Shelf Life

Category: Family

  • Comedian Michael Ian Black “A Better Man”

    Comedian Michael Ian Black “A Better Man”

    Michael Ian Black

    A Buzzfeed Most Anticipated Book of 2020, Michael Ian Black‘s new book, A Better Man: A (Mostly Serious) Letter to my Son (Algonquin Books) is a poignant look at boyhood, in the form of a heartfelt letter from the comedian to his teenage son as he is leaving for college. But more than that, it is also a far-reaching and radical plea for rethinking masculinity and teaching today’s young men how to give and receive love.

    In a world in which the word masculinity now often goes hand in hand with toxic, comedian, actor, and father Black offers up a way forward for boys, men, and anyone who loves them. Part memoir, part advice book, and written as a heartfelt letter to his college-bound son, A Better Man reveals Black’s own complicated relationship with his father, explores the damage and rising violence caused by the expectations placed on boys to “man up,” and searches for the best way to help young men be part of the solution, not the problem. “If we cannot allow ourselves vulnerability,” he writes, “how are we supposed to experience wonder, fear, tenderness?”

    Honest, funny, and hopeful, Black skillfully navigates the complex gender issues of our time and gives a touching answer to an extremely important question: How can we be, and raise, better men?

    Black, an actor, comedian, and writer, started his career with the sketch comedy show The State, on MTV, and has now created and starred in many other television shows. Movie appearances include Wet Hot American Summer, The Baxter, and Sextuplets.

    He is also the author of several children’s books including the award-winning I’m Bored, I’m Sad, and I’m Worried, and the parody A Child’s First Book of Trump. His books for adults include the memoirs You’re Not Doing It Right and Navel Gazing, and the essay collection My Custom Van. Black also co-authored with Meghan McCain America, You Sexy Bitch.

    As a stand-up comedian, Michael regularly tours the country, and he has released several comedy albums. His podcasts include Mike & Tom Eat Snacks, with Tom Cavanagh; Topics, with Michael Showalter; How to Be Amazing; and Obscure.

    Married, he lives in Connecticut with his wife and two children.

  • Old School Love and Why It Works

    Old School Love and Why It Works

                  A Hip Hop artist, even one who whose group has sold millions of records globally and was recently inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, isn’t the person we typically turn to when needing relationship advice.

                  That is, until, you pick up a copy of Old School Love and Why It Works (Dey St. 2020; $26.99) by Joseph “Rev Run” Simmons and his wife, Justine Simmons, long admired by friends for the longevity of their 30 year marriage.  

                  “We’ve had hard times, but we have resilience and we always knew we wanted to be together,” says Rev, front man of Run-DMC.

                  “Now people come up to us, people who see us on TV or follow us on Instagram,” says Justine about their reality shows—Run’s House, All About the Washingtons and Rev Run’s Sunday Suppers. “They ask us for advice or say we should write a book about how we make our marriage work.”

                  You can’t have a marriage without a love story, so let’s start with theirs. They met when Rev Run was just Joey but, still at the age of 15, an up and coming musician. He met Justine when performing at a roller rink. She was 14 but a vision in blue as he remembers. They went out, they liked each other, he wrote her a letter saying, “I will marry you one day.” But though they both lived in New York, the physical distance eventually worked against them. They parted. Joey became Rev Run, front man for the first rap group to earn a Grammy Lifetime Achievement honor. He was on top—fame, gold and platinum records, millions of fans, long days and crazy nights as he recalls. For some that would be all you’d ever need.

    But there must have been something missing because years later when his cousin asked him if he remembered a girl named Justine, Rev Run asked him to get her number. He called and just like that the relationship was on again.

      So what makes a marriage last, I ask Rev and he refers me to the chapter he wrote about that very subject. It’s simple but it all makes sense. “If you want to go partying and clubbing and carousing and drinking, here’s a better piece of advice: Do. Not. Get. Married.” Instead just stay single.

                  He has more to say.

                  “Be selfless, not selfish,” he tells me. “Pay attention, listen to what your spouse is saying, don’t let it be in the background. “If I can see she really wants something or if she doesn’t see my point of view, then I back up.  One of the biggest takeaways I want for this book is that it’s important to listen to the whispers to avoid the screams later.”

                  Takeaways are a big component of their book. Each of the chapters, written alternately by Rev and Justine end with a page of “Takeaways” or their advice on nourishing relationships. 

                  Here’s a big one from Justine.

                  “Both my parents were divorced and remarried,” she says. “If you have children and go into another relationship, make sure that they love your kids like they love you. And make sure you love their kids. If not, then don’t marry that person for your own selfish reasons because your child or their children will suffer.”

                  Luckily, when Justine met Rev she loved his three daughters. When the two adopted after the death of their infant daughter, they all blended into one family. Parenting became so important that the couple wrote Take Back Your Parenting: A Challenge to America’s Parents about how to make it all work.

                  Which brings us to this. Both Rev and Justine, who are a deacon and deaconess, want to help guide others—whether it’s in parenting or love. Helping is what they are all about.

                  One last thought. The letter 15-year-old Rev wrote the note pledging to marry Justine one day—well, she saved it and when they reconnected, she gave it to him.

    What: Rev Run and Justine Simmons presentation, Q&A and book signing event.  Old School Love and Why It Works

    When: Friday, January 31, 7- 9 pm

    Where: Wentz Concert Hall, 171 E. Chicago Ave., Naperville, IL

    Cost: Each ticket includes a copy of the book and admits one or two people. You will receive your book when you arrive at the event. They will not be available for pick up before that time. Rev Run and Justine will be signing each attendees book and posing for photographs after their presentation.

    fyi: For more information and to purchase tickets, 630-355-2665; andersonsbookshop.com

  • How to Forget: A Daughter’s Memoir

    How to Forget: A Daughter’s Memoir

              Kate Mulgrew is just finishing lunch when I call at the pre-arranged time and she asks for a moment so she can order coffee. She’s eating and talking because her schedule is so tight it requires serious multi-tasking. Right now, she is juggling filming a new season of Mr. Mercedes and is also on a multi-city book tour to promote her just released book, How to Forget: A Daughter’s Memoir.

              It is a book, she tells me, that she felt compelled to write as it chronicles “the turbulent, tragic and joyful “time she spent in Iowa with her dying parents.

              Knowing that sometimes expressing raw and painful emotions can be a psychological relief or catharsis, I ask if that was true for her.

              “It was the opposite of that,” says Mulgrew. “Instead writing took me into deeper waters. But I told myself you have to do this; you have to write this.”

              Those deeper waters were both emotional and physical as Mulgrew holed up in a friend’s house on Lough Corrib, which is, she describes as a desolate, deep and col lake near Cornamonai west Ireland.

              “Writing this book was lonely,” she continues after taking a sip of coffee. Since I’m drinking a cup as well, it’s almost like we’re having coffee together. “It took three years to write because I had to keep leaving to film Orange is the New Black.”

              Was it necessary to live on Lough Corrib to write the book, I ask?

              “It is the only way to write a book about them and how much I loved them,” she tells me, in that husky voice I remember from her playing Captain Kathryn Janeway of “Star Trek: Voyager.”

              Embracing the remoteness and isolation while writing about death, Mulgrew talks about the Ireland’s short winter days.

              “The sun is out for just short time, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. and then the darkness is upon us again,” she says.  “I shed many tears I would force myself to write until four and then light the fire and go for a walk or make dinner.”

              In the end, it was worth it.

              “These were the people who shaped me,” she says, as she sets her cup down for the last time, a clinking sound on my end of the phone signaling an end to the interview. “It’s important, that experience of saying goodbye, to be present with your parents at their mortal illness, to take the journey with them. We know that the turn in the road to sickness and then to death is universal. We know that bend in the road does not go into a flowering meadow, but into a darkening thicket from which no one will ever return. I’m one of eight children, each one of us has a different story and each one of us gets to go their own way in telling it.  And this was mine and this is how I decided to tell it.”