and the U-2 spy plane incident. Through it all, Cliburn maintains his place in popular culture even as his playing skills stagnate and eventually decline.

Part musical biography, part nostalgic look at the hula-hoop era and part Cold War history, Moscow Nights strikes the right chord in all respects.

 

This article was originally published in the October 2016 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Looking for some appropriate piano accompaniment to that multi-part documentary on the Cold War you’re planning? It’s an easy call—just check out the musical archives of Van Cliburn, who became synonymous with the saber-rattling U.S.-Soviet Union standoff when he won the first International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow in 1958.
NonfictionBiography

Inside the Reich’s rise

Review by Keith Herrell

When it comes to book titles, it’s hard to think of one more ominous than Hitler: Ascent, 1889-1939. The first of a two-volume project by German historian and journalist Volker Ullrich, this is a sprawling and ambitious attempt to explain how a man from humble beginnings with few accomplishments well into adulthood could morph into a ruthless dictator whose name has become a universal insult.

With the millions of words that have been written about Hitler, why another biography? In his introduction, Ullrich notes that more than 15 years have passed since the last important work on Hitler, with much research occurring in the meantime on him and surrounding figures. Moreover, Ullrich contends, a wealth of new material has appeared, including newly public notes and speeches. And finally, Ullrich sets out to challenge conventional wisdom that Hitler was a man of “limited intellectual horizons and severely restricted social skills” and shed more light on his private life, including his relationships with women and his social interactions.

Ullrich aggressively makes his case, noting that Hitler devoured books on a wide variety of topics during his struggling artist years in Vienna and Munich and that he led a varied social life, albeit one intertwined with his political activities. (Friends such as Winifred Wagner, daughter-in-law of the composer Richard Wagner, had the added bonus of advancing his political interests.) As for Hitler’s relationships with women, including mistress Eva Braun, Ullrich valiantly attempts to sort fact from myth (and downright gossip) but stops short of lurid speculation. 

At more than 1,000 pages, with a readable translation by Jefferson Chase, Hitler: Ascent is no quick read. That’s for the best, as this is a book to be studied with one eye toward the past and the other toward the future—and Volume 2.

 

This article was originally published in the September 2016 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

When it comes to book titles, it’s hard to think of one more ominous than Hitler: Ascent, 1889-1939. The first of a two-volume project by German historian and journalist Volker Ullrich, this is a sprawling and ambitious attempt to explain how a man from humble beginnings with few accomplishments well into adulthood could morph into a ruthless dictator whose name has become a universal insult.
NonfictionFamily & Relationships

Sifting through a life’s leftovers

Review by Keith Herrell

Which is harder to come to terms with: a 23-room clapboard mansion filled to bursting with “stuff,” or 60-plus years of complicated family relationships? Plum Johnson tackles both in They Left Us Everything, a memoir that’s both humorous and thoughtful.

An artist and former publisher, Johnson doesn’t seem particularly well suited to preside over the emptying of the rambling lakefront house in Oakville, Ontario, when her widowed mother dies at 93. But she tackles the task with gusto, moving in for well over a year (the original plan was six weeks) and getting down to the business of making it presentable enough to put on the market. 

It should be noted that Johnson’s mother was a character, in every sense of the word. She’s very much alive in the hilarious first chapter, which baby boomers caring for elderly parents can instantly relate to, and remains a strong presence throughout the book. So, for that matter, does Johnson’s father, who ran the family with an iron fist until falling victim to Alzheimer’s disease. Inevitably, Johnson’s clearing out of the family home becomes intertwined with better understanding her parents.

Some things (plastic bananas, old oxygen tanks, etc.) simply get tossed, while others are divvied up among siblings in a ritual akin to the National Football League draft. 

But rest assured, there are plenty of treasures—chief among them a trove of 2,000 letters written by Johnson’s mother, plus wartime letters between her parents. Understanding was there all along, it turns out, somewhere between the canned tomatoes and the boxes of National Geographic magazines.

ALSO IN BOOKPAGE: Read our Q&A with Johnson about They Left Us Everything.
 

This article was originally published in the August 2016 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Which is harder to come to terms with: a 23-room clapboard mansion filled to bursting with “stuff,” or 60-plus years of complicated family relationships? Plum Johnson tackles both in They Left Us Everything, a memoir that’s both humorous and thoughtful.
NonfictionPop Culture

What’s the deal with Seinfeld?

Review by Keith Herrell

Maybe we should add “Seinfeldia” to the lexicon, joining “yada yada,” “sponge-worthy” and “Festivus.”

In Jennifer Keishin Armstrong’s view, espoused in the book of the same name, it’s not just a play on the title of the NBC sitcom that ran from 1989 to 1998 and starred comedian Jerry Seinfeld and featured four friends dedicated to zero personal growth. It’s an imaginary place, still thriving thanks to obsessive fans and enduring memes. And Seinfeldia (the book, that is) is the essential travel guide.

Armstrong is on familiar turf here: She also wrote Mary and Lou and Rhoda and Ted, about “The Mary Tyler Moore Show,” and spent a decade on the staff of Entertainment Weekly. It’s a safe bet that she had a blast writing Seinfeldia, revisiting its origins, debriefing its writers (still shell-shocked from dealing with famously punctilious co-creator Larry David) and catching up with former cast members and network executives.

She’s at her best with tales from the writers, eager to dish about their turn at bat. Encouraged to mine their daily lives for stories, they came up with plotlines about dates gone wrong, shenanigans at the zoo and transgressions of the all-important “social contract.” But eventually the mines are emptied and it comes down to, as one writer once said, “sitting in an office in Studio City.”

And how did “the show about nothing” change everything? In Armstrong’s view, just look at shows like “The Office,” with its awkward humor, or “The Wire,” with its narrative complexity—both “Seinfeld” staples. But perhaps there’s nothing new under the sun: We learn that Michael Richards, who played “hipster doofus” Kramer, gleaned acting tips from watching Gale Storm in the 1950s sitcom “My Little Margie.”

 

This article was originally published in the July 2016 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Maybe we should add “Seinfeldia” to the lexicon, joining “yada yada,” “sponge-worthy” and “Festivus.” In Jennifer Keishin Armstrong’s view, espoused in the book of the same name, it’s not just a play on the title of the NBC sitcom that ran from 1989 to 1998 and starred comedian Jerry Seinfeld and featured four friends dedicated to zero personal growth. It’s an imaginary place, still thriving thanks to obsessive fans and enduring memes. And Seinfeldia (the book, that is) is the essential travel guide.
NonfictionBiography

A Scottish sprinter’s inspiring saga

Review by Keith Herrell

Maybe they made the wrong movie.

Or, at least, perhaps there should have been a sequel to Chariots of Fire, the 1981 historical drama that became an international hit and won four Academy Awards. That’s because, as British author Duncan Hamilton writes in For the Glory, Scottish sprinter Eric Liddell’s life was really just beginning when he won a gold medal in the 400 meters at the 1924 Summer Olympics after missing out on the 100-meter event by famously refusing to race on Sunday in accordance with his Christian beliefs.

As Hamilton depicts in this vivid and heartfelt narrative, Liddell went on to make a far more lasting mark in life than his athletic triumphs. A year after his Olympic glory in Paris, he began serving as a teacher and missionary in a remote region of China, where he was born the son of missionary parents. It was a difficult life in an environment already hostile to outsiders, and it became progressively more difficult as war clouds threatened. Ultimately, Liddell and other Westerners were sent to a Japanese work camp, where he died at age 43 from a brain tumor in 1945.

Hamilton’s passion for his subject shows through on every page as he recounts life in the camp, where Liddell worked tirelessly, gave up his meager rations and counseled despondent fellow internees. He also could be cajoled into the occasional footrace, never being beaten until near the end of his life.

Through it all, Liddell held to his beliefs and inspired countless others to follow in his footsteps. Hamilton makes it clear: His race became theirs, and the human race was the better for it.

 

This article was originally published in the May 2016 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Scottish sprinter Eric Liddell’s life was really just beginning when he won a gold medal in the 400 meters at the 1924 Summer Olympics after missing out on the 100-meter event by famously refusing to race on Sunday in accordance with his Christian beliefs.
NonfictionMemoir

Stranded in the Andes

Review by Keith Herrell

When it comes to inspirational books, it’s hard to beat Alive, Piers Paul Read’s 1974 account of the survival and eventual rescue of 16 survivors of a plane crash in the Andes. Roberto Canessa, one of two men who hiked out of the mountains and then led authorities to the survivors’ location, wisely doesn’t try to beat it in I Had to Survive, choosing instead to write (with Pablo Vierci) a complementary account of the ordeal and its effect on the subsequent four decades of his life.

It’s been quite a life, with Canessa forging a career as a pediatric cardiologist in his native Uruguay. The book is his way of expressing how, as Vierci puts it, “his ordeal on the mountain had shaped his life.”

For the record, Canessa wastes no time addressing what, for many, was the most salient feature of Alive: how the survivors had to consume “the only nourishment that was keeping us alive, the lifeless bodies of our friends.” But he has a larger purpose than explaining that decision. Rather than consigning his ordeal to the past, he’s made it an indelible part of his life.

So while the first part of the book recounts the crash and its aftermath, the second part is where Canessa truly bares his soul. From his words and those of his family and the families of his patients, it’s clear that while some people might think the Andes cast a shadow over his life, his view is totally different: “It’s the light from the mountain that continues to illuminate my path, in life and in death.”

 

This article was originally published in the March 2016 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

When it comes to inspirational books, it’s hard to beat Alive, Piers Paul Read’s 1974 account of the survival and eventual rescue of 16 survivors of a plane crash in the Andes. Roberto Canessa, one of two men who hiked out of the mountains and then led authorities to the survivors’ location, wisely doesn’t try to beat it in I Had to Survive, choosing instead to write (with Pablo Vierci) a complementary account of the ordeal and its effect on the subsequent four decades of his life.

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