From a reader of memoirs stand-point, she “quoted” historical figures too often and asked too many rhetorical questions. Evidence is well and good until it starts taking up pages where you could be saying your own words, as that should be the point of writing a book. If I wanted to read pages and pages of John F. Kennedy or Calvin Coolidge I would read their work.

Her chapter on “feminism” attempted to define feminism with a definition that even a junior in college could tell was incoherent. Strikingly, she discussed the idea that Susan B. Anthony was pro-life. Recently, I found an article that mentioned the Susan B. Anthony List, and I researched the organization further. So, if there isn’t any documentation that Anthony was pro-choice, then you can spin her to be pro-life? If we’re using that logic, I get to say Jesus was a raptor.

I like memoirs. I like hearing about people’s lives (sometimes) and how they got from point A to point B. From Argumentation & Debate, I learned that you need read a little about everything in order to constructively discuss it. Listening is definitely more my M-O, but good discussions are something to be relished. Do not construct an opinion on having only read one-side of an argument. As difficult as it was for me to read something like America By Heart, I’m glad that I furthered my opinion straight from the source. Primary sources go a lot further than hearsay and gossip.

And if that doesn’t work for you, then there is Sun Tzu’s quote from The Art of War:

Know your enemy.