This book is interesting if you're a huge Cobain fan and deeply interested in his most banal scribblings. There are some cool bits--song lyrics he's working out--but mostly this is marginalia. It's certainly of some historical value, but it's not super riveting to the average fan or reader. ( )

A non-fiction book filled with photocopies of journal enties, sketches, lists, song lyrics, etc. from the life of Kurt Cobain before his death in 1994.

It’s quite an easy read and very intriguing to see the process he went through, his journey into rock-n-roll stardom and even his inner thoughts which could have very well led right up to or be hinting at his suicide.

Not often does a musician or anyone famous leave behind such an intimate example of their life for others to read and understand. He was quite an artist which didn’t care about being famous. He hated the attention but he loved music and he wasn’t going to give it up just because reporters were around. He details his drug use, his relationships, his daughter, and his struggle to live and strive in a world full of negativity and change. ( )

Though the book is a capitalistic marketing of an icon I could not resist buying it. I wanted to know if he was the same person I had reckoned him to be through his songs. When I finished the book , I had realised how incredibly daft and supremely beautiful was his passion for music. The book is an excellent journey of affect through passion and how it burns you out if left on its own. ( )

Totally Awesome! ( )

I was and continue to be a huge Nirvana fan. There is just no way to over-represent what Nirvana meant to me at 12; they were the first band that made me realise that music could be more than Amy Grant and Vanilla Ice, and that it could speak specifically to my experiences. I'd resisted reading this book for a long time, both because it struck me as a cash cow and because I was sure that the journals were heavily edited and redacted. In the end I figured that those last facts would make reading them less of an exercise in voyeurism, and so here I find myself. The book is rather disjointed (as edited and redacted journals tend to be) but still offers a fascinating glimpse into several things: how Kurt Cobain's experience of social ostracism mirrored my own as a teenager; the genesis his lyrics and some of his famous letters to Rolling Stone; how desperately Cobain wanted fame until he actually had it; and how utterly, completely fucked up on drugs he was. Perhaps the best feature of the book is that it simply reproduces the journal pages without offering any sort of commentary or explanation; no one who isn't already a fan of the band will find anything of interest here, but it really is an interesting addition to the band's story from a fan's perspective.