Book Review: Through the Storm

Through the Storm by Lynne Spears with Lorilee Craker
Thomas Nelson
$24.99, Hardcover, 212 pp.

Abraham Lincoln is supposed to have written a book review that reached the dubious conclusion, “People who like this sort of thing will find it the sort of thing they like.”

He might have been describing celebrity memoirs of the current era, particularly this as-told-to rehearsal of the rise and fall of Britney Spears by her mother, Lynne.

Beginning with her own upbringing in the rural south, Lynne Spears describes her family’s life and the ascent to celebrity of her daughters, primarily Britney. The theme of the book is that the elder Spears was too trusting of people and unprepared for the deluge of attention by the public and manipulation by industry insiders that accompanied her daughter’s rise to stardom.

That theme wears thin as Lynne Spears seems to assign responsibility for all events in her life to someone other than herself. The phrase “against my better judgment” becomes a mantra that she invokes when describing nearly every choice she made, from decisions concerning her marriage to her alcoholic husband to the choices that advanced Britney’s career.

The book climaxes with Britney’s temporary committal to the UCLA Medical Center for psychiatric evaluation, an event which Lynne describes as the catalyst for freeing her daughter from her most manipulative handler and regaining control over her life.

Despite her too-much-protestation of naïveté concerning the ways of the world, Lynne Spears comes across as a sincere woman who values family and wants the best for her children. The book is a poignant reminder of the fact that tabloid celebrities are not the cardboard cutouts presented to us but are real people with families, hopes, and dreams—just like the rest of us.

If you like that sort of thing, you'll probably like this one.

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