Skip to main content

Review of "I Remember the Time" by Kim Hemphill

In the simplest terms, Kim Hemphill is a survivor. That's all he knew, that's all he had. And, he's a Seattle Mariner's fan, so things are still tough since the Mariner's have never made it to the World Series, but he's still rooting for them. And, I'm a Mariner's fan, so I know what it's like rooting for the underdog when there's no help in sight.

Of course, that's what Kim's life was like for years. The car he was riding in what hit by a train when he was three years old. The result was cuts, scrapes, bruises and 105 stitches across his face and his scalp. Just an early turning point. 

His family life was rough and tumble, and they were so poor he bought himself his first toothbrush when he was 14, shortly before he lost his brother to the Vietnam war.

If you are ready for a tough read, a story of homelessness, a story of learning to live with what you've got on your back and nothing more, then I Remember the Time, Kim Hemphill's memoir is for you.

There's much more here than struggle. There's eventual love, success, and reward. There's a new life filled with inventions sold across the United States and Canada, and there are acceptance and satisfaction.

Published January 1, 2017, this book is deep in drama, conflict, and survival. It's also a story of hope and perseverance. You can get a copy on Kindle right now!



Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Review of "The Deeper Dark" by Michael Allen

  Michael Allen's The Deeper Dark is a military-political thriller with a haunting forecast of what could happen when our political system controls just a tiny bit more of our lives than it already does. Our story starts with a pilot's worst nightmare: being forced down over enemy lines. Then, like John McCain and other real-life wartime pilots, his nightmare comes into even scarier focus as he is met immediately by the opposition forces who are armed and most certainly dangerous. In Deeper , pilot Haven Kayd is taken to a dank and soon to be dark cell that has housed many other prisoners. The fact that he's the only one there is less than comforting. For months Kayd fights away the psychological fears his captors impose on him and manages to escape, only to find that his nightmare continues when he returns home to find his wife and daughter shocked to see him. They've been told he's dead. The message finally dawns on him: Fear the Deep State. Kayd asks questions a...

John Grisham's "The Guardians"

  If you've been waiting for John Grisham to deliver another solid book, the 2019 issuance of The Guardians is probably your best bet. Grisham, of course, has made a habit of taking small-time or at least small-town lawyer story's to breakneck-speed endings while spinning a vast (if not luxurious) web of possible plots across a reader's mind. I'm a fan, but there have been a few stumbles in my opinion, such as The Whistler , and Camino Winds , that move slowly and lack the thrill of the chase I found in earlier books. Fortunately, Grisham's on the ball with this book, and I was happy to get trapped for hours inside the covers of my bed and the book itself. In this "wrongful conviction" story, lawyer Cullen Post takes a series of cases as far as he can, saying "I have five cases...., I've watched one of my clients die. I still think he was innocent. I just couldn't prove it in time." Such is the pressure and turmoil of a pro-bono lawyer a...

Review of "The Grifter" by Ali Gunn

I've heard the saying that revenge is a dish best served cold, meaning it has more impact if it's well past the harm done. Well, sometimes Karma doesn't work fast enough to suit us, and that's the setup to The Grifter,  a novel by Ali Gunn and Sean Campbell. Gunn most recently released The Career Killer , Campbell has a dozen books available. All are based in the UK and revolve around police detectives and, well, psychopaths. Hank Marvin, our story's protagonist, is bent on revenge. So much so that he watches the younger and seriously more successful (soon to be a billionaire fund manager) Kent Bancroft every day from across the street, bundled in a sleeping bag, or standing on his one leg, leaning up against a tiny stoop. When the two interact early in the novel I'm reminded slightly of the discussion of a major player on Wall Street and a homeless wretch on the street in Bonfire of the Vanities . There's a flavor there, the language, and definitely the bri...