Scar Tissue (2004)

Author: Anthony Kiedis, Larry Sloman | Page Count: 465

"I was still high out of my mind and trying not to lose an eyeball or tuft of hair, so I started running through the halls. Jennifer chased me. For some reason, I had a bag of cookies, so I started throwing the cookies at her, to keep her far enough away that she couldn't connect with any of her punches."

Scar Tissue chronicles the life of Anthony Kiedis, lead singer of The Red Hot Chili Peppers, from his birth and childhood in Michigan to his adolescence in Southern California to the formation of the band and his trials and tribulations with fame, love, and drug addiction all the way to his sober present while living a life that was totally untethered and impulsive.

The text reads as if Keidis is telling the story right to the reader which is pretty much how it was written since it was transcribed by Sloman as it was told to him with surprising recollection and detail by Keidis. The window it opens into the world of music and fame is fascinating as well as the change in culture that would allow a prepubescent kid to skateboard around a city unmonitored just exploring and experiencing. That isn't unheard of nowadays, but parents are sometimes arrested for that lack of chaperoning. Keidis' own personal journey is a running theme throughout from his self described egomania to his much healthier and calmer "life of service" which is equally fascinating. There are also several photos presented offering a visual look into his life that are interesting. An absorbing read punctuated with some insights and peeks into the hollywood behind-the-scenes.

4 Nothing drops the panties faster than music out of 5

Survival in Auschwitz (1958)

Author: Primo Levi | Page Count: 187

At that time I had not yet been taught the doctrine... that man is bound to pursue his own ends by all possible means, while he who errs but once pays dearly.

Survival in Auschwitz first appeared in English as If This Is A Man. Translated from its original italian, it tells the story of the author Primo Levi's capture, transfer to Auschwitz and subsequent liberation from it. He describes the inhuman treatment of the "haftlings"( the word for prisoner) by not only the nazis, but also fellow prisoners either out of the same racist views of the time, to possibly gain favor and privilege or just as a means to help themselves. The latter of which he didn't seem to hold against them given the circumstances and as it was a behavior he also participated in.

Levi actually doesn't beat the reader over the head with how it was horrible and how the reader should feel. He simply states clearly the events that transpired and lets the reader think about it as if he doesn't want pity or sympathy, but rather just to tell the story. There is even a running theme about how the physical stress, as bad as it was with disease, malnutrition and inadequate...everything, wasn't as bad as the dehumanization. Being told they were less than human and then forced to prove them right by having to embrace it for survival by stealing from fellow prisoners, loss of compassion for a struggling worker because it only slows down their work and other moments that he felt nothing for at the time and only much later remembered clearly enough to feel regret.
His prose is clear and concise, but still affecting and insightful. A very good read.

4 Soup and bread rations out of 5

High On Arrival (2009)

Author: Mackenzie Phillips, Hilary Liftin | Page Count: 292

"Not now darling, Daddy's shooting up."

The controversial memoir of Mackenzie Phillips following her from childhood to the present. It is a story almost typical about how child stars can spiral out of control into self destruction with drugs, sex and daddy issues and how she overcame these problems. As to the more salacious revelations in the book, I'll say free loving hippies + lots of drugs = I believe it.

There is certainly plenty of stuff to work with in her story, it is just hampered a bit by the writing. It's clear Phillips wrote most of it herself with constant overuse of certain words and phrases and while it is mostly chronological she does tend to drift at points. I suspect Liftin was just hired to clean up the manuscript after Phillips wrote it all down, but there is an interesting story with some fascinating details like how before rehab was a regular thing, addicts were still allowed to drink alcohol as it was considered separate from drugs. How far we've come.

2½ I suppose other addicts could sympathize more out of 5

De Profundis (Written 1897. Published 1905)

Author: Oscar Wilde| Page Count: 72

"We have forgotten that water can cleanse, and fire purify, and that the Earth is mother to us all. As a consequence our art is of the moon and plays with shadows..."

De Profundis is an epistle written by Oscar during his imprisonment in Reading Gaol (that be ye olde spelling of jail, the big house, the hoosegow etc).  The work was for the eyes of Lord Alfred Douglas, although he isn't mentioned by name.  It’s a piece of writing which at times seems almost pitiful, full of both profound realisations and what seems to me to be obvious attempts at self-delusion.  It’s also both self-effacing and at times supremely arrogant (although if arrogance was to ever be perceived as a kind of misunderstood virtue there is no one more deserving of it than Wilde).  In short, it’s a monologue about the beauty of suffering and about the need for it in order to be born anew.

The religious tones get very heavy at times and it occasionally feels like he is clutching at illusory straws with which to weave himself a basket that he might sail away from the very real hardships into a world of literary flagellation, overseen by Christ as poet, offering salvation through escapism.  Two years of eating black bread and scrubbing stone floors would do that to even the sturdiest individual.  It offers a very real insight into his mindset during those last years but is perhaps much too gloomy to be of interest to anyone other than Wilde fans.

3½ fruits of experience grow on trees in shadow out of 5