Just Kids in Our Shared Shelf

Jun 03, 2011 Cynthia Paschen rated it liked it

Shelves: book-group

I enjoyed this but did not feel the need to know every clothing and accessory detail of Patti Smith and Robert Mappethorpe. Suffice it to say, they spent a lot of time getting ready to go places. They also spent a lot of time in poverty, which is interesting for a while. Smith drops a lot of interesting (to me) names related to the pair's stay at the Hotel Chelsea. Lots of other poets and musicians were less familiar.

I expected more related to Smith's music. She talks a lot about her early artis ...more

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Dec 31, 2010 Tammy rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: read-in-2011

Now here is a window into the New York artists' scene of the late 60s and early 70s that reads like an invitation. The shabbiness of New York calls to you. Patti Smith and Robert Mapplethorpe were indeed just kids, but what kids and in what company. A love letter to a soulmate, Just Kids captures time and place and circumstance profoundly. Would I have forgone regular showers and pissed in a cup to have been there? I think maybe. ...more

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Jun 08, 2015 Jesica rated it liked it

Amy Poehler called this book poetic. Ha! This book is not poetic at all. It's just a memoir of Smith and Mapplethorpe. The book was interesting. I didn't know that Smith had met and mingled with so many famous ppl. I thought the book abruptly ended; all of a sudden Smith made Horses and was moving to Detroit with a guy. And I was thinking who is this guy, how did she meet him, why Detroit, etc? I didn't know if she wanted to leave that for another book or what? But it was a good read nonetheless ...more

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Sep 13, 2012 Amy rated it it was amazing

Shelves: bookclub-book

As "Because The Night" would definitely make it on a CD of my favorite songs, I was excited when this was selected for book club this month. The writing of this story was so poetic and emotional. I wept through the entire final section. What a beautiful relationship between two people. Of the photograph (taken by Mapplethorpe) of Smith which became the iconic cover of her album Horses, she wrote," When I look at it now, I never see me. I see us." I think that is my favorite line of the book. I ...more

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