Bits and Pieces

March 11, 2024
Actor Goldberg (Two Old Broads) reflects in this tender chronicle on the deaths of her two closest family members. Goldberg grew up in New York City’s Chelsea projects with her mother, Emma, and brother, Clyde, while Emma worked tirelessly as a practical nurse and a schoolteacher to support her children. Even as Goldberg hits the requisite celeb memoir career beats—including sections on her one-woman Broadway show, her breakthrough film role in 1985’s The Color Purple, and her supporting actress Oscar for Ghost—she keeps the focus on Emma, whose thriftiness and lust for life filled the author’s childhood with happy memories of trips to Coney Island and Radio City Music Hall to see the Rockettes. Goldberg contrasts these reveries with the overwhelming grief she felt when Emma died, in 2010, from a stroke. Five years later, Clyde succumbed to a ruptured brain aneurysm, leaving Goldberg to face the world without the “folks who let her be exactly who she was and gave her the confidence to become exactly who she wanted to be.” Throughout, Goldberg’s earthy, no-nonsense voice anchors her commentary on the ravages of bereavement (“If you go into a funk, then really let yourself go fully into it. Pull up a fainting chair. Draw the curtains. Close out the world for a while and get as insane in your grief as you ever thought you could”). This is no dishy Hollywood tell-all—it’s a salve for wounded souls.

April 15, 2024
Whoopi Goldberg has made an indelible mark on pop culture via film, TV, theater, and literature. Her new memoir is an emotional and uplifting exploration as, with her unique voice and trademark wit, she reflects on the people, places, and experiences that have made her the multi-award-winning icon she is today. Goldberg offers rare and personal insights into the lives of her family members, including her mother, Emma Harris, and brother, Clyde K. Johnson, and their profound impact on her life. Her mother, in particular, enabled Caryn Johnson, a weird little kid from the projects no one expected to achieve very much, to become a star. Goldberg recounts her challenges as a Black woman in America, the highs and lows that shaped her personal and professional journey, and the valuable lessons she learned, hoping to inspire readers. According to Goldberg, having a supportive group of individuals in your life is invaluable. She believes having people who accept and encourage you to be yourself is an exceptional gift that should never be taken for granted. Generous, candid, and uplifting.HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Goldberg's fan base will be avid for the mix of memoir and guidance.

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May 1, 2024

EGOT-winning actor Goldberg (n�e Caryn Jonson) reflects on her early life and career in this earnest tribute to her family. As a child, she counted on two people: her mother, Emma, and her older brother, Clyde. Emma worked diligently as a nurse while teaching her children to take time for the small things. Clyde doted on his little sister and allowed her to hang out with him and his friends. Years later, when Goldberg became famous, she brought Emma and Clyde to awards functions, fundraisers, and galas. The loving bond between the family never broke, even after Emma's and Clyde's deaths. Black-and-white photos in the book further demonstrate how much Goldberg cherishes them. Goldberg's career is secondary to the family's story, which in this memoir ends after her 1991 Oscar win. Instead of speaking directly about her career, she talks fondly about people she met along the way. That includes Mike Nichols, who facilitated her big break by directing her first and one-woman Broadway show. VERDICT Told mostly in chronological order, this breezy and moving memoir portrays a close-knit family that includes a daughter who is also a celebrity. A fine addition to biography collections.--Anjelica Rufus-Barnes

Copyright 2024 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

April 1, 2024
A vivid portrait of the author's beloved mother and brother, interwoven with the story of her rise to the top of American entertainment. In her latest book, Goldberg (b. 1955) shares memories of her mother and brother, who passed away unexpectedly in 2010 and 2015, respectively. In the first half, the author offers a close, intimate view of her childhood growing up in public housing in Manhattan's Chelsea neighborhood in the 1960s and '70s. It was just the three of them in what Goldberg calls her "nucleus family," and she shows scene after scene of her tightknit family life, as if flipping through a photo album: a summer day at Coney Island, a trip to the World's Fair in Queens, the Rockettes' Christmas Spectacular at Radio City Music Hall. Even the author's recollection of an unnerving familial tragedy does little to disrupt the warm glow of these childhood years, recalled in loosely chronological order. Until a young Goldberg discovers her love of acting nearly 70 pages in, the narrative suffers from a meandering quality, moving around place and time without a clear rhyme or reason. However, as we watch the author's career develop in the second half of the memoir--from experimental theater to Broadway and Hollywood--her memories of her mother and brother take shape around a guiding idea, creating a poignant, enjoyable, and moving read. "For those of you who still have your mom, dad, and siblings," she writes, "don't let a lot of time pass without talking about death....[M]ost of us don't have to face or think about death all that much. Let me tell you when you don't want to have to figure it out: after the person has died." Readers will want to call their parents after finishing this behind-the-scenes look at the life of a major entertainer.

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