Scan barcode
A review by aliciagw
The Red Leather Diary: Reclaiming a Life Through the Pages of a Lost Journal by Lily Koppel
medium-paced
2.5
I really thought I would enjoy this- it seems right up my alley. Unfortunately I was disappointed in it.
I listened to the audiobook version.
It is a non-fiction story of a NYC writer who finds an old diary in a dumpster and reads it and hunts down the original writer of the diary- Florence Wolfson. The story of the author finding the journal was really interesting, as was the part where she found the still alive author of the diary.
I guess my problem with it was that I really was interested in hearing the diary, not the interpretation of the diary by Koppell. Florence Wolfson sounded to me to be a very interesting person - dramatic, intelligent, artistic and unique. She sounded more than a wee bit spoiled, but in her defense she was a relatively wealthy teenage girl at the time she wrote the diary. Teenage girls aren't always known for being rational. I thought I would be hearing the diary itself, which I believe I would have loved. Instead, a line from the diary would be read, followed by extended amounts of Koppell describing what happened. The descriptions seemed extremely embellished to me, almost to the point of sounding like fiction. They didn't sound at all like what Florence had actually written. They were overly romanticized and embellished, which I feel is somewhat disingenuous in a non-fiction book. Koppel sounded like she identified with, admired and was enamored with the writer of the diary, which just gave it an odd unreal feel to me. It also sounded like she believed every single thing Florence wrote in her diary, which I think should be doubted a bit. After all, if a teenage girl thinks her parents are unreasonable, does that mean they really are? Or if she thought she was prettier than and better than everyone else at every form of art she tried, was she really? I know when I was a teenager I didn't think my parents knew anything, and have since learned that wasn't true.
Just wasn't my cup of tea.
I listened to the audiobook version.
It is a non-fiction story of a NYC writer who finds an old diary in a dumpster and reads it and hunts down the original writer of the diary- Florence Wolfson. The story of the author finding the journal was really interesting, as was the part where she found the still alive author of the diary.
I guess my problem with it was that I really was interested in hearing the diary, not the interpretation of the diary by Koppell. Florence Wolfson sounded to me to be a very interesting person - dramatic, intelligent, artistic and unique. She sounded more than a wee bit spoiled, but in her defense she was a relatively wealthy teenage girl at the time she wrote the diary. Teenage girls aren't always known for being rational. I thought I would be hearing the diary itself, which I believe I would have loved. Instead, a line from the diary would be read, followed by extended amounts of Koppell describing what happened. The descriptions seemed extremely embellished to me, almost to the point of sounding like fiction. They didn't sound at all like what Florence had actually written. They were overly romanticized and embellished, which I feel is somewhat disingenuous in a non-fiction book. Koppel sounded like she identified with, admired and was enamored with the writer of the diary, which just gave it an odd unreal feel to me. It also sounded like she believed every single thing Florence wrote in her diary, which I think should be doubted a bit. After all, if a teenage girl thinks her parents are unreasonable, does that mean they really are? Or if she thought she was prettier than and better than everyone else at every form of art she tried, was she really? I know when I was a teenager I didn't think my parents knew anything, and have since learned that wasn't true.
Just wasn't my cup of tea.