Somebody to Love?: A Rock-And Roll Memoir

Rating:
Summary: depends
Review: This is a good book if you just want to read about what grace Slick did outside of Airplane and why she decided to do it. It isnt one of those books which documents every single date of release of album and what happened within the record company and how it was marketed in the nation etc.... Those books are good but to me this is a nice change to very complicated books, and although she does write the book in an informal manner, it makes it better as it sort of seems right to talk about stuff away from the band in the tone she uses. this book is mainly sex, drugs, and a bit of rock and roll. Still very funny and good sense of humour though. Just depends what style of book you are after.

Rating:
Summary: Nice idea, but...
Review: To her credit, Grace Slick doesn't try to paint herself as particularly likeable or mature. Her book is poorly written, as if by a 16-year old. What also struck me as odd is how the book says relatively little about the music that was the focus of Ms. Slick's life. It spends a lot of time talking about the various excesses that her fame allowed her to indulge in. These topics might be interesting to teens, or to hardcore Airplane fans, but for anyone else there are much better books to buy and read.

Rating:
Summary: Still Don't Know Grace
Review: Upon purchasing this book I was hoping to discover some real insight of the early, San Francisco 60's music scene as observed by an insider. Sure we got to read about Grace's early family life, her penchant for drama and dressing up, college days, many affairs, marriages and relationships. Yet, something was missing....what were her REAL thoughts and emotions as she went through these times? Some things were left unexplained...why so close with the Grateful Dead in the early days @ the Fillmore West and then nada-zip....no more mention of them. What happened to that relationship? Was it because the Airplane/Starship membership sold out to BIG MONEY? Same thing with her personal relationships...no real insight as to what really happened or how she felt. As I read on, I kept hoping for a "real" connection to Grace and perhaps a sharing of her soul & innermost thoughts as she traversed several musical eras. Instead, I was left with the feeling that the book was a "slap-dash" attempt (maybe under a publisher's deadline?) @ trying to tell a monumental story that was reduced to disjointed chapters that were hard to follow. At books end, I still like Grace and find her amusing & candid, but sure would have enjoyed a more intimate tale. The highlight of the book was just a paragraph or 2 devoted to Janis Joplin. That was the closest the book came to what I had hoped for....."Janis felt like an old soul, a wisecracking grandmother whom everybody loved to visit."

Rating:
Summary: A horribly written and edited book about the queen of rock.
Review: Where did Grace find this "writer" to co-author her biography? What could have been a terrific and insightful look at one of rock and roll's greatest and most rebellious icons instead reads like entries from a diary. Poorly sequenced and unimagitively written, this book suffers from an obviously inexperienced co-author who has a pre-occupation with Slick's sexual trysts and demonstrates little interest in nor knowledge of her music-making. She should stick to writing romance novels. I'll remember Grace Slick for her electrifying performances and wonderful music, but never this book. Get it from the library and save your money.