Dispatches from the Edge
Written by Anderson Cooper
Narrated by Anderson Cooper
3/5
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About this audiobook
In this gripping, candid, and remarkably powerful memoir, Anderson Cooper offers an unstinting, up-close view of the most harrowing crises of our time, and the profound impact they have had on his life.
After growing up on Manhattan's Upper East Side, Cooper felt a magnetic pull toward the unknown. If he could keep moving, and keep exploring, he felt he could stay one step ahead of his past, including the fame surrounding his mother, Gloria Vanderbilt, and the deaths of his father and older brother. As a reporter, the frenetic pace of filing dispatches from war-torn countries, and the danger that came with it, helped him avoid having to look too closely at the pain and loss that was right in front of him.
But recently, during the course of one extraordinary, tumultuous year, it became impossible for him to continue to separate his work from his life. From the tsunami in Sri Lanka to the war in Iraq, the starvation in Niger, and ultimately Hurricane Katrina, Cooper gives us a firsthand glimpse of the devastation that takes place when the normal order is ruptured on such a massive scale. Cooper had been in his share of life-threatening situations before -- in Sarejevo, Somalia, and Rwanda -- but he had never seen human misery quite like this. Writing with vivid memories of his childhood and early career as a roving correspondent, Cooper reveals how deeply affected he has been by the wars, disasters, and tragedies he has witnessed, and why he continues to be drawn to some of the most perilous places on earth.
Anderson Cooper
Anderson Cooper joined CNN in 2001 and has anchored his own program, Anderson Cooper 360°, since March 2003. Cooper has won 18 Emmys and numerous other major journalism awards. He lives in New York with his sons.
Reviews for Dispatches from the Edge
383 ratings27 reviews
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Compelling read
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Anderson Cooper is an excellent storyteller and writer. Dispatches from the Edge is a very readable book that combines Cooper's personal story with his coverage of several significant world events. I really enjoyed this book, and will probably re-read it in the future.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5I'm a huge fan of Anderson, watch his show every night or as close as possible. I had read it previously but I couldn't remember it, so technically this is a re-reading. It's still good, however, it could have been a lot better.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5I'm fascinated by what makes people tick. With Anderson Cooper, I have been interested in what drove him to spend almost his whole career in the most desolate, war-torn areas of the world, particuarly after growing up in relative affluence. With this memoir, we get a lot closer to an answer. Cooper describes shutting off his emotions at a fairly young age (10) after the loss of his beloved father, and how that was cemented after the loss of his brother to suicide. The early years of his career in Bosnia and Somalia appear to be both an attempt to escape the pain, but also an attempt to reawaken some of those emotions. He describes self-loathing, as he begins to lose sight of the fact that he's documenting the slaughter of people, rather than simply subjects for his reports. Still, as much as he's willing to share this emptiness, this part of himself that is troubling to him (and to us), he still doesn't let us get close to the rest of him. He documents in vivid detail the images of death he sees in all these places, but he only hints at having difficulty dealing with social situations, being less than available to his friends and loved ones. He describes how his time covering Hurricane Katrina finally started to crack that diamond-like shell covering his emotions, but he never takes the final step of revealing who he's become as a result. At 38, his journey is far from over, so perhaps his intent was only to document what brought him here to this moment, saving the rest of the story for some future work. I'm still curious, so I'm hoping that someday he trusts us (and maybe himself) enough to finish the story.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Heavy book, but nicely done. Anderson is an awesome narrator. I'm a big fan of his work.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5A great read with interesting insights into parts of Anderson's life set alongside his take on his experiences reporting the Tsunami and hurricane Katrina.