Good non-fiction and positive read
Picked up this book for some light holiday reading before the CNY. Didn't start until after the festival and then finished it in merely a few days. This woman, the first Hispanic and third female appointed to the U.S. supreme court, is a perfect example of how to be positive. Growing up with an alcoholic father and a largely absent mother in the Spanish-speaking Puerto Rican immigrant corner of New York, in addition to Type I diabetes, she had every reason to be cynical. However, throughout the book, she rarely mentions, not to say complains about the hardships she has gone through, like that she had to give herself the insulin shot every day since the young age of eight (not with disposal syringes), or that she was too insecure to speak up in class during her first two years in Princeton, or working 15-hour days throughout her career…Between the pages, what one would read is love, sunshine, kindness, friendship, generosity, mentors, and good luck. While the autobiography by another sitting Supreme Court justice who was also "shaped by early experience of racism, poverty, family tragedy, affirmative action and persistent self-doubt…reads as a list of betrayal and traps, Sotomayor's story reads as a series of lucky chances taken." (Washington Post Book Review, <https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/book-review-my-beloved-world-by-sonia-sotomayor/2013/01/11/7a93dcd6-55cd-11e2-bf3e-76c0a789346f_story.html?utm_term=.25ac0b6d93bd> )