I initially had stopped reading this book at the mid point because I found it very depressing and thought Cooper's endless pursuits of finding the next tragedy and trauma a little exploitive. It wasn't until I decided to finish it and got to the chapter on Katrina that I began to see how much Cooper cares about the people behind the stories and how the tragedies of others have helped him deal with tragedy in his own life. I found his experiences as a journalist difficult to read at times but very interesting.

Some of these stories were compelling and I liked a lot of Anderson Cooper's conviction throughout it but the entire time I was wondering "if you're saying it seems so strange and detached that news people are just gawking and you feel bad because you find yourself doing it sometimes...STOP DOING IT!"

It was a creepy story of how someone knows what the answer is and realizes that his profession, in general, doesn't help the situation but then he hides behind his profession once in a while.

Great stories that will hopefully teach us a lot but Cooper's telling of it was so existential and surreal. This isn't an indictment of Cooper because I feel like he does better than most, but I still find the idea of crisis reporting unsettling.

Nothing new here.

I've just found Anderson Cooper to be an intriguing reporter. It was a quick read into a somewhat tormented soul. His need to be in such dangerous places at such dangerous times is curious.

Not sure how to describe this book...vignettes of the trauma a journalist sees?My biggest takeaway is that Cooper Anderson lost two immediate family members, his dad and his brother and that both deaths are emotionally unresolved. He seems a bit frozen and tries to escape reflection or resolution by constantly chasing dramatic news stories. Sketch after sketch of death and loss which was depressing but impersonal for the victims...it was overwhelming. Later Cooper described his experience in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and his shock of the area’s similarity to a war torn country. This section was more interesting because it was of the US and how we are all the same in the end...people are people and that idea that something won’t happen to me because I’m American is false.

It’s well written but I think it would’ve been more powerful had he been more reflective of his life and loss and how these events impacted him. He just skims the surface really. The personal memories about his family were most enjoyable but those were too few and difficult to make a connection about what he’s seen as a journalist and his journey of loss and maturity.

I really enjoyed this book. It was done in a journalistic style, which I really like. Plain and simple . It also show his more sensitive side.

I would say worth reading, or listening to the audio book as I did, which Cooper himself narrates.
In this book we hear of the devastating tsunami in South Asia to the suffering Niger, and ultimately Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, Cooper shares his own experiences of traversing the globe, covering the world’s most astonishing stories. As a television journalist, he has the gift of speaking with an emotional directness that cuts through the barriers of the medium. This is his first book and he keeps flipping between an experience in the field, such as after Katrina, back to the experience of his youth where his brother took his own life. Cooper will then go on to recount his experience in Sri Lanka, after the tsunami, then flash back to another sad memory of his lost brother.
It is almost as the book was a sort of catharsis for the author, therapy for him, but weighty on the reader. You can see how both brothers, and their famous mother all had some very traumatic childhoods.
In this book it just sticks out as distracting, whereas in his later book, "Vanderbilt, the Rise and Fall of an American Dynasty", where Cooper relates the history of the famous American clan, starting with the Commodore himself- Cornelius Vanderbilt , this tragedy is told better in the family history.

Although I didn't love the delivery, with the narrative seemingly bouncing all over the place as Cooper tried to weave his personal heartbreaks into a traumatic year of reporting, there was a lot of interesting material and observations, some of it quite critical. I like his reporting. There were times I wondered if he knew exactly what he wanted to do with this book, or if he was winging it. Still, I stayed with it. I felt he was honest, but there were lingering feelings that he was holding back too. In the end I thought this was pretty good, though I still prefer a more straightforward presentation.

Why do people write memoirs?

Because they want to understand the life they lead by looking back at the life they led.

Why do people read memoirs?

More or less the same reason, but just reversed. Isn’t it rather fashionable to read about someone else’s life, learn what you can and quote it next time in casual conversation in order to pass oneself as learned?

Sure we can.

At times we do and even get a kick out of it equally, especially when someone takes notice of it and marvels at your apt usage of it and at the significance of such a tidbit. Admittedly, what drew me in to buy & read the book is the author himself; a prominent anchorman and news personality on CNN and hosts his own show, AC360.

And even if he went by another name, who wouldn’t take notice of him; of his piercing stare, his clear and crisp commentaries and equally creative repartee with his guests. Not to mention his distinguished looks; all grey-haired and smart looking. Yes, Anderson Cooper is well liked.

When I found this hardbound 1st edition at a Book Sale branch in Makati, I liked it all the more because I didn’t have to order it from Amazon as Powerbooks don’t have it and it only cost me only P70, which is roughly $1.56 just to get to know him.

Born into a family of wealth and opportunity, Anderson is the son of famous fashion designer, Gloria Vanderbilt. But he traded all that to live his life, to pursue and discover his calling, wherever it may take him. The book touches on his reminiscing about his father, of his own identity crisis after he died and the chasm that threatened to pull his family apart that claimed his brother’s life as well, for he took his own life by jumping off their condo balcony, just minutes after speaking to his mother.

There are no words for situations like these but somehow Anderson has managed to weave all of this family history and drama into the dream that ever more gets strengthened and tested whenever he travels to other countries like Sarajevo, Nigeria, Iraq, Indonesia and more recently in New Orleans when Hurricane Katrina struck the city in 2005.

Finishing the book tonight and reading his entries about missing his father, I can’t help but think of my own; how my Dad’s own passing changed me and continues to do so and affect me in profound ways that I could not have predicted.

They always say that life is for the living and that the good of men (as well as the bad) are often interred with their bones. And knowing that it is said often; might we not rock the foundation just a little bit and remember properly those who died? That what they left behind propels us to look inward and decide for ourselves what and how much can we leave behind, when it is time to do so?

I may not be a parent yet. But when the time comes, I would want to do the same for my child, be they be a son or a daughter.

That as a child, you live your life in accordance with what you parents have taught you, what your values dictate. And in so doing, you honor their life and memory by giving and living your life; giving it the best show that you can give. So far the best shots that I have given have resulted and manifested in creative endeavours like the release of my first album, dedicated to Dad and also embarked on the writing of my first book which I am dedicating to Mom who has strongly carried on for us and whom we equally feed and give our own strength back to whenever needed.

Although 3 years after Dad’s passing, I may not be a crack shot just yet, I can at least say that I’ve managed to aim dead center and increase my chances of getting a bullseye.

Target up.

Ready. Aim. Fire.

Bullseye.

……Next Round please.

I’ll admit I’ve not really followed Anderson Cooper, or the news much, for that matter, so many of the events in this book and details about his life were new to me. Anderson Cooper was raised by rich parents, and his dad died when he was pretty young. When he was in college, his older brother committed suicide. Anderson basically admits that most of his passion for these terrible events and stories around the world is due to his search to feel again.

Grief is a tough thing and can lead some people to do some pretty crazy things. I’ve experienced some of this tragic loss in my own life, and I know it has changed and shaped the way I view certain things. So my point is, while I was initially kind of annoyed at him for being yet another adrenaline- and feeling-seeker through other’s pain, he was able to admit that he had trouble actually relating to these people in life’s most tragic circumstances and looks back and wonders how he didn’t feel more. I think in some ways, it is easy to become desensitized to tragedy when you are constantly surrounded by it. I think it’s also easy as humans to just shut off our ability to feel and easier to just simple move on. I think it’s also incredibly unhealthy.

I’d give this a 7 of 10 for enjoyment and 4 of 5 for readability. I’d score it a little higher on both accounts except it’s hard to read 200 pages full of death, destruction, and starvation.

-Holly

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Interesting book made much better with the autobiographical inserts. I enjoyed listening to the audio book, which was narrated by the author.

This memoir is raw, brave, and moving. Anderson Cooper writes beautifully, and presents his account as it is, not fearing that his honesty would taint his image. This is integrity. He writes about personal pains involving his family, and how his years of reporting has helped him face the ghosts of his past. He shares the nitty gritty about his work—the reporter's struggles behind the camera and his breakdowns long after the camera stops recording. We get a closer look at the people he has met along the way, victims and survivors, and share with their misery and hope. This book will make you think about the evanescence of life, and how fortunate and undeserving we are of the comforts that we have. Disaster, war, famine, death—these are all equalizers, death being the greatest of them. We see it everyday on the news, yet we digest it nonchalantly like our dinner in front of the TV. How dare we forget? How dare we take everything for granted?