Ghost Rider: Travels on the Healing Road by Neil Peart
|
List Price: Our Price: $9.56 You Save: $10.39 (52%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $3.95 (click here) Category: Book See more book details and other editions |
|---|
Book Reviews of Ghost Rider: Travels on the Healing Road
Book Review: Welcome back to the land of the living!
Summary: 5 Stars
I took a long time reading this, not by design, but because I wanted to know what was going on inside of Neil. Boy did he let me know. This book was about how to deal with the death of your world and then trying to figure out if you want to be a part of the living or to just join the lost. How hard it was for him to explore the scenery inside and outside of himself. I could sense the changes taking place, but the longing to hold onto what was familiar and made him happy kept creeping back in. I cried when he cried and and laughed at him as he made fun of himself. It took a lot to write down the feelings from your soul and then let people read it. I enjoyed this book, because it made me feel good that at the end there is something after all that keeps us going. Whether to find what is around the next corner or to see how situations end or just being afraid of being alone and you don't actually want to leave this world.
I received this book after I saw Rush in concert in October. My favorite band of all time has not disappointed yet. It took a long time to read this book and I finished it just two weeks after the loss of my father. What I learned from this man, hopefully he learned from himself. Yes, you can hurt for the lost, but also must live for the living. Unfortunately death is part of life whether planned or not, expected or not and you have to be able to get through the bad to see the good.
All I want to say to Neil is:
Welcome back to the Land of the Living.
The best drummer ever has kept the beat of his life, his love and his music. Congratulations.
Book Review: Remarkable Journal
Summary: 5 Stars
Although I'm not yet through with the whole book, my opinion on this endeavor is clear: Neil Peart already came across to me as a very talented, dry-witted and insightful writer in his earliest book, The Masked Rider. Having been in Africa myself for quite a while, I could underline lots of his statements, fascinations and critizicms.
The honesty with which he desribes his emotional state is remarkable; and I'm sure, most of us go through stages in life where the cynical ideas somebody has about the direction the world takes or the lifestyles lots of people have are not always pleasant. Still, they are there, and often enough, they have truth in it. Expressing them is a means of overcoming internal anger, and everybody's entitled to express that. I don't see the point why he should be bashed for making cynical remarks on "fat" and loud people in a particular scene. After all, he never forgets to add humoristic words (even aimed at himself), which tells the reader that not every letter is to be taken literally.
I'm deeply impressed with the way he connects with his friends via writing letters. So even if things get repetetive, they are there for a reason. Peart's language art is so amusing to read, that I don't care to hear about the same day's adventures twice.
He hooked me, and as a lyricist he is as fascinating as as a musician. Now, I can't wait for the next Rush album to come out. Before I encountered his books, I tended to prefer their earliest albums. Now that I listen better to their lyrics, I suddenly enjoy the former bummers like Roll the Bones.
Book Review: Full circle
Summary: 5 Stars
First of all, let me say that I haven't read this book yet, so you may find my rating uninformed. However, I am well aware of the circumstances that drove Peart to the journey described in the book--losing your daughter and your wife less than a year apart to tragic and untimely events would have shattered lesser souls, and certainly has--and all due credit should be given to N.P. for daring to deal with his pain and to let the fans in on what he was feeling. Not every celebrity would make such an effort, some would be entirely too open while others would give away nothing, preferring the hermit approach.That said, I must say that, while his contempt for Americans may sting, I can understand where that would come from, having had a chance in recent months to live as an outsider in a foreign country (England) and try to understand what it is about my country and its people that would rate such contempt. I find myself sympathising--we have, after all, managed to export the more egregious parts of our culture abroad, thus creating resentment and contempt among the people of the many other nations of this world--and thus less judgmental of Peart for his feelings.
Whatever the case, he made a full recovery from personal tragedy to write one of the best albums of Rush's career, and to put on some of the most memorable shows the band has yet managed. (I saw them in NYC back in October--it was well worth the money spent and the trouble undertaken to get to Madison Square Garden.) Kudos to Peart for being who he is, unapologetically.
Book Review: Rock's Most Enigmatic & Ironic Hero's Comeback from Tragedy
Summary: 5 Stars
Neil Peart is the finest rock drummer in the business, one of the finest lyricists and arguably the most unique in rock. His battle with unthinkable loss and near-unbearable grief will console any Rush fan who has lost a loved one, and with frank admission of his own human frailty Neil finally gives us a glimpse of the human being behind so many songs encouraging people to live as true individuals and face life's hardships with bravery. For all of us who had been waiting for Neil to finally write books, it is a very sad thing that his second one deals with heart-rending circumstances not even a storyteller could dream up. His love for his family shines in all his words and it is actually easy to imagine the very real Peart as the man who has written so many songs that exemplify the saying "fortune favors the bold." Some people may wish there was more about Rush in the book, but this is Neil and I happen to have read this excellently written memoir just months after losing my mother, who had been a Rush fan since the 80s. Neil's Vapor Trails material and his stoic and true presence on tour last summer were a great inspiration to me in dealing with my own sadness. If you admire Neil Peart's songs, you will be fascinated by this book; if only it could have been written under different circumstances. The Masked Rider is also highly recommended, Neil's writing is crisp and direct, artful and humorous. He has seen horrors most of us could only imagine and he is, to this fan since 1984, a real hero.Book Review: Quite a journey.
Summary: 5 Stars
Like most writers, Neil seems to have been born with the travel bug. Always on the move and always with a new angle. Like Robert Fulgum, he is a man of perpetual variation, finding ways to turn a journey into pros. I started the book with feverish excitement. Never wanting to put it down. Every page full of delight and awe of the natural world that surrounded him. Having an interest in maps and history of my own I found it quite interesting to read through the details, the roads he traveled and the sites he visited. I did, however, find it a bit annoying when I was, over and over again, presented with lists of Sinatra tunes and other Jazz and big band standards. At one point Neil refered to a moment in a tune that could have also served as a segue into Debussy's "Scheherazade." I am sorry to say that it was not written by Debussy but by Rimsky-Korsakov. This is Not, however, a reflection on Neil and his taste in music. Perhaps in future editions this can be corrected.
I was pleased to discover that with all that he has accomplished in his life, wich is a great deal, he is still moved by the things that would move any of us. This is what I like most about the book. One does not have to be rich and famous To see a grizzly up close or to witness the uncomparible beauty of Lake Louise or to have to bury your own child. noone is amune to these things.
I look foward to reading the "Masked Rider."