Title: Exhaustive research?
Product review: I was given this book by a friend who knows of my love for Caruso's music. The industry reviews on this page talk about the "exhaustive research" done by the author. I had to put the book down after page one: within three paragraphs, the author repeats one of the most preposterous lies about Caruso's life, that his mother had 17 previous children who died within a year of their birth. Then I flipped back to the dust flap, where it claims that Caruso performed "an astonishing 37 major roles each year" at the New York Metropolitan Opera. Newsflash: Caruso's mother did not lose 17 children: Enrico (Errico) was the third of seven children. And no tenor every performed 37 different roles in one year, let alone EVERY year. To accomplish the latter, the Met would have had to run performances 52 weeks a year, with Caruso changing roles every 10 days for 17 years. How can one trust a book that makes mistakes like that before you even get to page 2?
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