Review of "Becoming Badass" by Margie Goldsmith

Score: 96/100 (9.6 out of 10)

Becoming Badass by Margie Goldsmith is already one of the frontrunners for Best Book of 2026!
It is certainly one of the most eventful, heartfelt, spirited, and inspirational memoirs in months.

Margie Goldsmith lives and embodies the words of Eleanor Roosevelt in this book:
"Do one thing every day that scares you" & "You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face."

It's an invitation not to let fear and apprehension crush your dreams, passions, and your willingness to do and try new things. This book dares the reader to try everything, do everything, and explore the infinite possibilities that life provides.

This book is 250 + pages of a woman repeatedly looking fear in the face, sometimes shaking, sometimes cursing, sometimes laughing, but always moving forward, even in the face of mistakes, disappointment, abuse, addiction, profound loss, divorce, career upheavals, and cancer.

This is the remarkable true story of a woman who DID IT ALL!

Margie Goldsmith has visited 150 countries on seven continents, won 101 writing awards, earned an Emmy Award for her documentary on the Shroud of Turin, climbed some of the world's tallest and deadliest mountains, and picked up a Swiss Army Knife of hobbies and skills along the way!

She has rubbed shoulders with celebrities including politicians (like President Bill Clinton and eventual-president Donald Trump, with whom she witnessed Mike Tyson knock Spinks out), athletes (including NBA greats like Michael Jordan, Larry Byrd, and Magic Johnson), musicians (like Whitney Houston, Billy Joel, and legendary blues harmonica player Charlie Musselwhite), authors (like James Jones of From Here to Eternity, William Styron of Sophie's Choice, and Alex Haley of Roots), and people involved in the film industry like her ex-husband, Director John Berry, as well as James Earl Jones and Francis Ford Coppola!

Keep in mind: a lot of these encounters just happened in the spur of the moment or as part of one of her jobs. It speaks a lot to getting yourself out there and making yourself available/accessible.

Speaking of Director John Berry, he really kicks off a series of up-and-down romantic relationships/marriages that mark different eras in this book and Margie's life, almost like how the history of the world is basically divided into periods of war and peace.

What was interesting to us is that, while there were times when Margie's husbands and partners like Berry were sometimes mean or belligerent, the author doesn't full-on demonize any of them. In fact, they all seem to have their reasons for acting and behaving the way that they do, and the author doesn't try to bury those things to make a stronger case for herself or to tell a black-and-white story.

This shows a lot of empathy and emotional intelligence on the part of the author. She could've easily thrown them all under the bus and presented them like savage evil male misogynists, but she instead chose to present them as flawed humans battling their own personal demons the same as she was. Heck, she's quick to point out that she was battling a cocaine addiction during one of these relationships that she was quite ruthless when it came to one of her partners being overweight.

In other words, she is willing to put her own complicity, occasional cruelty, and blind spots on the page too. That balance is a big part of what makes this memoir feel mature and emotionally honest rather than like a score-settling tell-all.

Speaking of which, her father and mother are also noteworthy. Early moments with her father may be triggering in more ways than one, but they are honest and actually seem to reverberate throughout the book like a haunting echo. In fact, Margie even describes having a dream about her father after she has conflict with her then-husband. Likewise, her mother's battle with breast cancer is something that is fought in the background of much of this book, interestingly reverberating as Margie herself battles cancer much later. It's incredible that this is a true story because the literary parallelism is uncanny, but truth is often stranger and more fascinating than fiction.

But one thing this book does well is reminding the reader (and perhaps the author herself) that, until your last breath, there are always new things to do and new things to try.

Throughout the book, Margie learns multiple languages, is involved in the film industry (including founding MG Productions), is published over a thousand times in magazines and newspapers, learns to play the banjo (humorously playing so bad that squirrels would run away) and the harmonica, becomes a runner then a race-walker after being injured, climbs two of the world's tallest and most dangerous mountains including Everest itself, and even randomly does things like scuba diving.

It's like this woman—despite having cancer and all of these turbulent events and trauma bearing down on her—won't be stopped! What a badass!

Lastly, we also found it interesting how the author compares different people in her life (and herself) to different flowers, revealing yet another niche and random interest for floriography. She casts Granny Elsa as a lush, high maintenance hydrangea that thrives in rich soil, her elegant but thorny mother as a rose, and her disappointing father as a yellow carnation tied to rejection. One sister becomes invasive goutweed that crowds everything around it, another a bright lipstick plant that is beautiful and dramatic but not exactly sturdy. Margie frames her younger self as a cobra lily, a strange little carnivorous survivor in toxic soil, then later introduces figures like Brian the Sunflower and JR the Gardenia. These floral avatars pop up throughout the book and give the memoir a surprisingly gentle, fairy tale frame around some very dark experiences.They also add another layer of sophistication to it, making it quite poetic.

Check it out on Amazon!