Book Description
A unique, ruminative biography-a fascinating excursion into the American underworld at the dawn of the twentieth century, the life of an unrespectable Irish woman, and the hidden inner life of any woman who has tried to choose the unconventional path-by the author of the New York Times bestsellers Are You Somebody? and My Dream of You.
Nuala O'Faolain, the author of three consecutive New York Times bestsellers, has come upon a story that is not only a perfect match for her literary gifts but also takes her career in a surprising and rich new direction. This Irish woman writer who achieved international fame with a remarkably candid appraisal of her own unorthodox life has taken as her subject another daughter of Ireland-this one a notorious criminal and unrepentant, independent woman.
The legend says that May was a tall girl with glorious hair and big blue eyes, compellingly attractive to men. At nineteen, she stole her family's savings and ran away from her home in rural Ireland to America-first Nebraska, then Chicago at the time of the World's Fair, and then on to New York. In these new American cities, she worked as a grifter, a confidence trickster, a prostitute, a sometime showgirl-earned her moniker and was hailed in tabloids as "Queen of the Underworld." And then she fell in love with a big-league criminal, followed him to Paris where they successfully robbed the American Express, then were apprehended, tried, and sent to prison. May survived prison, returned to America, and was reborn again and again-falling in love, lapsing back into the criminal life, flirting with legitimacy, writing her memoirs.
O'Faolain brings a sympathetic scrutiny to this extraordinary life story, reaching across the decades for points of connection and understanding. May was born in post-famine Ireland and died in the world of telephones, sportscars, and movies, in 1929, just before the stock-market crash. Is there a woman's experience they can share? An Irishwoman's experience? An outsider's? In the hands of one of our most astute and gifted memoirists, The Story of Chicago May is not only a tale well-told, but an inquiry into the telling of any life story. "There are pioneer journeys still to be made to the edge of the territory where we know how to be sympathetic," O'Faolain writes. "Shine the beam of attention out there and the dark recoils, and the frontier of human settlement moves forward."
Customer Reviews:
She Did It Her Way.......2007-07-28
I first heard of Irish writer Nuala O'Faolain when I picked up one of her books in the WH Smith at Heathrow as I ran to catch a flight back to the States. Sometimes we are drawn to certain authors in mysterious ways, as if the moments were meant to be. Thereafter, I was led to her two memoirs, breathtaking in their candor about moving through stages of life as a young Irish girl, a writer, and mature woman coming to terms with her past.
Knowing this writer's work, I didn't expect "The Story of Chicago May" to be a traditional biography, and it most certainly was not. May Duignan, born in post-famine Ireland, nicked her family's savings and ran away to America. There, she achieved legendary status as "Chicago May," working as a thief, outlaw, showgirl and prostitute.
What I find remarkable is how the writer weaves in her own process of discovery and personal experience in researching and writing the book. This approach won't work for all readers. Some prefer the conventional biography, but others will find this book refreshing. No matter how a writer strives for objectivity, biography writing will never truly elude the subjectivity of the writer's own experience. O'Faolain did it her way, though she painstakingly researched her elusive subject. She literally traced the steps of May through city after city on two different continents.
Years of May's life were spent in prisons on both sides of the Atlantic, but she managed to survive a life on the edge. Exhausted and sick at heart, she later met police reformer August Vollmer, who convinced her to write her autobiography as a way toward the light. O'Faolain refuses to sugarcoat the "Queen of Crook's" struggle to make ends meet, her experiences in and out of prison, or her poor choices in men, several notorious crooks in their own right.
"Hope kept me up," May wrote in her last, desperate note to Vollner before her death as "a tired old prostitute" in an unmarked grave in Philadelphia. But the book is not about a character who tried to save her own soul, whatever that may be interpreted to be. It ends with just as many questions about the seeming lack of meaning in May's life, yet assures us that even such a life as hers is worth examining: "Out there, people are waiting in the dark. Shine the beam of attention out there. The dark recoils."
When History and Memoir Mix.......2006-11-09
Like some of the previous reviewers, I was annoyed and bewildered after the initial reading of this book. Not because it wasn't well-written. It is. But the intermingling of the author's experiences and what she perceives May Duignan-Churchill to have felt/experienced was disorienting because I thought I was buying a biography of Chicago May. Most historical biographies are devoid of personal observations unless the author happened to be there along with his / her subject, which certainly wasn't true in Nuala O'Faolain's case.
It didn't take me long, however, to appreciate "The Story of Chicago May" for the unique literary effort that it is. O'Faolain is using May Duignan's story to depict one woman's struggle for independence AND show how similar struggles go on today despite increased earning power and educational opportunity. The author is an accomplished memoirist, and in this book she uses her brilliant capacity for insight to help make sense out of a cheerfully unrepentant female crook's career.
By the end of the second reading, I loved the book. That said, I understand why other readers who expected a no-nonsense historical biography, packed with facts and no fancy, were disappointed.
Disappointing.......2006-06-12
I agree with the previous reviewer that this book is "unfocused, disjointed, unstructured, incoherent, and rambling." It was difficult reading and difficult to keep up with what is fact and what is the author's interjections.
Also, I did not care for the personal family information from Ms. O'Faolain. In my opinion, it only added to the adjectives mentioned above and to the book's boring length that could have been more interesting if it were not so lenghtly.
As expected.......2006-02-25
The biography was much as described in other reviews, where an interesting person was described both through the historical facts found and personal experiences of the author. I enjoyed O'Faolain's strategy and the story of May's life.
A Sensitive Biography.......2006-01-27
I was struck with the skill and insight that the author demonstrates to draw us to this character. May becomes an examp-le of a human soul trapped by her environment and able to discard the yoke of fear that holds us in a dead-end life. She emerges as a soaring butterfly but is conscious of the difficulty of returning to "comfortable" life after living on the edge of society and flaunting it. The author carefully guides us thru the difficult years of incarceration and rejection, and is most skillful in identifying with the character in a way that makes the reader both despise and embrace her. Truly a fascinating story told in a manner which traps and holds the reader in timeless suspension.
Customer Reviews:
Fascinating historical account of survival.......2007-01-10
Nuala O'Faolain does a remarkable job of humanizing a woman who otherwise would've remained just another fallen woman. This book is a captivating tale of survival, as well as a wonderful source of history. Anyone interested in what it was like to literally survive in the U.S. at the turn of the 20th century will enjoy this tale. O'Faolain has a gentle, hypnotic writing style that really works here to evoke empathy for a woman who would otherwise be regarded as a common prostitute and petty thief. I loved it.
Average customer rating:
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The Story of Chicago May
Nuala O'Faolain
Manufacturer: Riverhead Trade
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
 General
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Thunderstruck
ASIN: 1594482179 |
Book Description
The story of a female outlaw like no other in history-by the acclaimed #1 New York Times bestselling author.
Legend says that May was tall with red-gold hair and big blue eyes, compellingly attractive to men. At nineteen, she stole her family's savings and ran away from home in rural Ireland to America where she worked as a confidence trickster, a thief, a showgirl, and a prostitute, notorious as much for her violence as for her diamond rings. The tabloids would dub her "The Queen of the Underworld." Reaching across the decades for points of connection, Nuala O'Faolain brings sympathetic scrutiny to the understanding of an outlaw experience like no other.
Customer Reviews:
The Story of Chicago May.......2007-01-12
I was disappointed in the book. It had more biography of the author than the subject.
Average customer rating:
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The Story of Chicago May
Nuala O'Faolain
Manufacturer: Michael Joseph Ltd
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
General
| Biographies & Memoirs
| Subjects
| Books
ASIN: 0141006587 |
Customer Reviews:
so disappointed.......2007-06-13
I had heard so much about this author and was really looking forward to this book, particularly as i had just finished Devil in the White City which covered the same time period. I barely made it through the first 30 pages and gave up. I felt she spent too much time dwelling on her own thoughts and feelings about her subject and not enough telling the story of Chicago May.
Average customer rating:
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The Story of Chicago May
Nuala O'Faolain
Manufacturer: Hamish Hamilton Ltd
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
General
| Biographies & Memoirs
| Subjects
| Books
True Crime
| True Accounts
| Nonfiction
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ASIN: 0718145232 |
Average customer rating:
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The Story of Chicago May
Nuala O'Faolain
Manufacturer: Large Print Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
Irish
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Criminals
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ASIN: 1594131686 |
Product Description
10 Hours 48 Minutes on CDs.
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Chicago May,: Her story,
May Churchill Sharpe
Manufacturer: The Macaulay company
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Binding: Unknown Binding
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ASIN: B00085PC6E |
Book Description
Rebels at the Gate is the dramatic story of the first Union victories of the Civil War and the events that caused Virginians to divide their state. In a defiant act to sustain President Lincoln's war effort, Virginia Unionists created their own state government in 1861-destined to become the new state of West Virginia.
Customer Reviews:
Tries to do to much.......2004-12-26
The title of the book promises a history of the 1861 Western Virginia Campaign. This little covered campaign propelled McClellan to command of the Union armies and pushed Robert E. Lee into obscurity. Only Jefferson Davis' faith in Lee rescued him from build fortifications along the Atlantic coast. Politically important, West Virginia succeeded from the Confederacy and became a state due to Union success. The infighting between Wise and Floyd provide a look into how poorly the CSA command functioned and how two petty people could bring everything to a halt.
The author attempts to cover all of this and provide unlimited human-interest stories too. He fails, as one part of the story elbows another out of the way, while tripping over a third part. This is not a poorly written book. The problem is origination and discipline. No story is completed and human-interest keeps interrupting. A major problem is maps! In the Illustrations section are three useless maps. First, they are in the wrong place, second the two dealing with battles have to little detail, lastly if you have not looked at the illustrations you will not know they are there.
This is the second book I have read on this campaign. I have not improved my knowledge or understanding by reading it.
A Worthy Companion to "Lee vs. McClellan".......2004-08-29
Clayton R. Newell covered the same ground as Mr. Lesser some years ago in his classic "Lee vs. McClellan" but what Mr. Lesser has done in "Rebels at the Gate" is take a fine portrait of the bitter, brother versus brother fighting in the hills of West Virginia and turned it into a landscape. He writes movingly of the Rebel General Garnett, who upon taking the West Virginia assignment to stop the Union forces knew he would die there; of little Josie Gordon, the 18 year son of a Union major, who enlisted in the Union Army much against the wishes of his father, and would be found dead on the battlefield by his heartbroken father.
He also writes of spies, of bushwackers like the deadly Nancy Hart, a little spitfire who killed a Union jailer taking her photo, of the various West Virginia politicians who clamored to 'secede' themselves from the Confederacy, and the figures of history, - Stonewall Jackson, George McClellan, Robert E. Lee, and the sarcastic "bitter" (Ambrose) Bierce, whose Civil War experience, which began in West Virginia, had a profound impact on his future writings.
As a previous reviewer has noted, Lesser has a storyteller's gift, but he also knows his history. A worthy work to place alongside the Newell book, if you can still get a copy.
Great Storyteller Tells Tale of West Virginia's Birth.......2004-08-29
The author's bio says he's had a 20-year career as an archaeologist and historical interpreter. It should also say he's an extraordinary storyteller.
This book is just terrific: brisk narrative pace, interesting characters, colorful anecdotes. It deals simultaneously with the Civil War's initial clash of arms in the mountains of western Virginia, and the political machinations that surrounded the birth of West Virginia and its entry into the Union as the 35th state.
Western Virginia is the place where Generals McClellan and Lee make their Civil War debuts. It is from these mountains that McClellen emerges as the Young Napoleon, hailed as the Union's savior. McClellen's prodigious organizational skills are clearly evident; for example, he pioneers the use of the telegraph in battlefield communications -- one of a dozen Civil War "firsts" the author cites. But the tendencies that would later cost McClellen his command and sully his reputation in military history already begin to rear their heads: exaggeration of enemy troop strength; battlefield timidity ("he sat there with indecision stamped on every line of his countenance"); a haughty, supercilious manner.
In contrast to McClellan, Lee limps out of western Virginia with his reputation greatly diminished -- undermined by uncooperative mountain weather, poor timing and internecine fueds between political generals that precluded battlefield coordination. It was during the bleak days in western Virginia that Lee grew a white beard, and earned the derisive sobriquet, "Granny Lee."
The western Virginia campaign often receives short shrift in Civil War histories, overshadowed by the larger, bloodier engagements that followed. "Rebels at the Gate" fills the void and does so with an engaging, well-paced narrative. This book is sure to delight anyone interested in the American Civil War.
A gripping and involving narrative of a turbulent time.......2004-06-08
Written by an archaeologist and historical interpreter of twenty years' experience, Rebels At The Gate: Lee And Mcclellan On The Front Line Of A Nation Divided is a study and evocative presentation of the earliest days of the American Civil War. Presenting a portrait of the fundamental issues and charasmatic personalities so strong that the result was a nation polarized. When Virginia Unionists formed the new state of West Virginia to sustain President Lincoln's war effort and block Confederate control of the territory and a key point of access to the North, Union and Confederate troops led by George McClellan and Robert E. Lee respectively were pit in a severe campaign that set the stage for the long years of bloodshed to come. A gripping and involving narrative of a turbulent time in American history.
Rebels at the Gates Opens an Overlooked Period in the ACW.......2004-05-13
This is an excellent book. Detailed enough to be useful and interesting but not dry, fast paced, it is a well written chronological account of an early period of the war and the many interesting people involved. The author clearly draws the links between actions taken during this period and later in the war. This is more than just another book on the Civil War. Mr. Lesser explains clearly, without bogging down in minutiae, how the political and military circumstances influenced West Virginia's formation.
A long time resident of West Virginia and western Virginia (the Shenandoah valley) and a sometime student of the American Civil War, I happily learned much that I didn't know about some of my favorite places and historical figures. Intrigued, I read this book straight through.
Book Description
Policymakers, scholars, and the news media have been alarmed by the potential for chemical and biological weapons (CBW) terrorism, and the U.S. Congress has allocated billions of dollars for counterterrorism and "consequence management" programs. Driving these concerns are the global spread of scientific knowledge and technology relevant to CBW terrorism and the vulnerability of civilian populations to chemical and biological attacks.
Notably lacking from the analysis, however, has been a careful assessment of the terrorists themselves. What types of terrorist groups or individuals are both capable of acquiring chemical and biological weapons and motivated to use them, and for what purposes? Further, what types of toxic agents would probably be produced, and how would they be delivered?
Answers to these questions would enable policymakers to prepare for the most likely contingencies. To this end, Toxic Terror provides in-depth case studies of twelve terrorist groups and individuals who, from 1946 to 1998, allegedly acquired or employed CBW agents. The cases were researched from primary sources, including court documents, interviews, and declassified government files.
By comparing the twelve cases, the book identifies characteristic motivations and patterns of behavior associated with CBW terrorism and provides an empirical basis for prudent, cost-effective strategies of prevention and response.
Customer Reviews:
The best case study volume on CBW terrorism.......2002-03-25
Tucker's collection of case studies involving the use or attempted use of chemical or biological weapons is truly excellent. It not only gives in-depth histories for each of the cases, but it also presents an analytical approach to their interpretation. The book is concluded by comparing all of the case studies in order to determine potential patterns and characteristics that would be useful in identifying potential terrorists and thwarting their efforts before they could come to fruition. Each case profiles the people that are involved, including the personalities of leaders, technicians, and of the actual cadres. It evaluates where and why successes occurred, and also where failures prevented perfect execution. From this book you will learn what certain groups have targeted, what as led them to violence, and how they attempted to use CBW. The book also examines a few cases where it has been believed that CBW was used, but the evidence has indicated otherwise. This book is perfect for people who desire to study terrorism in-depth, and for the reader who would like to be informed of many cases of terrorism throughout the 20th century.
Another outstanding BCSIA volume........2000-05-22
Tucker's collection brings together analyses of all known historical usages of chemical and biological weapons (including toxins) by terrorists, as well as debunkings of three popular but apocryphal stories of such use. The book is absurdly thorough, and an invaluable historical resource, whether one agrees or not with the conclusions the editor draws from the collection.
Book Description
This digital document is an article from Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, published by Educational Foundation for Nuclear Science, Inc. on September 1, 2000. The length of the article is 1257 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.
Citation Details
Title: Toxic Terror: Assessing Terrorist Use of Chemical and Biological Weapons.(Review) (book review)
Author: Leonard A. Cole
Publication:
Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (Refereed)
Date: September 1, 2000
Publisher: Educational Foundation for Nuclear Science, Inc.
Volume: 56
Issue: 5
Page: 58
Article Type: Book Review
Distributed by Thomson Gale
Book Description
The past 50 years of worldwide population growth and construction has changed the way the world works. Global warming, hurricanes and tornadoes are on the rise along with sea levels. Earthquakes and volcanic eruptions are on the increase. Many say that this is just a natural cycle of the earth. This is not the case. These so called "natural disasters" are direct results of this never before seen "Super Civilization".
We remove and move around the world, incalculable weight in the form of minerals, oil, coal, water and other elements. The "wobble" of the earth, has been increasing parallel to our construction efforts. Mother Earth, a perfectly balanced gyroscope, has to shift her tectonic plates to counteract any imbalances we cause resulting in more earthquakes and volcanic eruptions.
This electric motor called earth, encounters the friction of the atmosphere as it revolves exactly once a day. By deforestation, we increase friction and cause this motor to heat up which changes climates. Cities change wind flow across the planets surface and add more heat resulting in more hurricanes and tornadoes.
Along with logical and ground breaking explanations of recent disastrous world problems are solutions to ensure an ever advancing civilization.
Customer Reviews:
A True Eye Opener.......2006-04-07
After reading Will Jansen's book, it is clear that we are still in the "Stone Age," as he put it, of construction. This magnificent view on the way we are destroying the earth that we inhabit, not so much by the gaseous pollution that scientists propose, but simply by the way we build our cities, among others, is truly revolutionary, yet so simple that we should be ashamed that we continue to do what we do. Jansen's book will definitely be used as a guide for professionals and conservationists in the field and classroom for generations to come.
Books:
- The Tale of the Rose: The Love Story Behind The Little Prince
- The Walk West: A Walk Across America 2 (Walk West)
- Tris Speaker: The Rough-and-Tumble Life of a Baseball Legend
- Twice-Upon-A-Time: Born and Adopted
- Two Sides of the Moon: Our Story of the Cold War Space Race
- Ulysses S. Grant: The Unlikely Hero (Eminent Lives)
- What Can I Bring?: Sharing Good Tastes and Times in Northern Virginia
- When Presidents Lie: A History of Official Deception and Its Consequences
- Where Was Patrick Henry on the 29th of May?
- Wild Steps of Heaven
Books Index
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My Dream of You
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