Review of The Sum of All the Pieces
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Tabie Macharia
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Review of The Sum of All the Pieces
[Following is a volunteer review of "The Sum of All the Pieces" by Paul Bradford.]
In The Sum of All the Pieces, Paul knows pain first-hand. He carries with him both emotional and physical scars inflicted on him by his alcoholic father, who was abusive to his mother and siblings. He gets the same dose of scars while fighting in Vietnam and even more dosage as a prisoner. At sixty-two, Paul is arrested for committing a heinous sex crime. At such a ripe age you’d think he will wither within days but our country boy is a survivor.
As a hillbilly with no education, living in poverty, and working for many hours in the fields, he learned to be resourceful, strong, hardworking, and to survive with so little. He lived in five foster homes after his mother’s death and his father abandoned him. His rough childhood helped him make it through super-intensive military training, the war in Vietnam, life in prison, divorce, stigma both as an ex-convict and as a member of the LGBTQ community. He is however not always stuck at rock bottom. At twenty-three he marries the love of his life. He stays in a happy marriage for 43 years with two amazing kids whom he adores. During the same time, his business career is blooming.
What I loved most about The Sum of All the Pieces is that it is not just another narration, it has an objective. Paul is not only sharing his experiences and struggles because he survived them, he as well attempts to join the pieces together to get a whole summation of what would define him. The author keeps readers engaged as they try to sum up all the decisions, choices, and mistakes with him.
The author leaves no stone unturned. Paul Bradford vividly shares the ugly parts of his life; his confusion, experiments, feelings, and denial about his sexual preference. I picked this book because I wanted to explore a world of being different and Paul served me that and much more. Paul considers himself to be odd from his birth because he was born in a different town. His clan – the Bradford clan is also different from the rest of the world. In an age where every kid is in school, Paul and his siblings work for hours in the fields. Not forgetting that he turned out to be gay.
I did not dislike one thing about this book. I was comfortable with the content and language used.
I rate it four stars out of four because no error distracted me from my reading. I had to double-check again to confirm that the book indeed had zero typo errors. I can say that what I learned in this book is enough not excessive. I would however not recommend it to a young audience as some of the content could be offending. But for anyone wanting tips on how to survive life challenges and is okay with a few explicit scenes here and there then consider reading this book.
This book clearly shows how easy it is to go from hero to zero in real life, it only takes one bad decision. But we do not stop at zero we survive!
******
The Sum of All the Pieces
View: on Bookshelves | on Amazon
In The Sum of All the Pieces, Paul knows pain first-hand. He carries with him both emotional and physical scars inflicted on him by his alcoholic father, who was abusive to his mother and siblings. He gets the same dose of scars while fighting in Vietnam and even more dosage as a prisoner. At sixty-two, Paul is arrested for committing a heinous sex crime. At such a ripe age you’d think he will wither within days but our country boy is a survivor.
As a hillbilly with no education, living in poverty, and working for many hours in the fields, he learned to be resourceful, strong, hardworking, and to survive with so little. He lived in five foster homes after his mother’s death and his father abandoned him. His rough childhood helped him make it through super-intensive military training, the war in Vietnam, life in prison, divorce, stigma both as an ex-convict and as a member of the LGBTQ community. He is however not always stuck at rock bottom. At twenty-three he marries the love of his life. He stays in a happy marriage for 43 years with two amazing kids whom he adores. During the same time, his business career is blooming.
What I loved most about The Sum of All the Pieces is that it is not just another narration, it has an objective. Paul is not only sharing his experiences and struggles because he survived them, he as well attempts to join the pieces together to get a whole summation of what would define him. The author keeps readers engaged as they try to sum up all the decisions, choices, and mistakes with him.
The author leaves no stone unturned. Paul Bradford vividly shares the ugly parts of his life; his confusion, experiments, feelings, and denial about his sexual preference. I picked this book because I wanted to explore a world of being different and Paul served me that and much more. Paul considers himself to be odd from his birth because he was born in a different town. His clan – the Bradford clan is also different from the rest of the world. In an age where every kid is in school, Paul and his siblings work for hours in the fields. Not forgetting that he turned out to be gay.
I did not dislike one thing about this book. I was comfortable with the content and language used.
I rate it four stars out of four because no error distracted me from my reading. I had to double-check again to confirm that the book indeed had zero typo errors. I can say that what I learned in this book is enough not excessive. I would however not recommend it to a young audience as some of the content could be offending. But for anyone wanting tips on how to survive life challenges and is okay with a few explicit scenes here and there then consider reading this book.
This book clearly shows how easy it is to go from hero to zero in real life, it only takes one bad decision. But we do not stop at zero we survive!
******
The Sum of All the Pieces
View: on Bookshelves | on Amazon
Latest Review: Rediscovering the Wisdom of Human Nature by Chet Shupe
