2 out of 4 stars
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Louis (Lou) Spagna in his book Life, Love and Other Four Letter Words: Essays From Life's Rollercoaster, shares practically his whole life with more than a hundred stories. His idea to write this book came from wanting his grandchildren to know who he was, as he reflected on not knowing much about his own grandparents. I think this is a great idea!
Lou has had many interests, work and travel experiences, and close calls of death. His many interests include things like judo, snow skiing, cooking, and sailing, to name a few. He has worked on construction sites, at gas stations, and has even operated heavy machinery. Lou was a Radioman in the Navy during the Vietnam War and spent four years living in Guam. He enjoys sailing and describes what it is like to sail a boat and the problems that may happen when at seas.
I like the work experiences that came in handy later in his life. I like when Lou writes about his wife, Deb the best. I really like the way Lou and his wife, Deb use solar power and have a garden at their home in North Carolina. I think it is great that they like to sail and travel. Photos were shown throughout the book, which really helped visualize the people and things written about in his book. I also enjoyed reading about his childhood and growing up in a tough situation. His poems were touching.
Lou shares about his family, holidays, girlfriends, cars, and so many other things. At times, I felt like Lou was writing a Christmas letter to his friends and family, updating everyone on what he has been doing. I did not particularly like some of the details about the sailboats’ engines or about his love life with his girlfriends. I like the stories of his sex life the least. Some of the stories were repeated several times and some just had too many details about what food he ate, the weather, the boat’s speed and mileage as a few examples.
Though I do enjoy reading autobiographies and stories of people, I would have to rate this book a 2 out of 4 stars. The book was more like a record or journal of many detailed descriptions that were of interest to the author. There were also more than ten spelling errors and other grammatical errors found.
I would not rate the book a 1 out of 4 stars because I liked many of the stories, poems, and experiences shared by the author. If the book were to be well edited and revised (cutting out or combining the repeated stories), I would rate the book 3 out of 4 stars.
Family and friends would enjoy reading the detailed accounts of Lou’s interests, experiences, and travels the most. If you are interested in sailing and traveling and like to hear other people’s stories, you just may like this book as well.
If you don’t like memoirs with a lot of details and prefer fiction or fantasy, you would probably like Lou's real-life stories the least.
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Life, Love and Other Four-Letter Words
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