Kamala HarrisReseñas

BIBLIOGRAPHIC DETAILS
(Print: 8/4/2020; Penguin Books; 318 pages; 9780525560739.)
Audio: 1/8/2019; 9781984885746; Penguin Random House Audio Publishing Group; Duration 9:30:18; (8 parts)


SUMMARY/EVALUATION:
You can read the “Reader’s Digest” version of this on Wikipedia. The entry there speaks to all of Kamala Harris’s achievements, but it’s nowhere near as articulate, feeling, and inspiring as this book. This audiobook is probably better than the print because you really need to hear Kamala speak her truths to get the sense of her strength, warmth and compassion that is supported on beams of steel.

AUTHOR & NARRATOR:
Kamala Harris (10/20/1964). According to Wikipedia, “is an American politician and attorney serving as the 49th vice president of the United States. She is the United States' first female vice president, the highest-ranking female official in U.S. history, and the first African American and first Asian American vice president.”

LOCATION
Alameda County, San Francisco, California, Washington DC

GENRE:
Autobiography, non-fiction

TIME:
1964-2018

SUBJECTS:
Autobiography; politics; non-fiction; politics; senator; California, San Francisco; LGBT; Obama-Care; Affordable Care Act; family; Foreign Affairs; Judiciary Committee duty; attorney general; district attorney; Mira Loma; intelligence committee; foreclosures; sociology; cancer; leadership.

SAMPLE QUOTATION:
From Chapter 1 “For the People”
"I’ll never forget the time my supervisor was working on a case involving a drug bust. The police had arrested a number of individuals in the raid, including an innocent bystander: a woman who had been at the wrong place at the wrong time and had been swept up in the dragnet. I hadn’t seen her. I didn’t know who she was or what she looked like. I didn’t have any connection to her, except for the report I was reviewing. But there was something about her that caught my attention.
It was late on a Friday afternoon, and most people had gone home for the weekend. In all likelihood, a judge wouldn’t see her until Monday. That meant she’d have to spend the weekend in jail.
Does she work weekends? Is she going to have to explain to her employer where she was? Is she going to get fired?
Even more important, I knew she had young children at home. Do they know she’s in jail? They must think she did something wrong. Who’s taking care of them right now? Is there even someone who can? Child Protective Services might get called. My God, she could lose her kids.
Everything was on the line for this woman: her family, her livelihood, her standing in the community, her dignity, her liberty. And yet she’d done nothing wrong.
I rushed to the clerk of the court and asked to have the case called that very day. I begged. I pleaded. If the judge could just return to the bench for five minutes, we could get her released. All I could think about was her family and her frightened children. Finally, as the minutes in the day wound down, the judge returned. I watched and listened as he reviewed her case, waiting for him to give the order. Then, with the pound of a gavel, just like that, she was free. She’d get to go home to her children in time for dinner. I never did get the chance to meet her, but I’ll never forget her.
It was a defining moment in my life. It was the crystallization of how, even on the margins of the criminal justice system, the stakes were extraordinarily high and intensely human. It was a realization that, even with the limited authority of an intern, people who cared could do justice. It was revelatory, a moment that proved how much it mattered to have compassionate people working as prosecutors. Years before I would be elected to run a major prosecutor’s office, this was one of the victories that mattered most. I knew she was going home.
And I knew the kind of work I wanted to do, and who I wanted to serve."

RATING:
I give this 5 stars. Kamala covers several subjects-discussing her trials, achievements, people, opinions, standards and goals—for herself and for the nation.

This book was written in 2019 before Kamala Harris was tapped to be Joe Biden's running mate for the 2020 federal US election. But she was, obviously, thinking of that election because much of the book deals with what she sees as her accomplishments both as a prosecutor and as a senator. She did run for the Democratic presidential nominee race but withdrew and announced her support for Joe Biden. If she ever does ascend to the office of President, judging by this book, she would do an admirable job.

Throughout the book Harris mentions her mother, breast cancer researcher Shyamala Gopalan, as raising her to be strong, independent and principled. Kamala and her sister Maya were raised by their mother from the time Kamala started school because their mother and father separated. (Although she doesn't mention it in the book her mother took a position in Montreal when Kamala was twelve and she lived there until she graduated from high school in 1981.) After graduating with a law degree Harris took a position in the Alameda County District Attorney's office. Positions as Assistant District Attorney, DA, and California Attorney General gave her the opportunity to develop programs to curb recidivism,truancy and the death penalty. Coming to the AG's office in 2011 just after the 2010 subprime mortgage crisis, Harris devoted much time and effort to investigating and prosecuting banks for fraud, coercion and abuse. She was also a proponant of gay rights and campaigned against a proposition in California that restricted marriage to between people of opposite sexes. There were other meaningful initiatives taken under her leadership but she always credits the members of her teams for assistance. She ran for Senate from California in 2016 and won but tells how the celebration of that victory was diminished by Trump's win of the presidency. For the next four years she was quite the thorn in the side of the Trump administration. It is unfortunate that she was unable to stop the niminations of Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court but she certainly did her best. She also opposed other Trump nominations to high government roles. Now that she is Vice-President, the first female vice-president and the first African-American and Asian-American vice-president as well, she must have considerable influence on what appointments Joe Biden makes.

I hope I live to see the day that a woman becomes President of the United States. Maybe it will be Kamala Harris!

I REALLY enjoyed learning about Kamala Harris in this book. She openly shared about her family background and upbringing. Her career in the District Attorney’s office was admirable as she worked hard to improve the criminal justice system. Interesting stories about the opportunities she had to get involved in politics. Harris is an amazing, professional woman I look up to. It’s evident she really cares about people and has this country’s best interest at heart.

It turns out I don't like politics enough to really love political memoir. But it did give good insight on the author.

Everything I'd seen of Kamala Harris left me impressed and happy that she's an elected official but I didn't know much about her background or what her stances on issues were. After listening to her memoir (which could double as a huge campaign speech) - I'm sold.

It felt great to listen to her talk about her family, her career, and her beliefs which mirror many of my own. How nice to hear from a patriotic public servant who believes in helping make our country better for everyone.

My only complaint about the audio book is that she's not always the best narrator... But I don't think it would have been as effective for me if anyone else read it.

She talks about injustice, economic fairness, healthcare, immigration, and supreme court justices.

Bernie Sanders Guide to Political Revolution was better and more believable.

I wanted to get to know a little more about the Democratic Vice Presidential nominee. What I learned is that Kamala (pronounced Commala) Harris is a woman who learned from her single mother how important it was to be your best and think of those who need your help.

As Kamala explains her life story, she integrates how the lessons learned affected her time in public service. She takes us on her journey through Howard Univerity to law school to her time as Attorney General to the United States Senate. Harris explains how she has helped her California constituents by ensuring certain laws were signed that would benefit them.

Kamala Harris told an amazing story that allowed you to learn how her past shaped who she has become as a woman and a politician. This was the story of a woman who learned the best lessons and then took them a step further.

Perfectly acceptable political autobiography of Kamala Harris. A friend said "this reads like her application to be vice president", and that's exactly right. The humanizing touches feel studied and repeatedly retold, it's very clear she is trying to leave a particular kind of impression, and anything remotely controversial that can be scrubbed away is scrubbed away (my favorite example here is religion -- Harris frames herself as having strong moral convictions, but there's almost nothing here about where they come from or what wrestling she's done). But then again, the book served its purpose. I did learn a lot about Kamala Harris, and I do expect to see her on the national stage for the rest of her life.½

I liked the book. K.Harris's passion for righting the wrongs and fighting for the rights of all kinds comes through very clearly. She is a fighter and won't stop. Obstacles don't seem to slow her down. And throughout her career she has done everything thoroughly: "...you have to sweat the small stuff - because sometimes it turns out that the small stuff is actually the big stuff". That appeals to me a lot. And she definitely feels for the immigrants: "For as long as ours has been a nation of immigrants, we have been a nation that fears immigrants. Fear of the other is woven into the fabric of our American culture, and unscrupulous people in power have exploited that fear in pursuit of political advantage".

Kamala describes her childhood a bit, she desperately misses her mother who was her hero, and she talks about her marriage. And having such an interesting background - being a biracial child of two accomplished individuals - that, in itself, gives her a huge advantage - how she sees the world and her own country. I would have wanted to know more about her life as a private person, not just a lawyer and a politician. But she is shy in that respect, and, in fact, those glimpses that she did provide sound wonderful and sincere. The bigger picture for her is not about her - this book emphatically says so.

I picked the young reader's edition because the print size of the adult version was in such tiny print and so long that I knew it would be difficult to read with my glaucoma challenged eyes.

I was a little disappointed in the amount of personal shared. Maybe I should have tried for an audio version instead.

I did like what shared about her mother. The odd thing when it came to Kamala Harris views on abortion rights, gay rights, early childhood education, young offenders, help for lowering drug prices and helping the disadvantaged. I agree with her 100%. In fact, I could have written the same thing that she wrote, except that my examples would have been different. I hope that she gets projects in the Biden administration that will make more people aware of her drive and compassion for other people.

Her outstanding virtue is abundant empathy. We need to hear from her more.

I was shy about saying I liked this, so at first I didn’t. Yes, I like Biden’s Black friend, and not as much Naomi Klein or bell hooks. I just read my review of “No Is Not Enough”, and I took it down (moved it to the comments section, technically), until I can find a way to say that Naomi is extremely negative, without being whiny. (Twitter should be shut down, because it’s responsible for Trump, and big business should be destroyed, because it’s responsible for Trump—we’re all evil! But hey, this is just me being cosmic; wait until I get partisan! Maybe the New York Times and Kamala Harris are guilty too!…. See how whiny I get? Jeez Louise!)

But let me be positive. This is a good book. Kamala is a Black woman of very diverse family origin, and it’s important to try to make the world more diverse so that it works for more people. I know that socialism is groovy and far-out man, but honestly I believe it makes some difference if when the goofy girl at HomeGoods starts to dance to the awful music they play instead of working, if sometimes it’s a woman who’s the manager who’s job it is to tell her nay nay, and not always a guy because girls are too stupid and weak, right. It makes some difference whether you’re being told to stop jerking your arms and legs around and organize the pet toys because you’re wearing a red apron and you have a job, versus ‘I am a man and you’ll always be the irrational one, so do your job, because you can’t.’ Some people can’t work for whatever reason and need support from the government and community, but I don’t think that everyone will ever be all compensated equally for different work. Maybe compensation is too unequal now, or the class system too rigid. But personally I think that the most rigid thing of all is the race system, and also too the gender system, where because of your birth/background you can’t this and you are that and people lie to and about you, and it’s totally rigid in people’s minds. So I think it’s important to get out the love even though love is lame, and make the world more just, because if the successful people don’t all look alike and success isn’t a lie, it’s better for people on all levels of success. It’s even better for the “crackers” who think that their one success is to have been born white, because that’s really no way to live. You can’t legislate understanding I guess, but you can model it at least. I guess some people will always think that the most important factoid is how many black robbers are making white women disappear. You can’t force people to stop lying, really. It’s their life to make a lie if they want. If they but knew, they wouldn’t want to. If they but knew. But there’s always more I don’t understand, too. The only way to teach is to offer people your love.

Photo album on inside covers. Heroes. Timeline. Publication date is before the author became Vice-President of the U.S.

audiobook nonfiction (9 hours, read by the author), memoir and critical social/political reform (written pre-Jan.6 insurrection and pre-COVID).

fascinating look at the major challenges the US must deal with, including national security threats posed by cybercrime, criminal justice reform, healthcare reform, the opioid crisis and a ton of other things. A level-headed analysis of issues we all should be very concerned about.½

I didn't think I could be more happy than I already was that Kamala Harris is our Vice President-elect, but I am. There are no stylistic frills to how Harris tells her story, but why would there need to be? The book is as straightforward, remarkable, smart, and impressive as the woman, and gives me hope that our foundering ship of state can still be saved.

An autobiographical book where the vice president talks about all of the ordinary people who were superheroes to her. She encourages kids to think about who they know that has superhero qualities.

So, in fairness, I meant to pick up the 'heavy duty' version of Kamala Harris' book and got this one instead. I don't know if it's the diluted nature of the YA edition, but it did not engage me at all. I am a huge fan/support of Harris and wanted to like her. I don't feel like I know her any better than I did before I started the book. Disappointed.

Yesterday I finished [The Truths We Hold], a political memoir written by [[Kamala Harris]]. I first came to admire Kamala Harris when I saw her questioning Brett Kavanaugh and since then I've rooted for her.
I know we're not supposed to write about politics here, so I'll leave it at that.

This book is not structured like a traditional memoir or autobiography, but each chapter revolves around a specific topic or issue, such as civil rights, criminality, health, housing etc. Harris explains how this topic or issue touches her work or how she dealt with it in the past, as an attorney. This is usually illustrated by anecdotes and stories about people she met, but also by studies and research. Each chapter also concentrates on an aspect from the writer's life and she connects these aspects. For example, the chapter that deals with civil rights, and specifically LGTBQ rights and gay marriage, also tells us about how she got to know her husband Doug and their courtship and marriage, to make a point that love is love. The chapter on health care also includes her mother's battle against cancer. I enjoyed the variation this structure provided, although in the end it became a bit forceful and it seemed like she started ticking off boxes of topics that needed to be included. This is the only point of criticism I have, though.
I think Kamala Harris succeeds in explaining the core of her work and what she stands for. If one has followed the media, this is nothing really new: The story of her immigrant parents, her growing up amidst the Civil Rights Movement, her childhood as a Black child, and the many, many firsts she did - the glass ceilings she shattered.
I still found it very interesting to read about this and to learn more about her viewpoints. While many paragraphs resonate with her speeches, the book provides more insight into how she came to believe in her principles and how her experiences in her previous jobs and offices as well as the people she met along the way have shaped her.

However, I need to get a bit more personal here because otherwise I feel like I'm not doing the book justice. I'm a teacher working in one of Germany's poorest cities, and I mainly teach girls and young women, many from "underprivileged" backgrounds, many immigrants and refugees - and empowerment is what keeps me going and why I do what I do. I found strength and inspiration in Kamala Harris's words and I read so many quotes that had me nodding in agreement.

Here are two from her mother:
"Fight systems in a way that causes them to be fairer, and don't be limited by what has always been" (p. 18).
"Don't let anybody tell you who you are. You tell them who you are" (p. 25).

It feels fitting to end this review with these quotes because throughout the book, Shyamala Gopalan Harris is shown as the biggest influence on Kamala's life and beliefs, the person who taught her to fight and to stand up and not be intimidated - and I think that was what impressed me so much when I first saw her on TV in September 2018.½

In inviting first person narrative, Kamala Harris tells readers about her lifelong search for heroes, and how and where she found them, and what it means to be a hero: Heroes make you feel special, heroes make you feel brave, heroes are teachers, heroes stand up for what's right, heroes are kind, etc. Harris asks, Who makes you feel special? Who is kind to you?, encouraging readers to make connections to their own lives. She concludes, "Heroes are...YOU!" along with a picture of a mirror (the page is shiny, but not actually reflective).

Endpapers feature photos of young Harris alone and with family and friends. Back matter includes "The Hero Code" and a timeline of Harris' life, through being sworn into Congress in January 2017. (I wonder if there will be an updated version of this to include the fact that Harris is now Vice President.)

I wish I had read this before the 2020 primaries. This gives a good idea of what her platform was. She describes the problems facing us today and gives solutions to those problems. Utilizing stories from her own life and others who have crossed her path, she gives faces to those problems and solutions. Ms. Harris comes across as someone who listens and tries to help where she can and she'll go where she needs to to lend that helping hand. She has a lot of empathy and compassion. I am glad I read this. I think she will help lead this country back into the light.

This book discusses policy and vision through the lens of personal experience, which made it engaging and approachable. Senator Harris is smart, insightful, and pragmatic about addressing systemic issues that disproportionately affect people of color in the United States. I highly recommend this book. Senator Harris makes an excellent case for why she should earn our 2020 presidential vote.

Kamala Harris is an impressionable woman in government, and this children's book was just as inspirational as she is. The book asks the readers to reflect on the important people in their lives, which I really liked. I would recommend this book for younger to middle grade kids because it talks about Kamala's background while also showing all the "superheroes" in our every day lives.

An informative political memoir. Kamala Harris is a good writer, not especially eloquent or inspirational, but solid. The book is structured thematically rather than linearly, which means that it jumps around in time a fair bit. There are some odd omissions, such as very little info about her father, and little discussion about her own experiences with racism and misogyny. But still, it does go through her values and her accomplishments in good detail. She comes across as a faithful public servant and a quality human.

This part memoir, part policy platform* book covers the author's early life and schooling, and then follows her career from the criminal justice system to the U.S. Senate.

I really enjoyed this book; it sort of starts out as a loose autobiography but then moves into broader policy discussions, complete with lots of facts and figures. So, for instance, Harris talks about her mother's diagnosis of cancer and how that affected their family before transitioning into information about the status of health care in the United States before segueing into the opioid crisis. She makes her opinions known on various topics with subjective and strong words like 'disgrace,' but she also has lots of data to back up her points, which I really appreciate.

The audiobook version is narrated by Harris herself, which I think gives the book a particularly authentic feel.

I highly recommend this book for those who already know a little about Harris and want to learn more. However, given that she has recently been catapulted to the national stage at a larger level, I would recommend it to anyone paying attention to this country's politics -- which truly should be everyone.

*Harris specifically states this book is not meant to be taken as her policy platform but I haven't thought of a better pithy descriptor.½

What I knew of Kamala Harris I liked, but I admit that my knowledge is limited. This woman will, I sincerely hope, become the next Vice President of the country, and I wanted to know more about her. This book gave me good insight into her – her beliefs, her morality. It's also an entertaining story for anyone who likes to read memoirs. I'm confident we'll be in good hands when she and Joe Biden are elected.