Becoming by Michelle Obama

Series: N/a

Genre: Biography/Non-Fiction

Age Group: Adult

Audiobook - 19 hours

Source: Scribd

Published: November 2018

Add it // Buy it

Rating: 5/5

In a life filled with meaning and accomplishment, Michelle Obama has emerged as one of the most iconic and compelling women of our era. As First Lady of the United States of America—the first African American to serve in that role—she helped create the most welcoming and inclusive White House in history, while also establishing herself as a powerful advocate for women and girls in the U.S. and around the world, dramatically changing the ways that families pursue healthier and more active lives, and standing with her husband as he led America through some of its most harrowing moments. Along the way, she showed us a few dance moves, crushed Carpool Karaoke, and raised two down-to-earth daughters under an unforgiving media glare. 

In her memoir, a work of deep reflection and mesmerizing storytelling, Michelle Obama invites readers into her world, chronicling the experiences that have shaped her—from her childhood on the South Side of Chicago to her years as an executive balancing the demands of motherhood and work, to her time spent at the world’s most famous address. With unerring honesty and lively wit, she describes her triumphs and her disappointments, both public and private, telling her full story as she has lived it—in her own words and on her own terms. Warm, wise, and revelatory, Becoming is the deeply personal reckoning of a woman of soul and substance who has steadily defied expectations—and whose story inspires us to do the same. 

Becoming was the first audiobook I listened to this year and I couldn’t have started the year with a better choice. This book completely drew me in and I enjoyed the experience of reading it very much.

Throughout the book my admiration and respect for the Former First Last, grew continuously. Before I read this biography, I knew Michelle Obama mostly from her work as the First Lady. Listening to this book taught me a lot about her own work and career. The book is full of excellent quotes while Obama covers growing up in Chicago and covering many difficult topics including racism and infertility.

I cried multiple times during this book because of the beauty and kindness in Michelle Obama's words. She is straightforward and honest in her storytelling. I loved seeing the stories she picked out of her life to explain how she became the woman she is and is still becoming.

Though I cried the most when Michelle speaks of the loss of her father, the most difficult part of this book for me was the section about the 2016 election. Reliving the lead up to the election and the political climate of those initial days after was difficult especially because I use reading to forget about politics most days. Even so, this was incredibly crafted.

I think everyone could benefit from reading Michelle Obama's story. I highly recommend this book, especially the audio, to any reader.

Happy Reading!

Review - Capital Dames by Cokie Roberts

Series: N/A
Genre: Non-Fiction
Age Group: Adult
Audiobook - 14 hrs
Source: Overdrive 
Published: April 2015
Add it // Buy it 

Rating: 3/5

In this engrossing and informative companion to her New York Times bestsellers Founding Mothers and Ladies of Liberty, Cokie Roberts marks the sesquicentennial of the Civil War by offering a riveting look at Washington, D.C. and the experiences, influence, and contributions of its women during this momentous period of American history.

With the outbreak of the Civil War, the small, social Southern town of Washington, D.C. found itself caught between warring sides in a four-year battle that would determine the future of the United States.

After the declaration of secession, many fascinating Southern women left the city, leaving their friends—such as Adele Cutts Douglas and Elizabeth Blair Lee—to grapple with questions of safety and sanitation as the capital was transformed into an immense Union army camp and later a hospital. With their husbands, brothers, and fathers marching off to war, either on the battlefield or in the halls of Congress, the women of Washington joined the cause as well. And more women went to the Capital City to enlist as nurses, supply organizers, relief workers, and journalists. Many risked their lives making munitions in a highly flammable arsenal, toiled at the Treasury Department printing greenbacks to finance the war, and plied their needlework skills at The Navy Yard—once the sole province of men—to sew canvas gunpowder bags for the troops.


Cokie Roberts chronicles these women's increasing independence, their political empowerment, their indispensable role in keeping the Union unified through the war, and in helping heal it once the fighting was done. She concludes that the war not only changed Washington, it also forever changed the place of women.

While I’ve been interested in several of Cokie Robert’s books in the past, this is the first one I picked up. The Civil War has always been an area of interest for me and I was interested to see what the different perspectives and contributions women had during the war.

Throughout the book Roberts focused on the women who lived and worked in Washington D.C. The stories of these women are told through a chronological look at the war. Though this does put the events in context, it was difficult for me to keep track of all the women as we revisited their stories throughout the book. Since I listened to the audiobook this was especially difficult without a glossary to reference. There were quite a few women who were easy to recognize like Clara Barton, Mary Todd Lincoln and Julia Dent Grant, but others that were important in their time were difficult to keep track of as we jumped between them.

While I enjoyed the look at high society life in Washington during the mid 19^th century, it was disappointing to have so few women from other backgrounds included. Almost every woman profiled is either in the Washington political sphere or in the city itself. Very few women of color, poor women or working women are mentioned. While I’m sure it was more difficult to find individual women to profile from these backgrounds, I felt their voices were missing in this book about a war that killed substantially more working-class husbands and liberated African-American women from slavery.

Overall, this was interesting and I enjoyed learning about the lives of the women Roberts chose to profile, but I would have enjoyed it more with more voices included. All of the information was fascinating and I am glad to see a book covering many of the women who changed society and the political spheres during the Civil War.

My Last Review--> Hunting Ground by Patricia Briggs

Review - Elizabeth the Queen by Sally Bendall Smith

Genre: Biography 
Kindle - 668pgs
Published by Random House
Source: Library Overdrive
Add it // Buy it 
Rating: 3/5 

From the moment of her ascension to the throne in 1952 at the age of twenty-five, Queen Elizabeth II has been the object of unparalleled scrutiny. But through the fog of glamour and gossip, how well do we really know the world’s most famous monarch? Drawing on numerous interviews and never-before-revealed documents, acclaimed biographer Sally Bedell Smith pulls back the curtain to show in intimate detail the public and private lives of Queen Elizabeth II, who has led her country and Commonwealth through the wars and upheavals of the last sixty years with unparalleled composure, intelligence, and grace. 

In Elizabeth the Queen, we meet the young girl who suddenly becomes “heiress presumptive” when her uncle abdicates the throne. We meet the thirteen-year-old Lilibet as she falls in love with a young navy cadet named Philip and becomes determined to marry him, even though her parents prefer wealthier English aristocrats. We see the teenage Lilibet repairing army trucks during World War II and standing with Winston Churchill on the balcony of Buckingham Palace on V-E Day. We see the young Queen struggling to balance the demands of her job with her role as the mother of two young children. Sally Bedell Smith brings us inside the palace doors and into the Queen’s daily routines—the “red boxes” of documents she reviews each day, the weekly meetings she has had with twelve prime ministers, her physically demanding tours abroad, and the constant scrutiny of the press—as well as her personal relationships: with Prince Philip, her husband of sixty-four years and the love of her life; her children and their often-disastrous marriages; her grandchildren and friends.

Anything related to the British Isles interests me so when I started my Expanding Reading Horizons project, I started hunting a biography. This was quite a different book than what I normally read and it took me a few chapters to get back into the swing of non-fiction reading. Honestly I haven't picked up much non-fiction since college. It was very readable and the language wasn't difficult to follow which made this an easy read.

Even though it was interesting with a lot of information about the Queen and the Royal Family, I thought it was lacking in a few areas. I found the first half really interesting. This section includes a lot of information about Elizabeth's early life, her marriage to Phillip and her first two decades as queen. For me this section was filled with new information and a great mix of political, social and personal information. I thought this section kept moving with a nice variety of topics and covered the events of the Queen's life with good depth.

As we moved closer to present day, I thought the author's personal opinions became more apparent and her writing had to be taken with a larger grain of salt. Especially her portrayal of Diana seemed harsh and villainous. I also thought the sections on the Jubilees dragged a lot. They were heavy on the description, but low on interest for me. You could really tell which Prime Ministers the author liked and which she didn't as well.

Overall I think this book was an interesting introduction to the life of Queen Elizabeth and told me a lot of things I didn't know before. I would recommend it, but really be aware of the author's biases throughout the book so you aren't swayed too easily.