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Audition: A Memoir
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List Price: $29.95
Our Price: $19.77
Your Save: $ 10.18 ( 34% )
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Manufacturer: Knopf
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Hardcover
Dewey Decimal Number: 070.92
EAN: 9780307266460
ISBN: 030726646X
Label: Knopf
Manufacturer: Knopf
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 624
Publication Date: 2008-05-06
Publisher: Knopf
Release Date: 2008-05-06
Studio: Knopf
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Editorial Reviews:
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Young people starting out in television sometimes say to me: “I want to be you.” My stock reply is always: “Then you have to take the whole package.”
And now, at last, the most important woman in the history of television journalism gives us that “whole package,” in her inspiring and riveting memoir. After more than forty years of interviewing heads of state, world leaders, movie stars, criminals, murderers, inspirational figures, and celebrities of all kinds, Barbara Walters has turned her gift for examination onto herself to reveal the forces that shaped her extraordinary life.
Barbara Walters’s perception of the world was formed at a very early age. Her father, Lou Walters, was the owner and creative mind behind the legendary Latin Quarter nightclub, and it was his risk-taking lifestyle that gave Barbara her first taste of glamour. It also made her aware of the ups and downs, the insecurities, and even the tragedies that can occur when someone is willing to take great risks, for Lou Walters didn’t just make several fortunes—he also lost them. Barbara learned early about the damage that such an existence can do to relationships—between husband and wife as well as between parent and child. Through her roller-coaster ride of a childhood, Barbara had a close companion, her mentally challenged sister, Jackie. True, Jackie taught her younger sister much about patience and compassion, but Barbara also writes honestly about the resentment she often felt having a sister who was so “different” and the guilt that still haunts her.
All of this—the financial responsibility for her family, the fear, the love—played a large part in the choices she made as she grew up: the friendships she developed, the relationships she had, the marriages she tried to make work. Ultimately, thanks to her drive, combined with a decent amount of luck, she began a career in television. And what a career it has been! Against great odds, Barbara has made it to the top of a male-dominated industry. She was the first woman cohost of the Today show, the first female network news coanchor, the host and producer of countless top-rated Specials, the star of 20/20, and the creator and cohost of The View. She has not just interviewed the world’s most fascinating figures, she has become a part of their world. These are just a few of the names that play a key role in Barbara’s life, career, and book: Yasir Arafat, Warren Beatty, Menachem Begin, George H. W. Bush, George W. Bush, Jimmy Carter, Fidel Castro, Hugo Chávez, Bill and Hillary Clinton, Roy Cohn, the Dalai Lama, Princess Diana, Katharine Hepburn, King Hussein, Angelina Jolie, Henry Kissinger, Monica Lewinsky, Richard Nixon, Rosie O’Donnell, Christopher Reeve, Anwar Sadat, John Wayne . . . the list goes on and on.
Barbara Walters has spent a lifetime auditioning: for her bosses at the TV networks, for millions of viewers, for the most famous people in the world, and even for her own daughter, with whom she has had a difficult but ultimately quite wonderful and moving relationship. This book, in some ways, is her final audition, as she fully opens up both her private and public lives. In doing so, she has given us a story that is heartbreaking and honest, surprising and fun, sometimes startling, and always fascinating.
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: Barbara Walters as a best friend
Comment: A very well written and honest book with a lot of insights in the Radio and TV world. A bit irritating is that Barbara Walters calls everybody her friend, good friend or best friend with a very few exceptions. I have deep respect not only for her writing qualities but als for her hard work as a presentator.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Product
Comment: Bought as a present along with another book (hardbound) from Amazon "The Last Lecture". On both copies pages were so unevenly cut it looked as though a mouse or two had a good dinner. The library had a proper copy! Otherwise, Amazon has been good to me over the years, except for the ultimate embarrasement of presenting this gift (time ran out.)
Customer Rating:
Summary: BARBARA WALTERS AUDITION
Comment: Here I am in Australia possibly one of a few to own the book as it is not due to hit our shelves until at least December. I received the book last night and sat up and read nearly half the book before I had to concede to sleep. She is a very interesting woman and the people she has met and interviewed is mind blowing and at the same time this intimate travel through Babara Walters life displays the humble and human side of her. I am betting that by late this evening I will have finished the book, because it was so hard to put down.
I would recommend it to anyone - even if you don't know the first thing about this lady. A book well worth buying.
Customer Rating:
Summary: worth the money
Comment: Entertaining.....very, very detailed story of Barbara's personal and public life. Long book, worth the money if you are a fan.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Didn't Read the Book
Comment: I will not support a woman that has had affairs by buying her book. Why not just put a PIG on the cover?
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