by Vijay Khuruna

I don’t know. It was very gripping to start out. But I never really felt that motivations were clear. It got a little monotonous, just like the northern Canada terrain they were covering. I also thought the ending epilogue was very bad and a serious letdown.

Chronological set of interviews, which get better as time goes on.

Love this bit from 2006:

“I can’t stand to play arenas, but I do play ’em. But I know that’s not where music’s supposed to be. It’s not meant to be heard in football stadiums, it’s not ‘Hey, how are you doin’ tonight, Cleveland?’ Nobody gives a shit how you’re doing tonight in Cleveland… They say, ‘Dylan never talks.’ What the hell is there to SAY! That’s not the reason an artist is front of people.”

Hell yeah, when you put it that way.

What comes through over and over, interview after interview, is Bob’s roots in folk music, and love and respect for (and encyclopedic knowledge of) those old songs and traditions and musicians who came before him. People who think folk was just a youthful phase or a mercenary way for him to break into the business don’t get it. “Those old songs are my lexicon and my prayer book,” he says in 1997, and I believe him.

by Lily Brooks-Dalton

Finally, I like the book club pick! This author does a good job of building and sustaining drama, and crafting characters you care about. Strong plot line, strong women – that’s a book for me!

by Dr. Jan Pol

He had a co-writer so it should have been a better read. It really had no organization, just one anecdote after another, and it got repetitive. I feel sorry to give it a negative review, because we used to enjoy the show. I would have liked a more chronological narrative approach. Instead it was, “Then there was the time I saw an animal do this and I did this. Then there was the time I did this and the animal did this.”

by Johanna Spyri

Another Johanna Spyri book. Makes HEIDI look like great literature. Seriously, a slight book where the goat-boy wrestles with his conscience over being a party to a misdeed, all for the sake of the love for his little goat kid. It does suffer by comparison to HEIDI; there’s no gruff old grandfather to love.