Mommy’s Little Girl by Diane Fanning

Mommy’s Little Girl: Casey Anthony and Her Daughter Caylee’s Tragic Fate by Diane Fanning

I’m one of the people who followed the tragic case of Caylee Anthony from the time her disappearance was finally reported to the police. I kept up with the online posts and of course, Nancy Grace who covered the case week after week and keeping it in the news for months.

So – I’ve heard the jail recordings, heard the breaking news nightly, etc – but I still learned some new tidbits from this book. I was curious if I would find anything new – and Diane came through for me It was also nice to read the story in chronilogical order along with Fanning’s scenario of what happened from the day Caylee “disappeared” until the story was covered aggressively by the media.

Anyone I talked to who followed the case – was familiar with basics of the case, felt bad for Cindy and George Anthony. Who wouldn’t be heartbroken for the loving grandparents who lost their granddaughter? There is Lee Anthony who seemed to be the caring brother and uncle – frantic to find his neice and to protect his sister. Over time, my impression of the Anthony’s changed. While I agree wanting to help and protect loved ones, I felt myself agreeing with Cindy’s frustrated family members as I read the book.

We will each draw our own conclusions about how Caylee died, about Casey’s guilt or innocence, whether the other Anthony’s have any knowledge of what really happened and much more. But Diane Fanning’s book is a great way to sort through all the media reports and to clearly see the timeline and the events as we know them to be at this time. Once the trial gets under way, I think it will also be helpful to have this “pocket guide” to verify or dispute claims made by the attorneys and witnesses. I have my own thoughts about what happened to poor little Caylee, but my heartfelt hope is that the person responsible for her death are prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.

Dispatches From the Edge by Anderson Cooper

I’m a big Anderson Cooper fan – but prior to his coverage of Hurricane Katrina – I admit that I wasn’t familiar with his work. The funny thing was that his coverage of the aftermath of Katrina irritated me. But as I kept watching his reports night after night – his reporting style really started to appeal to me and he comes across as a person that really cares about other people and their situations. I get the feeling that he wants to get to the truth, get people to admit they made mistakes and that he wants to feel like he has the chance to make a difference. What more could you want from a person in the media.

So – a couple of weeks ago I got the idea to look him up on Wikipedia. No clue what sparked the idea, but I read his bio there and discovered that he’d written a book – so I ordered a copy that night and it came in late last week.  I had just finished a few reviews and was getting ready to start a new book – so I started reading Dispatches From the Edge.

I knew his mother is Gloria Vanderbilt and I’ve read about the family all the way back to Cornelius Vanderbilt. I’d also seen the movie “Poor Little Rich Girl” about his mother.  But there was much more to learn.

Anderson Cooper shares many very personal moments from his life and he shares how various events in his news coverage have sparked memories and thoughts of his family, the loss of his father and the loss of his brother who commited suicide. The reader truly has the opportunity to get inside his mind to see what he was thinking and feeling – especially about these two losses in his life. Each of us that lost a family member to illness or to suicide can understand his feelings and I appreciated many of the thoughts, concerns and confusion that he’s felt over the years.

He has covered many horrible news stories; mass killings, starvation, illness, dying children, a number of wars, natural disasters and more. The insights into his travels to Rwanda, Niger, Irag, the Tsunami and extensive coverage of the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

As I read the two sections about Katrina – I also relived many of my memories of the news coverage of the devastation, the myriad of mistakes and the suffering and death that happened after Katrina. This helped me to understand the earlier sections and the “stream of consciousness” throughout the book.

In these days of 24 hour news and some news casters who seem like puppets for various causes — I really enjoyed reading the thoughts and feelings behind a news caster that I watch most evenings. The next big new event that I see Anderson Cooper report on will have a very different impact on me – so I would recommend this to anyone who wants to get inside the mind of this man. I will warn you that there are plenty of disturbing moments and passages in the book, but in order to understand why life and his work has such an impact on Anderson, I think the reader needs this depth of description and detail. It helps us see what many reporters experience to bring us the details that we crave and to have the chance to get inside these news stories.

I want to finish by saying that many times as I read this book, I wanted to reach out to Anderson Cooper and say that I have a deeper respect for what he does and what he brings to his work and news coverage.

Out There by Diane Fanning

I’m sure most people heard about the astronaut love triangle and the former Shuttle astronaut who drove from Texas to Florida to confront the woman who had taken her lover’s attention. That is the story that Diane Fanning tells in this book.

If you enjoy true crime and haven’t read any Diane Fanning books, I highly recommend that you pick one up. This book is very good too.

She begins by recounting the confrontation we heard about in the news. That was the part of the story we all knew. Former shuttle astronaut drives to Florida to meet up with a woman who had captured the heart of her boyfriend. Two astronauts and a woman in the Air Force were involved and Lisa Nowak’s arrest photo certainly didn’t look like her NASA photos.

After recounting the news information, Diane takes us back to meet a very driven young girl who always dreamed of going into space. She watched the monumental mountains in US space history in the late 1960′s and she wanted to go to space. In the 1960′s that was a far off dream for any woman. Fanning tells us about much of NASA history and some military history as it related to women being permitted to fly.

We come along on the journey as Lisa Marie Caputo strives for excellence and pushes herself toward that dream. She graduates from high school and goes to the Naval Academy. There she meets her future husband Richard Nowak.

The family move all over the country, but each stage of their lives brings Lisa closer and closer to NASA. In the mean time, space travel is changing and eventually woman are being accepted into the astronaut program. We watch as Lisa learns of the Challenger explosion and as she wonders if the space program will continue in the US. Her dream gets so close before she loses friends in another shuttle disaster.

I really enjoyed how Fanning shares the internal and external forces that push Lisa Nowak as she marches toward her dream of going to space. No matter what happens in Lisa’s world, she keeps that positive face for the world, but inside the cracks are starting to show.

Her good friend Bill Oefelein becomes her lover and although her marriage is still together, his marriage ends when his wife learns about the affair. But, over time, Bill’s romantic interests change and he becomes involved with Air Force Captain Colleen Shipman. We learn that Bill eventually told Lisa that their romance was over, but his actions sent her mixed signals.

Diane Fanning gives us insights from many perspectives and many inspects into the lives of astronauts before, during and after space travel. I learned many things about NASA and the space program that I never knew and these details certainly added to the story. For anyone who would like to learn about the people behind the headlines in this bizarre case, I highly recommend Out There by Diane Fanning.

Nikki Leigh
www.nikkileigh.com