About this title: Many know Andrews from "The Sound of Music" and "Mary Poppins." In this memoir, she looks back on her early years with an aspiring vaudeville mom and a loving dad and her role in "Camelot" with Richard Burton at age 20. b&w photos throughout.
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Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Hyperion
Date Published: 2008
ISBN-13:9780786865659ISBN:0786865652
Description: Good. A copy that has been read, but remains in clean condition. All pages are intact, and the cover is intact (including dustcover, if applicable). The spine may show signs of wear. Pages can include limited notes and highlighting, and the copy can include "from the library of" labels. Return Policy Any defects, damages, or material differences with your item, must be reported to us within 7 days of receipt of the item or 30 days from date of shipment. The returned merchandise must be ... read more
Description: Good. 0786865652 Fast Shipping. Cover torn, wrinkled, missing or book is otherwise damaged. Publishers Overstock. Customer service is our #1 priority. read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Hyperion
Date Published: 2008
ISBN-13:9780786865659ISBN:0786865652
Description: Good in Good jacket. 229-V-Add: Ex-library. Books rated "Good" may have some notes, underlining, or highlighting. These books also may contain the previous owner's name, stamp, sticker, or gift inscription, or may be library discards. read more
Description: Good. Light shelf wear and minimal interior marks. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More. read more
Description: Good. Light shelf wear and minimal interior marks. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More. read more
Description: Very good. Book has appearance of light use with no easily noticeable wear. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More. read more
Description: Good. Purchasing this item supports Pierce County libraries. Thriftbooks and PCL have partnered to help raise additional funds for the library system. Ex-Library book-will contain library markings. Book has appearance of light use with no easily noticeable wear. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More. read more
Description: Good. Light shelf wear and minimal interior marks. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More. read more
Description: Good. Light shelf wear and minimal interior marks. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More. read more
Description: Good. Light shelf wear and minimal interior marks. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More. read more
Description: Very Good. Great condition for a used book! Minimal wear. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy! read more
Description: Very Good. Great condition for a used book! Minimal wear. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy! read more
Description: Good. Former Library book. Shows some signs of wear, and may have some markings on the inside. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy! read more
Description: Good. 0786865652 Former library item may have library binding and show stamps, stickers or other marks. Items not meeting quality expectations may be returned. Due to the large scale of our operation, we do not have access to the specific contents/condition of our items. read more
Description: Good. 0786865652 Former library item may have library binding and show stamps, stickers or other marks. Items not meeting quality expectations may be returned. Due to the large scale of our operation, we do not have access to the specific contents/condition of our items. read more
Description: Good. 0786865652 Former library item may have library binding and show stamps, stickers or other marks. Items not meeting quality expectations may be returned. Due to the large scale of our operation, we do not have access to the specific contents/condition of our items. read more
Description: Good. 0786865652 Former library item may have library binding and show stamps, stickers or other marks. Items not meeting quality expectations may be returned. Due to the large scale of our operation, we do not have access to the specific contents/condition of our items. read more
"Julie Andrews is one of my strongest idols. I feel I can relate to her in many ways; we both dealt with difficult childhoods, being let down by our parents. I like her am a soprano and in my dreams I am just as successful as she is in the field of musical theatre. That being said though, I wasn't terribly impressed with this book for a number of reasons.
I couldn't help but feel like Julie had had perhaps too much luck, not enough actual work for the success she achieved. It was her luck that her mother and step father had already somewhat broken into the field, and that caused her success to seem to fly by. Suddenly out of nowhere she was singing for and meeting the Queen, being offered roles in prestigious pantomimes, and finally, best of all, being offered a lead role in a new Broadway show, The Boy Friend. It all seemed to come to her all too easily, and what's more, I didn't detect in her memoir that she quite realized what an amazing life she has lived. It was hard for a struggling actor like myself to connect to someone who was given so many chances by such extraordinary people.
This isn't to say that her struggles in her childhood weren't difficult or painful, and my heart went out to her at many moments where she detailed her stepfather's actions. But she never seems to truly let the reader in on her true emotions when she details these hardships. Julie writes in a tone that is at best consistantly optimistic, and at worst forced and lacking emotional connection to the reader. It is as though Julie is trying conciously to promote her Mary Poppins-esque persona, hiding some of her true feelings in the process. For example, there is a point in the book where a down-on-her-luck fellow performer purposely trys to make Julie miss her cue during a run of My Fair Lady. While many would respond to this sort of sabotage in an angry, or at least partially unhappy way, Julie responds immediately with pity; "I can only think that the envy or the sadness in her must have been all-consuming. Who knows what she was thinking or feeling that day". As the reader, my reaction was more along the lines of "b-tch please get out of Queen Julie's way!" It's hard to believe Julie never felt that way too.
I also felt that the story ended much too abruptly. I hope she's planning on releasing a second part, because the book definitely succeeded in making me want for more.
There were many good points in the book, though, now that the bad is out of the way. Julie told of many moments in her career that were fairly amusing (but not as funny for the reader as it most likely was for her). Also, the opening section of Chapter 40 made my hair stand on end.
At the end of the day the book was only so-so, and I feel like I need the second half of the story in order to truly appreciate this one. Better get to work Julie!"
"Julie Andrews was someone I really admired growing up and just wanted to learn more about her life. She is truly an amazing woman with her strong vocals and acting abilities. She started out singing at a very young age, and had a rough life as a young child growing up in England during WWII, and living between 2 homes with her parents divorcing. I was actually able to see what it was like for someone growing up during that time frame. My negatives on this were....I would get lost in all of the talk about others that she worked with, people I didn't know and didn't really care to know, and I was bit disappointed where the book ended, which lives up to the title of it being her early years. I wanted to hear more about her movies that she made, and this spoke to most of the theater work she did."
"Maybe (like everything in life) it's all about expectations. I didn't have much for this book, and I was so pleasantly, wonderfully surprised by how entertaining it was. First, when Julie Andrews writes, you can hear her saying the words -- she has a wonderfully authentic voice. The book focuses on her life before super stardom (in fact, it ends as she is about to go onto the "Mary Poppins" set), and really is about her childhood (tougher than you'd expect) and growing up on the vaudeville circuit in wartime London, and then her move to America to originate the roles of Eliza Doolittle in "My Fair Lady" and Queen Guinevere in "Camelot." The people who are "characters" in her book are the Broadway icons of today -- Rodgers, Hammerstein, Sondheim, Bernstein, etc. And just like her, they were trying to make it, and weren't the legends we see them as now. If you're at all interested in the history of Broadway or vaudeville, it's a great summer read. It might be (dare I say it) "practically perfect in every way.""
"After reading this book, I know much more about Julie Andrews, one of a few actresses I enjoy watching. I never would have guessed, for instance, that her first career was not acting but singing! Perhaps if I were living in England I would have known. I also had no idea that she had passed exams in dance. No wonder she dances so well in some movie scenes and moves so gracefully in others.
But this is also the story of someone with a less-than-pleasant childhood. We all have heard a few stories of people who rose above adversity and became great at something. Unlike most, Julie's family, while disfunctional in many ways, did give her opportunities not available to others. The fact that she took those opportunities and helped herself and her family shows an unselfishness not always seen in some others. And in spite of the adversity, the reader is left with the impression that Julie still loved her parents, while not really liking her step-father and perhaps some other relatives.
I enjoyed this book. I liked the way it was written because it is broken up into realistic pauses, making it easy to read a bit here and a bit there without losing the gist of the story. It is less negative than many autobiographies. When life is busy, this is a good book to break up the bits of stress - like a minivacation, or several of them in a day."
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