Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

Let me preface this by saying that I have always loved Val Kilmer on film: Real Genius, Top Secret, Doc Holiday in Tombstone, The Saint, Batman, Ghost and the Darkness, etc. So it hurts me to write this review, but I can only be honest with my opinions, so here goes... This tome is painfully wordy and filled with stream of conscience passages that are less than interesting and sometimes degrade to outright gibberish. So much praise of his Christian Science religion that not only helped create his dysfunctional family, but continues to enable his total lack of self-awareness about how insidious a force it was in his life, and still is, to include leading to his expecting his religion to cure his cancer. Too late does he learn that surgery and chemo were his only true options. And even now...he's in denial about that. Val throws out a tiny bit of personal info and then goes off on a enraptured meditation journey, sometimes in mid-sentence. It's jarring. If you’re searching for answers to the big questions in life, this book could leave you even more confused... as for me... I'm too busy living in the real world. Val's stream-of-consciousness writing style turned me off almost immediately. It reminded me of Jim Carrey's “Memoirs and Misinformation” that I recently tried desperately to finish but just couldn't get past the 3rd chapter...ugh. Now I know why there are script writers, because most actors literally have nothing interesting to say unless they're using other peoples' words. I realize acting requires one to be somewhat self-centered, but come on... there are limits! Maybe some people [Christian Scientists?]will be enthralled to see a photo of Mary Baker Eddy in this actor's memoir. Me, not so much. I will say it did help explain how & why he got so screwed up in his youth, and hasn't changed since then. For someone who claims his main force in life is to find god & self-awareness, he is exceedingly lacking in that category. Always in search of the perfect moment, the perfect woman, he'll never find any form of true peace or happiness because in life, nothing is ever perfect.. it's only as good as what you yourself bring to it. Oh, and he still loves every women he has ever loved [really?]... all of them were perfect[really?]... okay... so the relationships ended because....? He hasn't been with a woman in 20 years... this lady is not surprised. There were sections I literally skipped over where he'd drift off topic and would gush about Eddy...or Mark Twain.... or Marlon Brando. Oh, how he loves Marlon!! Two peas in a pod I should think. Here we have one of the prettiest, most prolific actors of the 1990's, with access to the best of everything, and yet he thought he could heal throat cancer with prayer & a heavy dose of denial, so that now he literally has no ability to speak. I'm bowled over by the irony. He should have followed Michael Douglas' advice and gotten treatment early... but Val knows best... just like he did at Juilliard... sorry.... at THEJuilliard School... which he keeps referring to in that manner ad nauseam throughout THEbook. HE knew better than his professors. HE was the first actor under the age of 17 to star on Broadway [hmmm... excuse me... does the name PATTY DUKE ring a bell?]. Even now he continues to claim he's improving physically, that his tongue is still swollen from the treatments which makes speaking difficult. I'm a Nurse and I know better. He has a permanent trach so he can breathe. He has probably lost a good deal of his tongue to the cancer. The muscles in his face show the toll it's all taken. Now don't get me wrong, a positive attitude can be a good thing, but delusional thinking is less than helpful. Lying to yourself rarely helps. There is no insight here into Val Kilmer or his films other than his beloved Christian Science, which, as stated previously, is discussed in his book to the point of madness . Even the discussion of his films & costars never rises above the level of what you can find in a simple Wikipedia search. He doesn't truly own the fact that he was a demanding man who pushed those around him who didn't see his “vision” of how it should be until they wanted him gone. Does he somehow thinks that by praising them now, he'll get back in their good graces? Pfffffht He praises Marlon Brando to the point of absurdity [birds of a feather?]. He might have done a better job if he had written a biography of Marlon Brando or better yet... Mary Baker Eddy. I have an extensive library that I add to frequently, but this is one book that's heading straight to Good Will, ASAP.