More Myself: A Journey
Ratings8
Average rating4.1
As one of the most celebrated musicians of our time, Alicia Keys has enraptured the nation with her heartfelt lyrics, extraordinary vocal range, and soul-stirring piano compositions. Yet away from the spotlight, Alicia has grappled with private heartache over the challenging and complex relationship with her father, the people-pleasing nature that characterized her early career, the loss of privacy surrounding her romantic relationships, and the oppressive expectations of female perfection. In More Myself, Alicia shares her quest for truth: about herself, her past, and her shift from sacrificing her spirit to celebrating her worth. With the raw honesty that epitomizes Alicia's artistry, More Myself is at once a riveting account and a clarion call to readers: to define themselves in a world that rarely encourages a true and unique identity. Attachments area
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3.5 Rounded down to a 3
I love Alicia Keys. Her music, her persona, her performances...everything. I was so excited to grab this book and dive right in. Who wouldn't right?
The beginning was great as it showed her beginnings and the feelings and thoughts behind it all. As the book progresses however, it turns more into a trophy sharing and accomplishment bragging type process. Gone were the serious thoughts and feelings behind it all.
Don't get me wrong...she DESERVES where she is and the accomplishments made. I guess I was just hoping for a raw memoir with a deeper insight into who she is. This honestly felt more like pushing a book out because it's Alicia Keys and of course we would want to read it.
I also felt maybe I was being too harsh, but reading other reviews of people who also love her...it seems I am not alone.
I also think maybe I just need to stay from celebrity memoirs...they are rarely, if ever, on the fully deep and let-you-in side.
I know they only share with us what they want... but I love when artists tell their stories and let us get a glimpse of their world. I loved hearing about Alicia's.
I don't know much about her as a musician, but this is notably good as an audiobook. Not only to hear the story in her own voice, but because she sings passages of songs she's talking about, plays piano during the chapter breaks, and includes guest voices from all parts of her life (running the gamut from her mom to Jay Z to Barack Obama).
The beginning and end are especially interesting as she interrogates what it means to be true to yourself, hold boundaries and let go of people-pleasing and the judgements of society. A lot of bits in the middle were kind of whatever as someone who doesn't really care that much about the details of her rise to stardom, but might be more interesting to a fan.
I don't listen to many audiobooks, as even when I've tried, I find myself wanting to sit down with the printed pages, whether it's to understand a dense passage, get the benefit of visual information (maps, graphs, etc) or highlight quotes. This memoir is the first audiobook I've encountered that I think was actually stronger in the audio format, and I didn't have FOMO and end up essentially reading/skimming it a second time on paper.
