Former First Lady, native South-Side Chicagoan, and all-around modern-day Renaissance Woman Michelle Obama won the Grammy for Best Spoken Word for her 2018 memoir, Becoming, at the 62nd annual Grammy Awards yesterday.
Scoring a stellar 4.6-out-of-5 on Goodreads (369,210 ratings), Becoming is described as, “a work of deep reflection and mesmerizing storytelling” that chronicles the First Lady’s life from early childhood to her legal career (she was an associate at Chicago law firm Sidley & Austin) and her time in the White House.
The reader reviews showcase a winning-level of appreciation going all the way back to November, 2016:
former First Lady Michelle Obama
any more than I already did
… This book had me in tears
for all the right reasons …
God, do I miss the Obamas.”
BECOMING
MICHELLE OBAMA | PENGUIN BOOKS
Winning company
Other contenders in the Best Spoken Word Album category include the Beastie Boys for Beastie Boys Book; Eric Alexandrakis for I.V. Catatonia: 20 Years As A Two-Time Cancer Survivor; John Waters for Mr. Know-It-All; and Sekou Andrews for Sekou Andrews & The String Theory.
Previous winners in the category include First Lady Obama’s husband, President Barack Obama, who in 2008 for The Audacity of Hope and again in 2006 for Dreams From My Father. President Jimmy Carter won in 2007 for Our Endangered Values, in 2016 for A Full Life: Reflections at 90 and last year for Faith: A Journey for All. Former first lady and Secretary Hillary Clinton won in 1997 for It Takes a Village, eleven years before becoming US Secretary of State for President Obama.
Backstory
Born on January 17, 1964, and raised in Chicago’s South Shore neighborhood, Michelle LaVaughn Robinson Obama attended Whitney Young High School, Chicago’s first magnet high school, and later graduated from Princeton University and Harvard Law School.
She and future husband Barack Obama met while working together at Sidley Austin. They went to see Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing on their first date in 1989 and married three years later. The Obamas have two daughters, Malia and Sasha.
Essence, Vanity Fair, Oprah Winfrey, the Harvard-related 02138, and People are among the magazines and personalities that have honored Michelle Obama’s example, influence, inspiration and fashion.
Send your awards updates to Reel Chicago Editor Dan Patton, dan@reelchicago.com.
