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Chiseled: A Memoir of Identity, Duplicity, and Divine Wine
In this gripping memoir, Danuta (Soderman) Pfeiffer, known to millions as the former co-host of The 700 Club with Pat Robertson, explains her sudden disappearance from the evangelical world and explores her chaotic past living under her father’s imposing shadow.
This is a story of navigating identities through a remarkable life. Danuta Pfeiffer was an unwed teenage mother escaping to the tundra of Alaska; a journalist who inadvertently became a television evangelist with a ringside seat to a presidential campaign; a wife c aught in a web of deceit and substance abuse. Through it all, she clings to her father’s legacy, sustained by his tales of fortitude and endurance when faced with the horrors of war. Finally, living happily as a winemaker in Oregon, she finds she must once more reinvent herself, when during a sojourn to the Carpathian Mountains of Poland she uncovers long-buried family secrets. Chiseled is the story of one woman brave enough to chip away at a life of lies and finally arrive at a shining core of truth.
432 pages, Kindle Edition
First published February 12, 2015
8 people are currently reading
77 people want to read
About the author
Danuta Pfeiffer
5 books16 followersDanuta Pfeiffer is a progressive journalist, best known for her work in radio and television in San Diego, and as her award-winning memoir, Chiseled, explains, as co-host of The 700 Club with Pat Robertson during his run for president. Today, Danuta and her husband Robin can be found tending to their 70-acre vineyard, making fine wine, and sharing it with friends in their tasting room at Pfeiffer Winery in Oregon.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 31 reviews
March 4, 2015
I feel a bit odd giving it 5 stars, but then again--I think the book deserves that rating from its author. It is a jaw dropper for anyone interested in what goes on behind the curtain of a worldwide television evangelical show. And how someone could slip into that role without due caution. It's quite the read, even if I do so so myself.
March 10, 2015
As I read each chapter of Chiseled my repeating thought was “that’s just messed up”. The walking on egg-shells existence, the nasty nuns, a father blaming his daughter for her own rape, the alcoholic husband. What emerged was a pattern was of a woman wanting love and acceptance and was being denied those things by the people so important to her life. A parade for selfish manipulators—the rapist, the TV evangelist, the spiritual guide—all the same user in different costumes. It’s a wonder she’s sane after this litany of betrayals.
But the author’s story is in the end a positive one. Having friends who accept and care about you without their own agendas cluttering the relationship. Finding that one person to love and be loved by. Her natural resiliency and connecting with good people made the difference. Danuta Pfeiffer’s story is a hopeful one.
But the author’s story is in the end a positive one. Having friends who accept and care about you without their own agendas cluttering the relationship. Finding that one person to love and be loved by. Her natural resiliency and connecting with good people made the difference. Danuta Pfeiffer’s story is a hopeful one.
September 28, 2015
This was an accidental read of a book by a local (to me) author. I friend of mine thought I might enjoy it and offered to lend me her copy.
My friend was right. I enjoy reading memoirs to get a get inside the heads of people different from myself. Danuta Pfeiffer definitely qualifies. We are very close in age and grew up in the United States, but Danuta was co-hosting the 700 club at a time when I'd been totally non-religious for 15 years and was working at a part time clerical job and caring for my 2 young children.
The book is three stories that almost seem like they happened to different people. The story of her early life and that of her father including fallout long past his death for things he said and did, the story of co-hosting on The 700 club and the story of meeting her husband and the life that came from that. The final story really resonated with me. A woman who took such a different path came to a crossroads very like mine.
My friend was right. I enjoy reading memoirs to get a get inside the heads of people different from myself. Danuta Pfeiffer definitely qualifies. We are very close in age and grew up in the United States, but Danuta was co-hosting the 700 club at a time when I'd been totally non-religious for 15 years and was working at a part time clerical job and caring for my 2 young children.
The book is three stories that almost seem like they happened to different people. The story of her early life and that of her father including fallout long past his death for things he said and did, the story of co-hosting on The 700 club and the story of meeting her husband and the life that came from that. The final story really resonated with me. A woman who took such a different path came to a crossroads very like mine.
April 26, 2015
Danuta Pfeiffer's Chiseled: A Memoir of Identity, Duplicity, and Divine Wine is the amazing story of Danuta's life -- filled with deception, devastation, and determination -- that takes readers on her courageous journey. Told in three parts, Chiseled is a masterfully written story of a woman spending a lifetime searching to find peace, love, and acceptance within herself. For readers who remember Danuta (then Soderman) and her mysterious departure from being the co-host of The 700 Club with Pat Robertson, details are revealed of not only her departure, but of how CBN and Robertson operated behind-the-scenes. For the full review, go to my blog http://kristinehallways.blogspot.com/...
April 17, 2015
There are so many layers to this amazing memoir, I don't know where to begin. Gut-wrenching family drama, fascinating history, behind the scenes revelations that are shocking, to say the least. Love story? There are several love stories, some of them ending unhappily. But all through the book is another kind of love story: the love of a mother for her children. I refer to both Danuta's mother, and Danuta (as a mother) herself. Both of them are heroes, in my opinion! I read this in one day, including re-reading many passages that I thought were especially meaningful. I was moved to tears many times, and am recommending it to everyone I know. Memoirs are my favorite genre, but not all memoirs hold my attention or are as well written as this one. Go get your copy now!
June 2, 2015
“Ultimately, this is the memory of a lie.” So begins this powerful memoir by a woman I'm honored to call my friend. “This is a story of how that lie carved a greater space for my soul.” Throughout this amazing story there are so many, many beautiful lines like that as she weaves her life story with themes like carving, family, faith, marriage, wine, and success.
Danuta Pfeiffer's childhood began like a fairy tale and ended in a nightmare, her father presiding over his family as both lover and monster. Of the former version of him, she writes, “he seemed so rooted to the ground that the very earth seemed to hold him up higher than the rest of us.” He was a master carver and some of her very best language derives from her observations of his work. There are so many wonderful passages to savor and I highlighted 34 notes on my Kindle. “He caressed wood like a lover, fingering the grains, reading the cambial Braille, fondling the sinews and muscles hidden in the fibers. My father was an alchemy of flesh and steel swinging his mallet, chiseling rhythmically into the wood. Long into the night my mother, brother, and I slept to the lullaby of the sculptor’s song: tapping tools and the gentle rasp of wood chips spiraling to the floor. By dawn, curled shavings rustled underfoot like crisp autumn leaves, remnants of his long night of lovemaking.”
Her father carved beautiful statues for a church he’d long abandoned. She writes, “I watched in wonder as shape emerged from the unshaped. Grotesque at first with the effort of becoming, body parts wrenched themselves from the fibers: fingers arthritic with unfinished knuckles; a coarsely hewn arm; a chin stubbing out from the grain; a rib as new as Adam gave to Eve. Before my eyes, Jesus was born next to the refrigerator.” That last is one of my very favorite lines. Ever.
But as time went by, his descent into drunken madness accelerated and he channeled his anger and frustration into both his work and his family. “His tools were both delicate and destructive. Sometimes he coiled bits of wood with an instrument as dainty as a dentist’s probe and other times he lunged at a carving with a chisel shaped like a soup can. His mallet was a rounded stump of wood concave from years of pounding, held by a rolling pin handle. I often marveled at how his biceps looked as round and hard as his mallet.” Again, she describes so wonderfully, “This was, in part, his genius. It was also his flaw. His creations seemed to claim bits and pieces of his life; their muscles flexed with his strength; their tendons tensed with his will; their faces filled with his sorrow . . . until slowly, agonizingly, bit by bit, Daddy became the man on the cross.”
As Danuta matures, she realizes, “We enjoyed much happiness on the bruised and battered back of my mother’s youth, shielding us from the scorching heat of my father’s blazing temper.” Ultimately, they had to escape. Following Danuta’s fall from the grace of her father’s eyes, which I won’t spoil by recounting here, her mother moves them from Michigan to Alaska, proving this very thing, “Though my mother was as soft as an English mist, she was stubborn as a London fog.”
Before she has her first wrinkle, she has lost sons and lovers. Of this she writes, “This ate at me like groundwater nibbling at the foundations of my emotional life, generating little landslides of failures until my losses outweighed my gains.” She glides into the 700 Club hostess seat as if by divine intervention, admitting, “My learning curve as a sidekick-cohost evangelist looked like a hockey stick. Within weeks of joining the television ministry, I stumbled into the role of an unordained surrogate pastor to millions of people who asked for my prayers, requested guidance for their lives, and wanted my interpretation of scripture. Before I learned the words to “Amazing Grace”, Christian organizations booked me for speaking engagements.”
But eventually the bloom fades from that particular rose. The political aspirations of her co-host lead to daily shows with scenes like this. Pat Robertson tells his devoted followers, “We need to pray that Congress approves a plan for a stronger military and a stronger nuclear defense. We need those weapons. It’s just got to happen.” Pat turned to us, signaling our support for big guns and bigger bombs. It was just another day proclaiming the love of Jesus on CBN.” When Roberts is exposed for dealing with African tyrants, among other things, she writes humorously, “The Second Coming of Christ would have to wait for another John the Baptist.”
Ultimately Danuta’s own faith is tried and some very big questions plague her. She asks, “As for the death of people, did they not pray hard enough for their lives? Did the Lord take them because they were termites, or nonbelievers? Or were they good solid Christians and the Lord just wanted to “take them home?” If the Lord wanted them because they were good, was being spared a punishment? Or did they die because, of all the people who were saved, they lacked God’s mercy the most? I wish I had asked those questions.” These are some of my own top questions and I hope some day we'll both get some answers. She writes, “I carried that glow even after the love dimmed. Then I carried that glow by faith. And when faith wavered, I continued my relationship with Jesus as a memory of what used to be.” She might have left the show on her own volition, but before she has the opportunity, she’s fired as quickly as she was hired.
After the 700 Club, Danuta’s life slides into a downward spiral fueled by her alcoholic husband, her failed marriage, and the loss of everything they own. At the risk of simplifying things, divorce and biking combine to save her soul. And angels. As she writes, “Sometimes, in God’s silence, there come angels. Two angels in my case and not easy to see because they came while I was clouded by despair, but they persevered.” She bikes the west coast from Vancouver Island to San Diego with one of these angels and learns to Breathe again. And she meets her soul mate, the owner of a winery in Oregon where she can fulfill this affirmation she has written, “I want happiness, passion, hope, choices, time to write my father’s book, control of my own life, peace, to be in love, a home in the country, to ride my bike, freedom from stress, to plant a garden, to make a difference with my life.”
Ever the prodigal daughter and in spite of their alienation, she carries her father’s voice in her head, “Danuta, some day you will write my story.” Her father has long since died, but she has tapes he recorded, “thirty-six reels in the same sorry shape as our relationship, corroded by time and neglect, some parts flimsy as gauze.” Here her story comes full circle, looping back to page 26 where she writes, “And so we lived, bound to a longing that was not ours and to a past we couldn’t share, imposters attending my father’s counterfeit life.” She travels to Poland where “On the table, empty vodka bottles posted the rounds to oblivion and ashtrays brimmed with half-smoked cigarettes that smoldered like forgotten days.”
There, instead of filling in the missing facts of her father’s life, she learns that his stories have mostly been lies. There, she learns for herself what she’d written earlier as she prepared to tell her brother that he was actually her son. “Identity is your root and your foundation. I wouldn’t know how it felt to have those securities shattered until years later, when it happened to me, when I would lose my own identity. Only then would I understand how precariously we walk the tightrope of trust—a thin wire of confidence. Balance is an art form that requires sure footing and focus, maturity, flexibility, and an ability to waiver without falling. These things I would learn when my time came.” It is at this point in the story that her time has, indeed, come.
In spite of my lack of brevity in this review, there is so much more to this story than what I’ve recounted. More plot points. More characters. More beautiful imagery. Danuta Pfeiffer is a skilled writer and story teller. But art imitates life so more than that, she is an amazing woman who has led a fascinating life. I’ll leave you with this final thought and hope that you will have your own experience of her words, discovering for yourself where this last sentence leads. “Like my father, I shied away from God, losing my faith to sorrow and neglect, allowing it to ebb away one small grace at a time. The lifeline to the God of my catechism frayed until the threads could no longer sustain the weight of my needs. When the power of the sacraments and the saints no longer sheltered me from the ravages of my young life, I looked elsewhere for my salvation.”
Danuta Pfeiffer's childhood began like a fairy tale and ended in a nightmare, her father presiding over his family as both lover and monster. Of the former version of him, she writes, “he seemed so rooted to the ground that the very earth seemed to hold him up higher than the rest of us.” He was a master carver and some of her very best language derives from her observations of his work. There are so many wonderful passages to savor and I highlighted 34 notes on my Kindle. “He caressed wood like a lover, fingering the grains, reading the cambial Braille, fondling the sinews and muscles hidden in the fibers. My father was an alchemy of flesh and steel swinging his mallet, chiseling rhythmically into the wood. Long into the night my mother, brother, and I slept to the lullaby of the sculptor’s song: tapping tools and the gentle rasp of wood chips spiraling to the floor. By dawn, curled shavings rustled underfoot like crisp autumn leaves, remnants of his long night of lovemaking.”
Her father carved beautiful statues for a church he’d long abandoned. She writes, “I watched in wonder as shape emerged from the unshaped. Grotesque at first with the effort of becoming, body parts wrenched themselves from the fibers: fingers arthritic with unfinished knuckles; a coarsely hewn arm; a chin stubbing out from the grain; a rib as new as Adam gave to Eve. Before my eyes, Jesus was born next to the refrigerator.” That last is one of my very favorite lines. Ever.
But as time went by, his descent into drunken madness accelerated and he channeled his anger and frustration into both his work and his family. “His tools were both delicate and destructive. Sometimes he coiled bits of wood with an instrument as dainty as a dentist’s probe and other times he lunged at a carving with a chisel shaped like a soup can. His mallet was a rounded stump of wood concave from years of pounding, held by a rolling pin handle. I often marveled at how his biceps looked as round and hard as his mallet.” Again, she describes so wonderfully, “This was, in part, his genius. It was also his flaw. His creations seemed to claim bits and pieces of his life; their muscles flexed with his strength; their tendons tensed with his will; their faces filled with his sorrow . . . until slowly, agonizingly, bit by bit, Daddy became the man on the cross.”
As Danuta matures, she realizes, “We enjoyed much happiness on the bruised and battered back of my mother’s youth, shielding us from the scorching heat of my father’s blazing temper.” Ultimately, they had to escape. Following Danuta’s fall from the grace of her father’s eyes, which I won’t spoil by recounting here, her mother moves them from Michigan to Alaska, proving this very thing, “Though my mother was as soft as an English mist, she was stubborn as a London fog.”
Before she has her first wrinkle, she has lost sons and lovers. Of this she writes, “This ate at me like groundwater nibbling at the foundations of my emotional life, generating little landslides of failures until my losses outweighed my gains.” She glides into the 700 Club hostess seat as if by divine intervention, admitting, “My learning curve as a sidekick-cohost evangelist looked like a hockey stick. Within weeks of joining the television ministry, I stumbled into the role of an unordained surrogate pastor to millions of people who asked for my prayers, requested guidance for their lives, and wanted my interpretation of scripture. Before I learned the words to “Amazing Grace”, Christian organizations booked me for speaking engagements.”
But eventually the bloom fades from that particular rose. The political aspirations of her co-host lead to daily shows with scenes like this. Pat Robertson tells his devoted followers, “We need to pray that Congress approves a plan for a stronger military and a stronger nuclear defense. We need those weapons. It’s just got to happen.” Pat turned to us, signaling our support for big guns and bigger bombs. It was just another day proclaiming the love of Jesus on CBN.” When Roberts is exposed for dealing with African tyrants, among other things, she writes humorously, “The Second Coming of Christ would have to wait for another John the Baptist.”
Ultimately Danuta’s own faith is tried and some very big questions plague her. She asks, “As for the death of people, did they not pray hard enough for their lives? Did the Lord take them because they were termites, or nonbelievers? Or were they good solid Christians and the Lord just wanted to “take them home?” If the Lord wanted them because they were good, was being spared a punishment? Or did they die because, of all the people who were saved, they lacked God’s mercy the most? I wish I had asked those questions.” These are some of my own top questions and I hope some day we'll both get some answers. She writes, “I carried that glow even after the love dimmed. Then I carried that glow by faith. And when faith wavered, I continued my relationship with Jesus as a memory of what used to be.” She might have left the show on her own volition, but before she has the opportunity, she’s fired as quickly as she was hired.
After the 700 Club, Danuta’s life slides into a downward spiral fueled by her alcoholic husband, her failed marriage, and the loss of everything they own. At the risk of simplifying things, divorce and biking combine to save her soul. And angels. As she writes, “Sometimes, in God’s silence, there come angels. Two angels in my case and not easy to see because they came while I was clouded by despair, but they persevered.” She bikes the west coast from Vancouver Island to San Diego with one of these angels and learns to Breathe again. And she meets her soul mate, the owner of a winery in Oregon where she can fulfill this affirmation she has written, “I want happiness, passion, hope, choices, time to write my father’s book, control of my own life, peace, to be in love, a home in the country, to ride my bike, freedom from stress, to plant a garden, to make a difference with my life.”
Ever the prodigal daughter and in spite of their alienation, she carries her father’s voice in her head, “Danuta, some day you will write my story.” Her father has long since died, but she has tapes he recorded, “thirty-six reels in the same sorry shape as our relationship, corroded by time and neglect, some parts flimsy as gauze.” Here her story comes full circle, looping back to page 26 where she writes, “And so we lived, bound to a longing that was not ours and to a past we couldn’t share, imposters attending my father’s counterfeit life.” She travels to Poland where “On the table, empty vodka bottles posted the rounds to oblivion and ashtrays brimmed with half-smoked cigarettes that smoldered like forgotten days.”
There, instead of filling in the missing facts of her father’s life, she learns that his stories have mostly been lies. There, she learns for herself what she’d written earlier as she prepared to tell her brother that he was actually her son. “Identity is your root and your foundation. I wouldn’t know how it felt to have those securities shattered until years later, when it happened to me, when I would lose my own identity. Only then would I understand how precariously we walk the tightrope of trust—a thin wire of confidence. Balance is an art form that requires sure footing and focus, maturity, flexibility, and an ability to waiver without falling. These things I would learn when my time came.” It is at this point in the story that her time has, indeed, come.
In spite of my lack of brevity in this review, there is so much more to this story than what I’ve recounted. More plot points. More characters. More beautiful imagery. Danuta Pfeiffer is a skilled writer and story teller. But art imitates life so more than that, she is an amazing woman who has led a fascinating life. I’ll leave you with this final thought and hope that you will have your own experience of her words, discovering for yourself where this last sentence leads. “Like my father, I shied away from God, losing my faith to sorrow and neglect, allowing it to ebb away one small grace at a time. The lifeline to the God of my catechism frayed until the threads could no longer sustain the weight of my needs. When the power of the sacraments and the saints no longer sheltered me from the ravages of my young life, I looked elsewhere for my salvation.”
January 6, 2020
There are eventful lives... and then there is Danuta Pfeiffer's. Daughter of an emotionally and physically abusive father, she became pregnant after being raped on a date. The pregnancy was hidden from her father and everyone else except her mother. She delivered the baby by herself. She had once observed her cat bearing kittens and used that as a guide.
To escape her father's anger, her mother took her, a young brother, and her infant son on a harrowing drive from Michigan to Alaska at the height of winter. Her mother found work there and the infant was represented to everyone as her mother's son and Danuta's brother.
Then she turned 18.
Later, she bore another son. At the insistence of the infant's father, she gave the child up for adoption.
For someone with such a difficult start, she was an amazing success... in public. She took a job as one of the first female camera operators at a television station in Phoenix and worked her way up to local news anchor and morning show host on a San Diego TV station.
She was reborn as a fundamentalist Christian and became a regular co-host on Pat Robertson's The 700 Club. But the Christian Broadcast Network (CBN) was embarrassed to have a single woman in such a prominent role and urged her to marry. She accepted the proposal of a fine, Christian man who became an alcoholic and emotionally unstable.
She saw CBN becoming more of a vehicle for Robertson's personal ambitions and less of a messenger for Jesus' teachings as she understood them. At the same time, information about her pre-CBN life began to surface. CBN dropped her, she dropped fundamental Christianity, and eventually, she dropped her husband.
After a period of casting around, she met the owner of a vineyard in Oregon and married happily. She then began research for a book to document her father's heroic World War II experiences.
This book is a painful read for several reasons: It hurts to read about abuse as it occurs. It's also hard to read about how abuse affects a person for the rest of her life. The "reveal" near the end of the book is visible in the first few pages. And the writing style is romance novel. But what a life!
To escape her father's anger, her mother took her, a young brother, and her infant son on a harrowing drive from Michigan to Alaska at the height of winter. Her mother found work there and the infant was represented to everyone as her mother's son and Danuta's brother.
Then she turned 18.
Later, she bore another son. At the insistence of the infant's father, she gave the child up for adoption.
For someone with such a difficult start, she was an amazing success... in public. She took a job as one of the first female camera operators at a television station in Phoenix and worked her way up to local news anchor and morning show host on a San Diego TV station.
She was reborn as a fundamentalist Christian and became a regular co-host on Pat Robertson's The 700 Club. But the Christian Broadcast Network (CBN) was embarrassed to have a single woman in such a prominent role and urged her to marry. She accepted the proposal of a fine, Christian man who became an alcoholic and emotionally unstable.
She saw CBN becoming more of a vehicle for Robertson's personal ambitions and less of a messenger for Jesus' teachings as she understood them. At the same time, information about her pre-CBN life began to surface. CBN dropped her, she dropped fundamental Christianity, and eventually, she dropped her husband.
After a period of casting around, she met the owner of a vineyard in Oregon and married happily. She then began research for a book to document her father's heroic World War II experiences.
This book is a painful read for several reasons: It hurts to read about abuse as it occurs. It's also hard to read about how abuse affects a person for the rest of her life. The "reveal" near the end of the book is visible in the first few pages. And the writing style is romance novel. But what a life!
March 2, 2016
A gripping story in which we follow the author as she battles her way through life. Difficult to put down once started.
She starts of in what appears to be an idyllic family setting listening to her Polish father’s incredible tales of his heroic sufferings, but the father terrorises the family, and when she gets pregnant the mother runs away with them to Alaska.
There she gets pregnant again, but the baby is given up for adoption, and they move to California, where she becomes involved in religion. Later she gets to be a host on religious evangelical television, and becomes a nation-wide personality, but the organisation pressurise her into going along with the organisation’s dodgy practices (fascinating stuff!) as well as marrying an older man, and telling her son that she is his mother, not his sister.
She then falls out with the organisation, gets in debt, and returns to California with her husband, who sinks into alcoholism and gets them into debt again. After much strife, the marriage falls apart, and she moves up to her mother in Oregon where she marries a delightful-sounding winegrower.
Now finally at peace after 30 years of struggle, she thinks life won’t have anything else to throw at her, but never having gained a rapprochement with her father, whom she had adored, she visits her family in Poland, and discovers some more bad things.
A remarkable tale, and written with a journalist’s eye for pace and human detail, it unfolds in a masterfully engaging way. The writing itself is easy and assured, and with a skilful mix of dialogue and narrative, the book reads easily. The author also has the ability to convey character through her writing, and all the players in the tales are made alive and credible – a rare occurrence in this type book.
The author comes over as being someone able to face down almost anything, and keep smiling, but the edge in the story is never lost, and I found myself eagerly turning the pages to find out how each drama resolves itself.
She starts of in what appears to be an idyllic family setting listening to her Polish father’s incredible tales of his heroic sufferings, but the father terrorises the family, and when she gets pregnant the mother runs away with them to Alaska.
There she gets pregnant again, but the baby is given up for adoption, and they move to California, where she becomes involved in religion. Later she gets to be a host on religious evangelical television, and becomes a nation-wide personality, but the organisation pressurise her into going along with the organisation’s dodgy practices (fascinating stuff!) as well as marrying an older man, and telling her son that she is his mother, not his sister.
She then falls out with the organisation, gets in debt, and returns to California with her husband, who sinks into alcoholism and gets them into debt again. After much strife, the marriage falls apart, and she moves up to her mother in Oregon where she marries a delightful-sounding winegrower.
Now finally at peace after 30 years of struggle, she thinks life won’t have anything else to throw at her, but never having gained a rapprochement with her father, whom she had adored, she visits her family in Poland, and discovers some more bad things.
A remarkable tale, and written with a journalist’s eye for pace and human detail, it unfolds in a masterfully engaging way. The writing itself is easy and assured, and with a skilful mix of dialogue and narrative, the book reads easily. The author also has the ability to convey character through her writing, and all the players in the tales are made alive and credible – a rare occurrence in this type book.
The author comes over as being someone able to face down almost anything, and keep smiling, but the edge in the story is never lost, and I found myself eagerly turning the pages to find out how each drama resolves itself.
July 10, 2015
I worked with Danuta during the five years we were at CBN, but in 1988 we each went our separate ways: I went to CNN for 25 years and also became a novelist; she... well... I didn't know what became of her -- until I read this book. Very WOW. I had a lot of respect for Danuta when we were colleagues, but I come away from reading "Chiseled" with tremendous respect and admiration for her. This is a powerful and courageous memoir filled with one stunning twist after another. She reveals truths about herself that are as excruciating as they are liberating. The takeaway for me: the truth will set you free, even if it hurts to tell it.
~John DeDakis
Former CNN Senior Copy Editor ("The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer")
Mystery-Suspense Author ("Fast Track," "Bluff," and "Troubled Water")
http://www.johndedakis.com/my-books.html
~John DeDakis
Former CNN Senior Copy Editor ("The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer")
Mystery-Suspense Author ("Fast Track," "Bluff," and "Troubled Water")
http://www.johndedakis.com/my-books.html
February 2, 2017
I had the pleasure of sitting beside the author during lunch at Pfeiffer Winery (that was included with the Epicurious package of the Oregon Truffle Festival in Eugene). Over a delicious lunch, I remember having the most amazing conversation with this remarkable woman! Of course it helped that she also adores Prague and we were not too surprised that we both have Slavic roots. She gave me some travel ideas for Poland which I just have to go visit now especially since Krakow is now known as the "New Prague". Only later on that evening did I discover that I was probably the only person in the room that didn't know how famous she was! The next day I was thrilled to see her book at the OTF Marketplace and I was captivated from beginning to end.
September 28, 2016
I happened upon this book via a friend and thoroughly enjoyed it. Drawn by the story of finding identity and also the mention of wine, I knew nothing of the author's 700 club celebrity but was at least curious of that aspect.
The story she tells is very personal and she tells it in a manner which is very easy to follow. It was like being invited into a friends home and having them share their innermost feelings. It was a rare experience to read "Chiseled".
The story she tells is very personal and she tells it in a manner which is very easy to follow. It was like being invited into a friends home and having them share their innermost feelings. It was a rare experience to read "Chiseled".
June 1, 2015
Well written and amazing story. Enjoy it with a bottle of Pfeiffer Pinot Noir!
January 16, 2016
A gripping story of a surprising and unusual life story.
October 30, 2018
This isn’t my usual reading but the book blurb intrigued me. I wanted to know how a person swings back and forth between such extremes. I don’t have to agree with all of person’s views to find their life interesting. I expected to read this book in chunks but once I started it, I was pulled in and listened to most of the book in one day, finishing it off the following morning. Pfeiffer tells a great story sharing the biggest and most important moments of her life in vivid detail, not shying away from the ugly, life-changing, and privately beautiful.
I’ve never watched the 700 club, though I have heard of it. I found this part of the book particularly fascinating because it seems so very odd to me. While I claim no religion, I do expect those that do to do their best to live up to it. However, with the 700 club there was the public persona (which abided by the 700 club code) and then the private life. Alcoholism was common despite the no alcohol rules. Faith healing, words from God, and the ‘give to get’ belief collided with private marital problems, alcohol abuse, and more. Plus, the 700 club wasn’t really into gender equality though Pfeiffer managed to become a very popular part of the show.
I was shocked to learn that Pat Robertson attempted to gain the Republican ticket to run for president. I was still a kid when this was going on, so I give myself a pass for not knowing this before. Now I’m glad we ended up with Bush instead of Robertson. Of course, Robertson became concerned about Pfeiffer’s private past (her child born out of wedlock during her teen years) while he was campaigning. Because of that painful time in her life, Pfeiffer becomes aware of just how much of a double standard there is for men and women in the 700 club.
By that point, I was ready to yank Pfeiffer away from Robertson and his TV church. You’re better than that! The story continues on and it takes a long while for Pfeiffer to realize that this is true. What followed was a bit of a train wreck and it was also hard for me to put away the book. Pfeiffer struggles with an alcoholic & suicidal husband, a depressed mother, and her own self doubts.
One of the things that helped her during this time was the audio memoirs of her dad. They were a surprise find that a friend of her father’s had been holding onto. Things had not gone well with her dad for years and then he passed away. Through these audio memories, she learns to reconnect with him. Later in the story, there’s a rude awakening about her dad’s past which made the book even more interesting.
It does seem that Pfeiffer is a bit of a hockey puck that gets smacked this way and then that, rarely taking control of her own life or taking ownership for her decisions that added to the situation. During her teen years, I found this completely realistic. Things happened during those years that affect her for life. Then as a young lady, she gets swept up into the 700 club with their positive acceptance of yet another convert to their faith. Still, she allows the 700 club and their parent TV station to make life decisions for her, like her marriage. It’s not until after the 700 club has chewed her up and abandoned her that she tentatively starts making decisions for herself. So I would have liked a bit more reflection along those lines, how sticking your head in the sand and just going with flow is an action that can leave you wanting later.
All told, it’s an interesting memoir even for someone like me who knew nothing of the author prior to picking up this book. 4.5/5 stars.
The Narration: Danuta Pfeiffer narrates her own book and she does a pretty good job. She has a variety of voices for the various people in this book and she gives a passable Polish accent for her dad and his relatives as well as a passable Swedish accent for her husband. Pfeiffer relates the emotional scenes quite well, imbuing the moment with just the right amount of emotions without going over the top. Her pacing is perfect. There were no technical issues with this recording. 4.5/5 stars.
I received this audiobook as part of my participation in a blog tour with Audiobookworm Promotions. The tour is being sponsored by Danuta Pfeiffer. The gifting of this audiobook did not affect my opinion of it.
I’ve never watched the 700 club, though I have heard of it. I found this part of the book particularly fascinating because it seems so very odd to me. While I claim no religion, I do expect those that do to do their best to live up to it. However, with the 700 club there was the public persona (which abided by the 700 club code) and then the private life. Alcoholism was common despite the no alcohol rules. Faith healing, words from God, and the ‘give to get’ belief collided with private marital problems, alcohol abuse, and more. Plus, the 700 club wasn’t really into gender equality though Pfeiffer managed to become a very popular part of the show.
I was shocked to learn that Pat Robertson attempted to gain the Republican ticket to run for president. I was still a kid when this was going on, so I give myself a pass for not knowing this before. Now I’m glad we ended up with Bush instead of Robertson. Of course, Robertson became concerned about Pfeiffer’s private past (her child born out of wedlock during her teen years) while he was campaigning. Because of that painful time in her life, Pfeiffer becomes aware of just how much of a double standard there is for men and women in the 700 club.
By that point, I was ready to yank Pfeiffer away from Robertson and his TV church. You’re better than that! The story continues on and it takes a long while for Pfeiffer to realize that this is true. What followed was a bit of a train wreck and it was also hard for me to put away the book. Pfeiffer struggles with an alcoholic & suicidal husband, a depressed mother, and her own self doubts.
One of the things that helped her during this time was the audio memoirs of her dad. They were a surprise find that a friend of her father’s had been holding onto. Things had not gone well with her dad for years and then he passed away. Through these audio memories, she learns to reconnect with him. Later in the story, there’s a rude awakening about her dad’s past which made the book even more interesting.
It does seem that Pfeiffer is a bit of a hockey puck that gets smacked this way and then that, rarely taking control of her own life or taking ownership for her decisions that added to the situation. During her teen years, I found this completely realistic. Things happened during those years that affect her for life. Then as a young lady, she gets swept up into the 700 club with their positive acceptance of yet another convert to their faith. Still, she allows the 700 club and their parent TV station to make life decisions for her, like her marriage. It’s not until after the 700 club has chewed her up and abandoned her that she tentatively starts making decisions for herself. So I would have liked a bit more reflection along those lines, how sticking your head in the sand and just going with flow is an action that can leave you wanting later.
All told, it’s an interesting memoir even for someone like me who knew nothing of the author prior to picking up this book. 4.5/5 stars.
The Narration: Danuta Pfeiffer narrates her own book and she does a pretty good job. She has a variety of voices for the various people in this book and she gives a passable Polish accent for her dad and his relatives as well as a passable Swedish accent for her husband. Pfeiffer relates the emotional scenes quite well, imbuing the moment with just the right amount of emotions without going over the top. Her pacing is perfect. There were no technical issues with this recording. 4.5/5 stars.
I received this audiobook as part of my participation in a blog tour with Audiobookworm Promotions. The tour is being sponsored by Danuta Pfeiffer. The gifting of this audiobook did not affect my opinion of it.
July 28, 2018
Audio and Print Review. I read this book in print three years ago, and when the author contacted me and asked if I’d listen to the new audio book format, I jumped at the chance. Even three years later, I remembered well the details of the book. Danuta Pfeiffer's Chiseled: A Memoir of Identity, Duplicity, and Divine Wine is the amazing story of Danuta's life -- filled with deception, devastation, and determination -- that takes readers on her courageous journey. Told in three parts, Danuta begins at her beginning, as a god-fearing child, living a spartan life, under a father she revered despite his abusive hands. Her father's stories of obstacles he'd overcome in the war, in the most brutal of circumstances, carried Danuta through her own travails time and again, even as her father continued to reject her.
For readers who remember Danuta (then Soderman) and her mysterious departure from being the co-host of The 700 Club with Pat Robertson, details are revealed of not only her departure, but of how CBN and Robertson operated behind-the-scenes. This provides fascinating insight into the sometimes-sordid world of televangelism, and it ultimately leads to Danuta's "losing God" for some time. As Danuta navigates her life - out of work, married to an addict, and questioning the very existence of God - she always draws strength from her father's challenges and perseveres. When she finally allows friendships into her life and allows herself to focus on her own needs, she finds true love with a winemaker, Robin Pfeiffer. Robin takes Danuta to Poland, where Danuta connects with her father's family, and discovers the truth and lies of her father's past.
Many of her sentences are stunning, and the imagery truly takes the story to another level. For example, in talking about her father's decline into depression, Danuta wrote, "His change took place the way a shoelace comes undone, gradually unravelling what was once secure." Or, when she speaks of her time with The 700 Club, she summarizes it by saying, "I had become a spiritual drug dealer imbued with the halo of power and celebrity, associated with the brokers of money and politics." Her characterization is excellent so that readers not only witness actions but understand and feel Danuta's emotions towards the characters who have the most impact on her life.
Particularly powerful is the story of Danuta's mother, Patricia, who is truly the hero of Danuta's life. In Patricia's strength and commitment to her family, Danuta finds a role model in a time when women were restricted by societal limitations. Throughout Danuta's life, her faith and relationship with God go through many iterations, and it is interesting to see her thought process at all stages and what ultimately leads her back to a life of faith. Sprinkled throughout the text were photographs from various times in Danuta's life, which enriched the story even further.
ABOUT THE AUDIO BOOK: One word: OUTSTANDING. I loved this memoir when I read it, and I loved it when I read it with my ears and heard the author narrate her life for me. It makes the already intimate feeling memoir feel even more intimate, more real (and more painful), and her triumphs more glorious. Pfeiffer’s training serves her well as her narration is perfectly paced and her voicing of various characters really enriches them. The voicing of her Polish relatives was particularly good. She nailed everything from the humor of her Uncle Frank to the awkwardness of his translating for others and the pain and confusion as Danuta tried to reconcile the father she thought she knew with the man his Polish family knew him to be.
Chiseled is a masterfully written story of a woman spending a lifetime searching to find peace, love, and acceptance within herself. At times, readers will have to remind themselves that Chiseled is a memoir and not fiction. It is unbelievable that any one person endured all the heartache and challenges that Danuta faced, and even more amazing that she survived it and now lives a healthy, happy life. I highly recommend Chiseled, as Danuta Pfeiffer eloquently shows that truth can be more dramatic and fascinating than fiction. Readers be prepared to be angry -- and possibly shed a few tears -- but in the end, feel inspired.
Thank you to the author for reaching out to me and offering an audio download in exchange for my honest opinion – the only kind I give. This full review and other features on Hall Ways Blog
“Women were expected to be seen but not heard. To be instructed but not instruct. To praise the Lord and pass the potatoes -- but not to preach.”
For readers who remember Danuta (then Soderman) and her mysterious departure from being the co-host of The 700 Club with Pat Robertson, details are revealed of not only her departure, but of how CBN and Robertson operated behind-the-scenes. This provides fascinating insight into the sometimes-sordid world of televangelism, and it ultimately leads to Danuta's "losing God" for some time. As Danuta navigates her life - out of work, married to an addict, and questioning the very existence of God - she always draws strength from her father's challenges and perseveres. When she finally allows friendships into her life and allows herself to focus on her own needs, she finds true love with a winemaker, Robin Pfeiffer. Robin takes Danuta to Poland, where Danuta connects with her father's family, and discovers the truth and lies of her father's past.
"Memory is wickedly elusive and necessarily subjective.
Ultimately, this is the memory of a lie."
Many of her sentences are stunning, and the imagery truly takes the story to another level. For example, in talking about her father's decline into depression, Danuta wrote, "His change took place the way a shoelace comes undone, gradually unravelling what was once secure." Or, when she speaks of her time with The 700 Club, she summarizes it by saying, "I had become a spiritual drug dealer imbued with the halo of power and celebrity, associated with the brokers of money and politics." Her characterization is excellent so that readers not only witness actions but understand and feel Danuta's emotions towards the characters who have the most impact on her life.
Particularly powerful is the story of Danuta's mother, Patricia, who is truly the hero of Danuta's life. In Patricia's strength and commitment to her family, Danuta finds a role model in a time when women were restricted by societal limitations. Throughout Danuta's life, her faith and relationship with God go through many iterations, and it is interesting to see her thought process at all stages and what ultimately leads her back to a life of faith. Sprinkled throughout the text were photographs from various times in Danuta's life, which enriched the story even further.
ABOUT THE AUDIO BOOK: One word: OUTSTANDING. I loved this memoir when I read it, and I loved it when I read it with my ears and heard the author narrate her life for me. It makes the already intimate feeling memoir feel even more intimate, more real (and more painful), and her triumphs more glorious. Pfeiffer’s training serves her well as her narration is perfectly paced and her voicing of various characters really enriches them. The voicing of her Polish relatives was particularly good. She nailed everything from the humor of her Uncle Frank to the awkwardness of his translating for others and the pain and confusion as Danuta tried to reconcile the father she thought she knew with the man his Polish family knew him to be.
Chiseled is a masterfully written story of a woman spending a lifetime searching to find peace, love, and acceptance within herself. At times, readers will have to remind themselves that Chiseled is a memoir and not fiction. It is unbelievable that any one person endured all the heartache and challenges that Danuta faced, and even more amazing that she survived it and now lives a healthy, happy life. I highly recommend Chiseled, as Danuta Pfeiffer eloquently shows that truth can be more dramatic and fascinating than fiction. Readers be prepared to be angry -- and possibly shed a few tears -- but in the end, feel inspired.
Thank you to the author for reaching out to me and offering an audio download in exchange for my honest opinion – the only kind I give. This full review and other features on Hall Ways Blog
May 23, 2018
This hard-wrought story is a tribute to Danuta Pfeiffer's father, and then mother. Danuta is best known for her time working with televangelist Pat Robertson on the Christian Broadcast Network and later falling from its grace. Pfeiffer is a crafty storyteller, and she does herself tribute in this frank look at how a life can be turned inside-out by those around them.
She begins the story as an unwed teen leaving home with her mother and brother and newborn baby in a car delivery scheme her mother, a hard-working nurse, comes up with in order to escape the wrath of Danuta's father. Danuta has been raped by a boyfriend from school, and she hides her ensuing pregnancy from her father and when the baby arrives in a home birth, she and her mother must face up to the facts that will come from her cranky, self-absorbed father. Danuta and her mother both know that her abusive father, John, will never live alongside them as they raise the baby or accept the rape story without violence to someone. The miracle trip to Alaska one I won't soon forget.
Danuta's story wides and twists through a series of miserable events, falling for a young man that can't grow up enough to help her raise her second child and convincing her to give the baby up for adoption...raising her first son as her "brother" in order to find a more normal life in Alaska and finish school...and eventually being convinced that it is her Christian duty to work alongside the corrupt, soon-to-be-Presidential candidate Pat Robertson on the 700 Club as a co-host and convincing thousands of viewers to send money to a charlatan that also demeans and bullies her both on screen and off...and marrying an older man addicted to alcohol and the lies that go with it. Through it all Danuta wants to honor her father's hard-knock life in Poland that he told the family about and that she is convinced is what soured him and made him so abusive. He is the anti-hero of her story known around upper Michigan for his skill in carving and creating monolithic sculptures of Christ for churches and rarely being paid well for it.
It is not until the last chapters of the book that Danuta finds out just how miserable her life has been made by her father's stories of Poland and his time in WWII serving in a concentration camp. Long-since deceased and leaving her a series of recorded tapes of his life story later delivered by a late-in-life friend, Danuta tries to pay final homage to the man that tormented her and her family with abuse and indiscretions believing him to be a victim of war crimes and abuse himself. She spends years trying to piece together his story that he told her she would one day write, only to find through a trip to Poland with her new husband (an Oregon winemaker who is the supportive man she finally deserves) that her father's family and Polish life were not at all what he made them out to be.
It's hard to do this book justice in a few paragraphs, but I highly recommend the book. It was suggested to me by a friend who heard of it from another friend. Aren't those always the best reads?
She begins the story as an unwed teen leaving home with her mother and brother and newborn baby in a car delivery scheme her mother, a hard-working nurse, comes up with in order to escape the wrath of Danuta's father. Danuta has been raped by a boyfriend from school, and she hides her ensuing pregnancy from her father and when the baby arrives in a home birth, she and her mother must face up to the facts that will come from her cranky, self-absorbed father. Danuta and her mother both know that her abusive father, John, will never live alongside them as they raise the baby or accept the rape story without violence to someone. The miracle trip to Alaska one I won't soon forget.
Danuta's story wides and twists through a series of miserable events, falling for a young man that can't grow up enough to help her raise her second child and convincing her to give the baby up for adoption...raising her first son as her "brother" in order to find a more normal life in Alaska and finish school...and eventually being convinced that it is her Christian duty to work alongside the corrupt, soon-to-be-Presidential candidate Pat Robertson on the 700 Club as a co-host and convincing thousands of viewers to send money to a charlatan that also demeans and bullies her both on screen and off...and marrying an older man addicted to alcohol and the lies that go with it. Through it all Danuta wants to honor her father's hard-knock life in Poland that he told the family about and that she is convinced is what soured him and made him so abusive. He is the anti-hero of her story known around upper Michigan for his skill in carving and creating monolithic sculptures of Christ for churches and rarely being paid well for it.
It is not until the last chapters of the book that Danuta finds out just how miserable her life has been made by her father's stories of Poland and his time in WWII serving in a concentration camp. Long-since deceased and leaving her a series of recorded tapes of his life story later delivered by a late-in-life friend, Danuta tries to pay final homage to the man that tormented her and her family with abuse and indiscretions believing him to be a victim of war crimes and abuse himself. She spends years trying to piece together his story that he told her she would one day write, only to find through a trip to Poland with her new husband (an Oregon winemaker who is the supportive man she finally deserves) that her father's family and Polish life were not at all what he made them out to be.
It's hard to do this book justice in a few paragraphs, but I highly recommend the book. It was suggested to me by a friend who heard of it from another friend. Aren't those always the best reads?
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
August 1, 2021
I don’t normally like to read nonfiction but this was a book club pick. I found myself pulled in to the author’s story of her father, the pains of trying to be there for him and others in her life, always putting others in front of her needs.
She has two children and raises neither one, is poorly treated by several men and finds love of a good man. She’s talented and smart and so despite the poor treatment she gets from others, she prevails.
It’s a book of resilience and mistakes and finding the truth and living with the flaws of that truth.
She has two children and raises neither one, is poorly treated by several men and finds love of a good man. She’s talented and smart and so despite the poor treatment she gets from others, she prevails.
It’s a book of resilience and mistakes and finding the truth and living with the flaws of that truth.
September 5, 2021
3.5 rating.
Book Club read. You cannot make this stuff up! If this book was labeled in the fiction category you would say it could not have happened as portrayed. It is a memoir!
Story of very dysfunctional family and told through eyes of daughter as she struggles to find love, stability and peace in her life. Ultimately she does and I found myself cheering her on. Her journey was painful, and long but she persevered thankfully.
Book Club read. You cannot make this stuff up! If this book was labeled in the fiction category you would say it could not have happened as portrayed. It is a memoir!
Story of very dysfunctional family and told through eyes of daughter as she struggles to find love, stability and peace in her life. Ultimately she does and I found myself cheering her on. Her journey was painful, and long but she persevered thankfully.
February 23, 2022
Hands down the best Memoir I've ever read. It reads like a thriller beginning with her life in the woods with famous sculptor father who has a secret past. From there she escapes with her family to the wilds of Alaska. And finally to her time on The 700 Club with Pat Robertson only to have to reinvent her life as a vintner with husband and best friend. If you read no other memoir this year, read this one. It will keep you turning pages from beginning to end.
May 23, 2017
Before reading this book, I knew of Danuta Pfeiffer, wife of a vineyard owner near where I live. I've never watched the 700 Club and didn't realize the connection. This is a chilling story of tragedy, abuse, and an ever evolving identity.
February 10, 2019
A fascinating read. Danuta led a difficult varied life. . Many years of her life were omitted and I would like to know what else she experienced. Would also like to know more about her children. I’m hoping to go to her winery next time I’m in Eugene.
July 5, 2020
An act of live, nothing more, nothing less
“The truth shall set you free.”. Never have those words been more vital to our national and individual conscience than now. Thank you for your book. Truly. Thank you.
“The truth shall set you free.”. Never have those words been more vital to our national and individual conscience than now. Thank you for your book. Truly. Thank you.
June 10, 2018
Good read!
Excellent writing. Holds your interest from the first words. Incredible life. More incredible woman! I sincerely recommend this book for an entertaining time.
Excellent writing. Holds your interest from the first words. Incredible life. More incredible woman! I sincerely recommend this book for an entertaining time.
July 6, 2020
A moving read
A story filled with love and anguish. A journey well-described and filled with surprises. One woman's search for self and truth. Really enjoyed the telling.
A story filled with love and anguish. A journey well-described and filled with surprises. One woman's search for self and truth. Really enjoyed the telling.
April 25, 2023
I’ve read this book twice. Fascinating life.
April 21, 2016
The most recent book selection by my book club and one of my favorites. Chiseled had me hooked from page one and kept me hooked until the last. The amazing story of Danuta's life from her childhood and dealing with an abusive father larger than life father, to her mother taking her on a harrowing journey to Alaska in the middle of winter. But just when you think you hit the peak a new chapter unfolds bringing us into her time on the 700 club and Pat Robertson's run for presidency.
I was so taken by this book and the writing it was near impossible to put down. To the point this book would repeatedly hit me in the face as I tried to read in bed at night. Refusing to let sleep steal a chance to get one more chapter in. Its a truly amazing story of one woman's journey through tremendous heartbreak and hardship and coming out on the other side. I really can't say enough about how much I love this book and what an amazing woman Danuta is. Her strength of character to push on through so many challenges and heartbreaks is a true testament to the will of the human spirit.
My book club had the chance to meet Danuta (and Robin) and their winery is she is such a genuinely warm and compassionate woman. I'm truly inspired by her achievements and proof that we can live through harrowing things and come out on the other side smiling with a true love for life.
I was so taken by this book and the writing it was near impossible to put down. To the point this book would repeatedly hit me in the face as I tried to read in bed at night. Refusing to let sleep steal a chance to get one more chapter in. Its a truly amazing story of one woman's journey through tremendous heartbreak and hardship and coming out on the other side. I really can't say enough about how much I love this book and what an amazing woman Danuta is. Her strength of character to push on through so many challenges and heartbreaks is a true testament to the will of the human spirit.
My book club had the chance to meet Danuta (and Robin) and their winery is she is such a genuinely warm and compassionate woman. I'm truly inspired by her achievements and proof that we can live through harrowing things and come out on the other side smiling with a true love for life.
December 14, 2016
This was a great book! I cannot even imagine living the life that Danuta has led. From a terrifying drive across Alaska in the winter, to co-hosting the 700 Club with Pat Robertson and ending up in Oregon as a winemaker's wife, the adventure continues. This is what fiction stories are made of, but this is real life and Danuta is a real person! It was hard to put down!
March 15, 2016
This book made me very grateful my life isn't interesting enough to write about. It's very readable, heartfelt, and honest, and does a good job telling the story of an interesting life.
June 26, 2016
The perfect title to describe her family saga and her path to authenticity. A fascinating story and easy read, but with much to think about / reflect upon.
December 8, 2022
Really interesting autobiography. I'll admit I wouldn't have read it without the local connection, but her life is a fascinating lens on American culture.
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