Misty Copeland was introduced to ballet at an after school program. She began taking dance classes at age 13, attending the San Pedro Dance Center. After only three months of training, she was able to dance en pointe, which I find to be impressive. She eventually went on to be a principal with the American Ballet Theatre, where she is still dancing. She is an exquisite dancer, and a beautiful person. Without encouragement and intervention along the way, she may never have became the wonderful dancer she is today. The subtitle of her book, "an unlikely ballerina", absolutely makes sense after reading it. 

 Jennifer Ringer began professional ballet training at age twelve, training at the Washington School of Ballet. She also attended the School of American Ballet in New York, while also performing with the New York City Ballet. She became a full time professional dancer with the New York City Ballet in 1990. This memoir discusses her career in dance, as well as the struggles she was faced with. She struggled with eating disorders and body image issues, which is a common issue amongst dancers, gymnasts, and skaters.

I love dance, and I enjoy ballet very much. I always wanted to be a dancer, but lack of time and money prevented that. I also never had the body type to be a dancer, and absolutely not the coordination. I live vicariously through those who do, and really enjoyed reading her story. 

 This book discusses different elements of mysticism and how those influenced religions, politics, and social life in the United States. I found this book to be exceptionally interesting, as this type of topic is certainly NEVER discussed where I am from. People around here like to rant, rave, and demand that everyone conform to some type of Christianity and that this is a strictly Christian nation of only Christian people, which is simply untrue and a desperate bid to control the narrative. Cultures all around the globe have seen religions come and go, and those religions and other spiritual elements have shaped global history. This is an important thing to recognize, and not many people around here are willing to come to terms with that, as cult mentality is S.T.R.O.N.G.

I own the Audible version of this book, and it was decently narrated and around 10 hours to listen to. The paperback version of this is about 300 pages if you prefer that medium. 

 This is the personal memoir of a paramedic with a special interest in the opioid crisis. Opiates and opiate derivatives are very prevalent on the street. They are in all neighborhoods. Chances are, everyone here reading my silly little book reviews knows, at minimum, one person who is struggling with some variant of addiction. Chances also are that that addiction has something to do with opiates. People are given pain medication, which is a wonderful and useful thing, and become addicted that way. People use opiates recreationally, developing an addiction that way. Some of us turn to them as a means to escape something. Opiate addiction is a difficult addiction to fight, and the effects of it in the aftermath are sometimes things that someone who hasn't struggled with this wouldn't imagine. The dangers of overdose aside, there are so many impurities in drugs on the street. They use all manner of things to cut with, which can kill you before the drugs do. Infections, diseases, homelessness, and other things are often byproducts of addiction. The author of this book relates many experiences he had on shifts, as well as the experiences of people he has treated.

This book is currently available on Audible Plus, which is the copy that I listened to. Listening time for this book was approximately 8 hours. The print copy is approximately 300 pages if you would prefer that version. I appreciated this book for several reasons. Struggling with heroin addiction is a very familiar conflict for me. It can happen to anyone, for a wide variety of reasons. People's journey's into addiction can be wide-ranging, but there are so many similarities in our stories. I appreciated that this author viewed those mentioned in the book as human beings, because, a lot of the time, that is not the case at all. Some of this book was tough to listen to for personal reasons, but this is such an important topic these days. I think this book did a great job about raising awareness for the issue of opioids and how to combat it. 

Adam Rippon was born in Scranton, Pennsylvania in 1989. He began skating at age ten, where he showed amazing talent and dedication to the sport. He competed in many competitions, even representing the United States in the 2018 Winter Olympics in South Korea. This memoir discusses his skating career and life in general. He has a wonderful sense of humor that really comes through in the book. I love watching skating, and Adam was a beautiful skater. I was so sad when he announced his retirement. I enjoyed this book. 

 

Anders Breivik began his criminal activities at in his teenage years. He was found to have painted graffiti all around the community. He became involved in several groups, essentially becoming a neo-Nazi. He published texts outlining his ideologies and hatred toward specific groups of people before then going on a mission of murder. He detonated a car bomb in the government district of Oslo, Norway, on July 22, 2011. This blast killed eight people and injured over 200 more. He then went to a youth camp, systematically shooting people. He killed 69 and injured 32 more there. One of those killed was the step-brother of the Crown Princess of Norway. He was apprehended without incident the same day and transported to jail. He was tried and convicted, receiving a 21 year stint in prison.

I had never heard of this incident, despite it occurring not all that long ago. This book was very informative and covered the ideology and motivation behind these attacks in a way that was easy to follow. Living where I live, ideology like this is pretty common, and it has always interested me how and why people are drawn to this type of thinking and abhorrent behavior. Despite the content and morbidity level, this was a very good book.

 

 If you have studied World War II history at any length, you are probably aware of Hitler's penchant for films. This book discusses what films Hitler liked and disliked, as recorded by members of his staff. It was interesting to see how much public disdain he had for Jewish people and others, yet how he enjoyed their films in private. It was also interesting to see how some of his ideas and laws he laid down directly correlated to the types of films he found interesting. This book was a pretty neat example of how media and art can relate to and influence the time period in which we live.

This book is currently available to listen to for free on Audible Plus. It was around seven hours long. The narrator was pleasant to listen to. The author did a good job presenting his sources and research throughout the book, even while speculating on certain aspects. If you are interested in a physical copy, the hardcover version is just over 300 pages. Overall, I found this to be a pretty intriguing book to read. 

 

This book features some really convoluted and complicated correspondence between the author and Dennis Rader. Rader is most commonly known as the BTK Killer, which is redundant to say, since the K means Kill. Rader discusses his obsession with building a murder barn similar to HH Holmes' Chicago murder house. I did learn more about Rader through this book, but I would not read it a second time.

This book is currently available to listen to for free with your Audible membership in the Audible Plus library. It is close to twelve hours to listen to, and, to be honest, I found it boring as all get out. I typically really enjoy a true crime book, but the last two I have selected have been terribly tedious. I also think I would have enjoyed a physical book more than an audio one in this case. If you are interested in a physical copy, it is about 300 pages.

 

 This book discusses the 1982 Lake Waco murders of three teenagers: Raylene Rice, Jill Montgomery, and Kenneth Franks. Franks was found by patrons of the park area, and law enforcement discovered the bodies of Rice and Montgomery nearby. This book discusses the investigation of the murders, which was full of twists and turns. I have the Audible version of this book, which was around seventeen hours long. The narrator was not my favorite, and it felt very tedious at times. If you want to give it a try, it is available on Audible Plus for free currently. If you are interested in a physical version, it is around 450 pages long. 

 Dominique Moceanu was born in Cleveland, Ohio in 1981. Her family moved to Texas so that she would be able to train with notorious gymnastics coaches Bela and Marta Karolyi. She was a very talented gymnast, earning her place in the 1996 Olympics, alongside another famous name: Kerry Strug. Moceanu went on to have a successful career after the Olympics, and certainly after she got away from the Karolyi gym. I remember watching her during the 1996 Olympics. This was a very good read.