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This Thing Called Life: Prince's Odyssey, On and Off the Record
"A warm and surprisingly real-life biography, featuring never-before-seen photos, of one of rock’s greatest talents: Prince.
Neal Karlen was the only journalist Prince granted in-depth press interviews to for over a dozen years, from before Purple Rain to when the artist changed his name to an unpronounceable glyph. Karlen interviewed Prince for three Rolling Stone cover stories, wrote “3 Chains o’ Gold,” Prince’s “rock video opera,” as well as the star’s last testament, which may be buried with Prince’s will underneath Prince’s vast and private compound, Paisley Park.
According to Prince's former fiancée Susannah Melvoin, Karlen was “the only reporter who made Prince sound like what he really sounded like.” Karlen quit writing about Prince a quarter-century before the mega-star died, but he never quit Prince, and the two remained friends for the last thirty-one years of the superstar’s life.
Well before they met as writer and subject, Prince and Karlen knew each other as two of the gang of kids who biked around Minneapolis’s mostly-segregated Northside. (They played basketball at the Dairy Queen next door to Karlen’s grandparents, two blocks from the budding musician.) He asserts that Prince can’t be understood without first understanding ‘70s Minneapolis, and that even Prince’s best friends knew only 15 percent of him: that was all he was willing and able to give, no matter how much he cared for them.
Going back to Prince Rogers Nelson's roots, especially his contradictory, often tortured, and sometimes violent relationship with his father, This Thing Called Life profoundly changes what we know about Prince, and explains him as no biography has: a superstar who calls in the middle of the night to talk, who loved The Wire and could quote from every episode of The Office, who frequented libraries and jammed spontaneously for local crowds (and fed everyone pancakes afterward), who was lonely but craved being alone. Readers will drive around Minneapolis with Prince in a convertible, talk about movies and music and life, and watch as he tries not to curse, instead dishing a healthy dose of “mamma jammas.”"
Neal Karlen was the only journalist Prince granted in-depth press interviews to for over a dozen years, from before Purple Rain to when the artist changed his name to an unpronounceable glyph. Karlen interviewed Prince for three Rolling Stone cover stories, wrote “3 Chains o’ Gold,” Prince’s “rock video opera,” as well as the star’s last testament, which may be buried with Prince’s will underneath Prince’s vast and private compound, Paisley Park.
According to Prince's former fiancée Susannah Melvoin, Karlen was “the only reporter who made Prince sound like what he really sounded like.” Karlen quit writing about Prince a quarter-century before the mega-star died, but he never quit Prince, and the two remained friends for the last thirty-one years of the superstar’s life.
Well before they met as writer and subject, Prince and Karlen knew each other as two of the gang of kids who biked around Minneapolis’s mostly-segregated Northside. (They played basketball at the Dairy Queen next door to Karlen’s grandparents, two blocks from the budding musician.) He asserts that Prince can’t be understood without first understanding ‘70s Minneapolis, and that even Prince’s best friends knew only 15 percent of him: that was all he was willing and able to give, no matter how much he cared for them.
Going back to Prince Rogers Nelson's roots, especially his contradictory, often tortured, and sometimes violent relationship with his father, This Thing Called Life profoundly changes what we know about Prince, and explains him as no biography has: a superstar who calls in the middle of the night to talk, who loved The Wire and could quote from every episode of The Office, who frequented libraries and jammed spontaneously for local crowds (and fed everyone pancakes afterward), who was lonely but craved being alone. Readers will drive around Minneapolis with Prince in a convertible, talk about movies and music and life, and watch as he tries not to curse, instead dishing a healthy dose of “mamma jammas.”"
352 pages, Hardcover
First published October 6, 2020
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387 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 78 reviews
February 25, 2021
How can a book about Prince possibly induce yawns? Oh, this isn't a Prince biography it's Neal Karlen writing his own autobiography and casting Prince as a supporting character. Although the author had 30 years access to Prince, the actual insights and interesting moments are few and far between. His writing is maddeningly repetitive and the narrative is constantly doing annoying loops in time. A frustrating read that was a chore to finish. The writer's ego diluted what could have been a fascinating book and ended up reading like a lazy first draft. I recommend Mick Wall's Purple Reign if you want an interesting dive into Prince's life and legacy that is a genuine page turner.
September 28, 2025
I saw a review of another Prince book that interested me, but my library didn’t have it, so I checked out the Prince’s Odyssey audiobook. I’ve recently been watching music reviews on YouTube and enjoy younger music fans discover some great music I’ve spent so many years enjoying. Prince is an artist that amazes these reviewers, justifiably. His musical genius mixed with his unique showmanship made him one of a kind. So, I wanted to find out more about him.
This audiobook is by Neal Karlen, who had a longtime relationship with Prince. That relationship allows him to share snippets from recoded conversations over the years of their relationship. What started as a business relationship developed into a friendship as Prince would call him, typically in the hours between late night and early morning.
Neal wrote about him professionally during the early years of their relationship, but hadn’t written for many years. I enjoyed the recordings, and Neal narrates well… but nothing shared really grabbed me. I came away learning that Prince was even more complex than I had known. Often withdrawn and very private, but with a sharp sense of humor. A very lonely man, sometimes honest but often spinning tales about his life that made it hard to know the real man.
While the book covers a lot of years, it tends to ramble and repeat. If it weren’t for the recordings of Prince included, I would say you could probably find a better book to learn about Prince, but I am glad I listened to the audiobook, even if I skipped through it a bit and overall only give it 3 stars.
This audiobook is by Neal Karlen, who had a longtime relationship with Prince. That relationship allows him to share snippets from recoded conversations over the years of their relationship. What started as a business relationship developed into a friendship as Prince would call him, typically in the hours between late night and early morning.
Neal wrote about him professionally during the early years of their relationship, but hadn’t written for many years. I enjoyed the recordings, and Neal narrates well… but nothing shared really grabbed me. I came away learning that Prince was even more complex than I had known. Often withdrawn and very private, but with a sharp sense of humor. A very lonely man, sometimes honest but often spinning tales about his life that made it hard to know the real man.
While the book covers a lot of years, it tends to ramble and repeat. If it weren’t for the recordings of Prince included, I would say you could probably find a better book to learn about Prince, but I am glad I listened to the audiobook, even if I skipped through it a bit and overall only give it 3 stars.
February 16, 2021
Writer talks too much about himself. The main problem here is the fact that i don’t give a fuck about the writer.
December 28, 2024
Not truly a full Prince biography, but more of the story of Neal Karlen's friendship with Prince (and thus it is also a partial biography of Neal Karlen, which nobobdy signed up for). The audiobook version has snippets of recorded conversations with Prince but they are of such poor quality that they might as well have not been included. If you just want my review of the book then there you go. If you want some thoughts on Prince then stick around.
Sometimes I read a biography of someone that I like and think "I really like this person's work, but I wouldn't have wanted to meet them". Prince falls into this category. A massive asshole that easily (and seemingly randomly) cast away friends and allies for little to no reason or treated people like crap at any perceived slight (one of my favorite stories from the book is Prince tracking mud through James Brown's house because he simply didn't like him). This isn't something that I learned from this book, but something that is pretty common knowledge that Karlen certainly didn't dispell.
The most frustrating thing about Prince (to me anyway) is that fact that Prince was such a massive liar. We will probably never have a truly complete biography of the man because he lied through his teeth about almost everything. Karlen kindly calls it Kayfabe (a wrestling term meaning you never drop the act of being your character in front of others) but even Karlen admits that Prince did this so much that he began to believe his own nonsense.
Was Prince as good of a basketball player as he always claimed? Who knows! Outside of some stories from his friends, there is only one (heavily edited) video of Prince playing basketball in existence. How religious was he? Who knows! He would forbid cursing in his home but once he was in the street he would swear with the best of them. He also threw huge birthday bashes, which is a big nono in the Jehovah's Witnesses (as Karlen puts it, Prince was 15% of a Jehovah's Witness 100% of the time). Was he cast out into the street with nothing when he was a teenager like he claimed? Probably not. Was his mom white like he claimed? Nope. Did he grow up in the Seventh Day Adventist Church? The evidence points to no. And on and on.
And that's the problem with any realistic Prince biography, including this one. They are just collections of stories of Prince being an asshole and other stories that probably aren't true.
I personally would have liked if Karlen had dug deeper into a theory that he just gives one line to: that Prince had savant syndrome (or something similar). It would go a long way in explaining his genius and his difficulty in engaging with others in a normal way.
The only time I liked Prince in this book was when Karlen would describe Prince fully letting his guard down and just being a normal dude. Prince was a massive fan of TV shows and would do (apparently excellent, but unfortunately we don't get to hear any) impressions of characters like Fonzie from Happy Days, Columbo, and Stanley from The Office. This is the version of Prince that I would have liked to meet, but it seems that this version wasn't around too often.
Sometimes I read a biography of someone that I like and think "I really like this person's work, but I wouldn't have wanted to meet them". Prince falls into this category. A massive asshole that easily (and seemingly randomly) cast away friends and allies for little to no reason or treated people like crap at any perceived slight (one of my favorite stories from the book is Prince tracking mud through James Brown's house because he simply didn't like him). This isn't something that I learned from this book, but something that is pretty common knowledge that Karlen certainly didn't dispell.
The most frustrating thing about Prince (to me anyway) is that fact that Prince was such a massive liar. We will probably never have a truly complete biography of the man because he lied through his teeth about almost everything. Karlen kindly calls it Kayfabe (a wrestling term meaning you never drop the act of being your character in front of others) but even Karlen admits that Prince did this so much that he began to believe his own nonsense.
Was Prince as good of a basketball player as he always claimed? Who knows! Outside of some stories from his friends, there is only one (heavily edited) video of Prince playing basketball in existence. How religious was he? Who knows! He would forbid cursing in his home but once he was in the street he would swear with the best of them. He also threw huge birthday bashes, which is a big nono in the Jehovah's Witnesses (as Karlen puts it, Prince was 15% of a Jehovah's Witness 100% of the time). Was he cast out into the street with nothing when he was a teenager like he claimed? Probably not. Was his mom white like he claimed? Nope. Did he grow up in the Seventh Day Adventist Church? The evidence points to no. And on and on.
And that's the problem with any realistic Prince biography, including this one. They are just collections of stories of Prince being an asshole and other stories that probably aren't true.
I personally would have liked if Karlen had dug deeper into a theory that he just gives one line to: that Prince had savant syndrome (or something similar). It would go a long way in explaining his genius and his difficulty in engaging with others in a normal way.
The only time I liked Prince in this book was when Karlen would describe Prince fully letting his guard down and just being a normal dude. Prince was a massive fan of TV shows and would do (apparently excellent, but unfortunately we don't get to hear any) impressions of characters like Fonzie from Happy Days, Columbo, and Stanley from The Office. This is the version of Prince that I would have liked to meet, but it seems that this version wasn't around too often.
October 25, 2020
One of the very few books I couldn’t finish.
So much wasted potential. Classic case of ambivalence towards what the author wants the book to be. Memoir? Biography? Karlen also spends a great deal of time trying to grapple with what I can only interpret as guilt towards writing (and theoretically profiting from) a book about a troubled friend with whom he had a complicated relationship. Might I suggest therapy instead?
So much wasted potential. Classic case of ambivalence towards what the author wants the book to be. Memoir? Biography? Karlen also spends a great deal of time trying to grapple with what I can only interpret as guilt towards writing (and theoretically profiting from) a book about a troubled friend with whom he had a complicated relationship. Might I suggest therapy instead?
November 19, 2020
Really about 2.75 stars - of the many Prince related books, this one was perhaps the most frustrating. Because Neal Karlen never was part of Prince's employ and knew him way back in school, I want to believe that his information comes from a place of truth. The challenge is often that what he relates are from conversations or times when only he and Prince were in the room (or when a third party, like Prince's dad, is someone who has since passed). So, there is really no one to dispute the facts since all parties involved are unable to speak from beyond the grave. Then again, with everything else I have read in books taken into consideration, Neal's words seem to fit. See, with Prince, it is always been about deciphering the puzzle - lining up the pieces to see what brings together the whole picture. The music is one piece. The public persona is another. But the big keys are those
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November 22, 2020I can't rate this book, I just don't know how to rate people's personal thoughts and opinions. Like in life Prince's death has left us dazed and confused. I think he did this on purpose, in an effort to keep his personal life personal and also to have mystery about him so that we could not take that away from him too. I think that mystery is why I buy and listen to his albums... you just don't know what you are going to get. He was constantly creating. I will continue to read anything that comes out about him because I am curious, I don't think we will ever get all of the answers. That being said, we don't need them. He was a person and deserves to write and edit his own story and give what he wanted to give the end.
February 3, 2022
Prince is one of my top five favorite musicians and seeing him live back in the 80's and 90's made this read bitter sweet since he is gone. I liked the vibe of the the book and the relationship that the author respectfully shared with fans and those just curious to get a glimpse of the man behind his music.
March 16, 2021
Every society honors its live conformists and its dead troublemakers
-Mignon McLaughlin, The
Neurotics Notebook (1960)
"It's always the same: once you're liberated, you are forced to ask who you are".
-Jean Baudrillard
-Mignon McLaughlin, The
Neurotics Notebook (1960)
"It's always the same: once you're liberated, you are forced to ask who you are".
-Jean Baudrillard
December 19, 2020
Too much about the author for me--
February 11, 2021
Although I found some sections of this book interesting and learned quite a bit about Prince and Minnesota, I’m not sure what its purpose was. Karlen seemed to be writing a book to say that he shouldn’t write a book about Prince because he didn’t really know Prince since no one really knew him, not even Prince himself. Huh? At least I understand why Prince and he were friends. Besides loving basketball, music, Dorothy Parker, and some television shows, both of them are weird. What I appreciated in the book many Prince fans probably won’t like. I liked the references to Fitzgerald (also from Minnesota, of course), Parker, and other literary figures. I especially liked the Virginia Woolf quotation about Samuel Coleridge. But I have a feeling I’m one of about three people who would read a book about Prince and enjoy a Woolf quotation about Coleridge. Karlen would be one of the other three; I’m not sure about Prince. I became annoyed near the end of the book when Prince’s weird journalist friend tried to compare him to LBJ because they both kept secrets. LBJ and Prince? As I was reading about the influence of wrestling on Prince, James Brown, whose cape handler coincidentally died this week, and Muhammad Ali, I was thinking that this book would have been great if Karlen had connected the artist who lied about his life to Donald Trump, another fan of wrestling. In fact, I wonder if the bleach blonde Trump, who was an older child in the fifties than Prince, who was born in 1958, was even more influenced by bottle blonde Gorgeous George, the wrestler that the three black showboaters were imitating. I don’t remember any musicians being interested in LBJ, but rappers liked Trump and so did Michael Jackson (I’m not sure about Prince). Maybe Karlen’s book would have been more coherent and less repetitious if he had focused it on the theme of wrestling and how it has influenced our culture and politics, using Prince and Trump to make his case. While the journalist’s writing was at times lyrical and playful, showing the influence of poets and musicians/rappers, it could also be sloppy. Because of one dangling modifier, I briefly thought that Miles Davis hated Spike Lee; Karlen was saying that Prince hated Lee like he hated Miles Davis. He needed a better editor.
February 25, 2021
Everyone who sets out to write about Prince has to answer the same question, to themselves and their publishers: why another Prince book? Particularly since the music icon's tragic death in 2016, the floodgates have been opened for authors (including Prince himself, posthumously) to share their stories.
Say this for Neal Karlen's new book: This Thing Called Life is certainly unlike any other Prince biography ever published. Based on the Minneapolis journalist's own decades of meetings and conversations with Prince, the book is at once completely subjective and an attempt to cut through what Karlen calls Prince's "kayfabe." In pro wrestling, kayfabe refers to the layer of invented reality that sits atop the actual truth, creating a fictional storyline around the actual bouts.
I reviewed This Thing Called Life for The Current.
Say this for Neal Karlen's new book: This Thing Called Life is certainly unlike any other Prince biography ever published. Based on the Minneapolis journalist's own decades of meetings and conversations with Prince, the book is at once completely subjective and an attempt to cut through what Karlen calls Prince's "kayfabe." In pro wrestling, kayfabe refers to the layer of invented reality that sits atop the actual truth, creating a fictional storyline around the actual bouts.
I reviewed This Thing Called Life for The Current.
July 15, 2022
Excellent book. While I was just a little too young to appreciate Prince in his prime, I am a fan. Neal, the author, does a superb job sharing the story of an icon while balancing his professional and personal relationship with Prince. I greatly enjoy books that allow you to be a fly on the wall for key moments and understand the subject’s motivation, journey and passions.
January 28, 2025
A fun book about Prince from a reporter who was friendly with him. Oddly, though, there's not really a lot about Prince's music but he comes across as an interesting, conflicted person.
January 18, 2021
Full of great personal insights but not very well written. Some devices and themes were strained and over-employed. Just had to scan and skip some of the discursive passages. Some jaw dropping revelations, though.
November 8, 2021
Somewhat of an oddity in the realm of Prince literature. Karlen, in some sense, knew Prince better than most. And in much of the writing, this is clear - his recollections ringing true. Yet, in huge swathes of other recollections, the recollections and quotes don't match up with anything we know (or think we know) about Prince at all, a claim that has led many in the fanbase to question Neal's accuracy.
This is an avenue that Neal explores himself in the book - Prince the bundle of contradictions, Prince the person that never let anyone get too close to knowing the truth. How much you believe in that is your own prerogative. An accurate assessment of their relationship? Or a hall pass for Neal to embellish? You decide.
The part that has hurt the fanbase most is the anecdote about Prince showing up at Neal's apartment following Neal having had surgery, only to grab the nearest bottle of pills and down a bunch of them. Whether it's true or not - and it certainly seems at odds with the level of privacy that Prince seemed to keep around any periods of potential pill abuse - it is something that perhaps should have been recollected with a bit more care, rather than the quite brazen way Neal tells the story here.
Overall, it's not an easy read - but one suspects by choice. Is it a must read? Probably not for anyone except those of us searching for the real truth of the greatest artist of all time. And that's something you'll never get from any one book. Rather, take everything with grain of salt, and you'll at least walk away from this read (and every other Prince book) with one or two things to ponder on. Maybe they'll get us closer to the truth and maybe not. And maybe, just maybe, that's exactly how Prince would have wanted it.
This is an avenue that Neal explores himself in the book - Prince the bundle of contradictions, Prince the person that never let anyone get too close to knowing the truth. How much you believe in that is your own prerogative. An accurate assessment of their relationship? Or a hall pass for Neal to embellish? You decide.
The part that has hurt the fanbase most is the anecdote about Prince showing up at Neal's apartment following Neal having had surgery, only to grab the nearest bottle of pills and down a bunch of them. Whether it's true or not - and it certainly seems at odds with the level of privacy that Prince seemed to keep around any periods of potential pill abuse - it is something that perhaps should have been recollected with a bit more care, rather than the quite brazen way Neal tells the story here.
Overall, it's not an easy read - but one suspects by choice. Is it a must read? Probably not for anyone except those of us searching for the real truth of the greatest artist of all time. And that's something you'll never get from any one book. Rather, take everything with grain of salt, and you'll at least walk away from this read (and every other Prince book) with one or two things to ponder on. Maybe they'll get us closer to the truth and maybe not. And maybe, just maybe, that's exactly how Prince would have wanted it.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
November 19, 2020
This was an impressive book about someone who has had many, many books written about him. Karlen has something unique to say, and very clearly knew Prince well, over a period of many years. There's no doubt that Karlen had his bones to pick (Prince's father, Minneapolis, Prince's haters), which sometimes got flogged. However, he had very insightful observations (and opinions) about the environment Prince was raised in, the influence of Minneapolis on Prince's development, and Prince's strive to build a character which he ultimately became. The events leading up to Prince's death were told in a sensitive and emotional way, and most of Karlen's stories were in good taste and came from a positive place.
That being said, Prince would be furious with Karlen using tape recorded clips of private conversations in the audiobook. But Prince isn't here. He's now an important historical figure, and so these tapes represent an important part of the historical record.
That being said, Prince would be furious with Karlen using tape recorded clips of private conversations in the audiobook. But Prince isn't here. He's now an important historical figure, and so these tapes represent an important part of the historical record.
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January 26, 2021I think mostly I'm just not jibing with this book in audio format — I might try to pick it up again one day in print, to see how I like reading it with my eyeballs instead of my ears. A solid 45 minutes into the audiobook, I've heard a lot more about the author than about Prince. It doesn't seem like a bad book, just one I'm not into for the moment.
December 3, 2020
Overall this book made me sad because I realized the effects of abuse, isolation, and loneliness that he suffered despite all of his fame. I chose the audiobook version and was pleased that there were some actual recordings of his voice sprinkled in. That helped to humanize this version of his life. That said, the organization of this book was all over the place. It seem to repeat things several times in different ways, so with the audiobook version I felt like I had accidentally moved back a chapter or two.
December 22, 2020
I'm really glad I did the audio book version of this because it includes taped conversations with Prince. I wonder about the author's writing ability and the editor's attention. So many parts were word for word repeats or re-explanations. I think we heard why Prince called things "sick" at least 15 times. And you only have to explain who Stanley Hudson on The office is once and that he was Prince's favorite character - it was repeated at least half a dozen times. Honestly, if I were not a Minnesotan raised in the 80s then I probably would have dropped this one halfway through.
August 24, 2021
An ode to the way this book is written: I liked it, except when I didn't. Not so much a biography of Prince, but more the story of the author's friendship and conversations. You come away not knowing much, if anything, about Prince. Which is maybe the point of the story, he was such a character he was unknown even unto himself at the end. But I wish he would have told his story more, the days on the rise, the marriages, the music. The good thing, I got days in of listening to Prince on repeat on spotify. And that was fun.
November 14, 2020
I desperately wanted to love this book. I just didn’t.
July 5, 2023
For over 30 years, I was a rabid Prince fan. It was a funky time, and what I knew about Prince was what everyone else knew: the wunderkind who came from an abusive home, and whose mother and sister were the muses of his most sordid songs and sexual repertoire. The royal badness who swayed the ladies and laid with the ladies, who were the most beautiful ones in the world. The multi-instrumental genus who blew the world away at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. A legend of all time, or was he just a legend of his own gimmick, which hid his true, authentic self?
Neal Karlen was Prince’s “acquaintance” for over 30 years, and even calling Prince that was reaching. Even so, Prince felt a kinship with the fellow Northsider from MPLS, and was the one journalist who Prince felt comfortable with going on and off the record to. In confiding in Prince, Karlen saw a man who was painfully human, yet so caught up in his own hype that he never allowed himself to BE human. Prince was the king of pain...Physically and emotionally. And “This thing called life” is a sad, painful read.
I enjoyed the read, despite some flaws. I do believe the book could have been edited some, and cut down by some pages. Despite being a convoluted read, there’s something about “This thing called life” that makes it the most honest, believable Prince book I’ve read (and I’ve read my share of them), hence four stars. One can see the parallels and contradictions of Prince, which resulted from Prince’s own need to recreate his “image,” at the expense of his humanity. He writes about him as Prince Nelson from North MPLS, because at the core of Prince’s being, he wasn’t a demigod: He was Prince Nelson from the Northside. Prince too saw Karlen as the real deal because he didn’t fall for the Prince Kayfabe, which was why he was so honest with him.
What Karlen leaves for us readers to think about is that Prince gave us way more than what us fans paid for, and it was a steep cost to his physical, mental, and emotional well-being. But then again, that too was part of the act. Sadly, the gimmick hid all the things that made Prince human, which is what ultimately killed him.
Note: some of the harshest reviewers here are Stan’s who believe that Prince was murdered by WB’s and the Illuminati. I know who they are. Never mind them
Neal Karlen was Prince’s “acquaintance” for over 30 years, and even calling Prince that was reaching. Even so, Prince felt a kinship with the fellow Northsider from MPLS, and was the one journalist who Prince felt comfortable with going on and off the record to. In confiding in Prince, Karlen saw a man who was painfully human, yet so caught up in his own hype that he never allowed himself to BE human. Prince was the king of pain...Physically and emotionally. And “This thing called life” is a sad, painful read.
I enjoyed the read, despite some flaws. I do believe the book could have been edited some, and cut down by some pages. Despite being a convoluted read, there’s something about “This thing called life” that makes it the most honest, believable Prince book I’ve read (and I’ve read my share of them), hence four stars. One can see the parallels and contradictions of Prince, which resulted from Prince’s own need to recreate his “image,” at the expense of his humanity. He writes about him as Prince Nelson from North MPLS, because at the core of Prince’s being, he wasn’t a demigod: He was Prince Nelson from the Northside. Prince too saw Karlen as the real deal because he didn’t fall for the Prince Kayfabe, which was why he was so honest with him.
What Karlen leaves for us readers to think about is that Prince gave us way more than what us fans paid for, and it was a steep cost to his physical, mental, and emotional well-being. But then again, that too was part of the act. Sadly, the gimmick hid all the things that made Prince human, which is what ultimately killed him.
Note: some of the harshest reviewers here are Stan’s who believe that Prince was murdered by WB’s and the Illuminati. I know who they are. Never mind them
July 6, 2023
For over 30 years, I was a rabid Prince fan. It was a funky time, and what I knew about Prince was what everyone else knew: the wunderkind who came from an abusive home, and whose mother and sister were the muses of his most sordid songs and sexual repertoire. The royal badness who swayed the ladies and laid with the ladies, who were the most beautiful ones in the world. The multi-instrumental genus who blew the world away at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. A legend of all time, or was he just a legend of his own gimmick, which hid his true, authentic self?
Neal Karlen was Prince’s “acquaintance” for over 30 years, and even calling Prince that was reaching. Even so, Prince felt a kinship with the fellow Northsider from MPLS, and was the one journalist who Prince felt comfortable with going on and off the record to. In confiding in Prince, Karlen saw a man who was painfully human, yet so caught up in his own hype that he never allowed himself to BE human. Prince was the king of pain...Physically and emotionally. And “This thing called life” is a sad, painful read.
I enjoyed the read, despite some flaws. I do believe the book could have been edited some, and cut down by some pages. Despite being a convoluted read, there’s something about “This thing called life” that makes it the most honest, believable Prince book I’ve read (and I’ve read my share of them), hence four stars. One can see the parallels and contradictions of Prince, which resulted from Prince’s own need to recreate his “image,” at the expense of his humanity. He writes about him as Prince Nelson from North MPLS, because at the core of Prince’s being, he wasn’t a demigod: He was Prince Nelson from the Northside. Prince too saw Karlen as the real deal because he didn’t fall for the Prince Kayfabe, which was why he was so honest with him.
What Karlen leaves for us readers to think about is that Prince gave us way more than what us fans paid for, and it was a steep cost to his physical, mental, and emotional well-being. But then again, that too was part of the act. Sadly, the gimmick hid all the things that made Prince human, which is what ultimately killed him.
Note: some of the harshest reviewers here are Stan’s who believe that Prince was murdered by WB’s and the Illuminati. I know who they are. Never mind them
Neal Karlen was Prince’s “acquaintance” for over 30 years, and even calling Prince that was reaching. Even so, Prince felt a kinship with the fellow Northsider from MPLS, and was the one journalist who Prince felt comfortable with going on and off the record to. In confiding in Prince, Karlen saw a man who was painfully human, yet so caught up in his own hype that he never allowed himself to BE human. Prince was the king of pain...Physically and emotionally. And “This thing called life” is a sad, painful read.
I enjoyed the read, despite some flaws. I do believe the book could have been edited some, and cut down by some pages. Despite being a convoluted read, there’s something about “This thing called life” that makes it the most honest, believable Prince book I’ve read (and I’ve read my share of them), hence four stars. One can see the parallels and contradictions of Prince, which resulted from Prince’s own need to recreate his “image,” at the expense of his humanity. He writes about him as Prince Nelson from North MPLS, because at the core of Prince’s being, he wasn’t a demigod: He was Prince Nelson from the Northside. Prince too saw Karlen as the real deal because he didn’t fall for the Prince Kayfabe, which was why he was so honest with him.
What Karlen leaves for us readers to think about is that Prince gave us way more than what us fans paid for, and it was a steep cost to his physical, mental, and emotional well-being. But then again, that too was part of the act. Sadly, the gimmick hid all the things that made Prince human, which is what ultimately killed him.
Note: some of the harshest reviewers here are Stan’s who believe that Prince was murdered by WB’s and the Illuminati. I know who they are. Never mind them
March 26, 2025
What a talent Prince was, practicing spinning basketballs to impress his coach as a player and writing 8 books ranging from vaudeville to baseball .... Oh, wait, I'm sorry, that all applies to author Neal Karlen, who spends nearly as much time talking about himself as he does his subject in this book. It's my main objection, and a rather big one, for what could've been otherwise a great book about Prince, the musical genius, especially the access that Karlen had in knowing him as a child before interviewing him several times from the 1980s until 3 weeks before his death. Karlen has some great insights about Prince I've never read anywhere else. Unfortunately, he too often situates himself within the story. By doing so, he makes what should've been a compelling 200 or so pages about the artist into a bloated 350-page document to peruse.
To his credit, Karlen has one of the strongest opening sentences I've ever read in a biography: "I pray to God Prince was dead by the time he hit the floor." He then explains that the one certainty he had about Prince was that the singer/songwriter/genius feared dying alone. From that point, he goes on to clear up many misconceptions, some purposefully put out by Prince as a joke on others, some occurring because the principals involved never talked about the stories until Karlen interviewed them. He still admits that he's not certain about some things Prince might or might not have done, including supposedly having a will that he dictated to Karlen in 1997 buried in a time capsule on his property that to this date has yet to be found. But the mystery has always been part of the allure about Prince, so I didn't feel disappointed by the lack of clarity in some parts of his story. Seems to fit Prince to a T to me, in fact.
This Thing Called Life is well researched and often well written, and Prince obsessives will probably rank it higher than the three stars I give it for that reason. Those less enthused by or familiar with the artist may in turn give it one less star than I do because of the way the information often veers away from the subject at hand so that Karlen can insert himself as part of the action. A pity, because with that element extracted from the book, This Thing Called Life would've been a real contender.
To his credit, Karlen has one of the strongest opening sentences I've ever read in a biography: "I pray to God Prince was dead by the time he hit the floor." He then explains that the one certainty he had about Prince was that the singer/songwriter/genius feared dying alone. From that point, he goes on to clear up many misconceptions, some purposefully put out by Prince as a joke on others, some occurring because the principals involved never talked about the stories until Karlen interviewed them. He still admits that he's not certain about some things Prince might or might not have done, including supposedly having a will that he dictated to Karlen in 1997 buried in a time capsule on his property that to this date has yet to be found. But the mystery has always been part of the allure about Prince, so I didn't feel disappointed by the lack of clarity in some parts of his story. Seems to fit Prince to a T to me, in fact.
This Thing Called Life is well researched and often well written, and Prince obsessives will probably rank it higher than the three stars I give it for that reason. Those less enthused by or familiar with the artist may in turn give it one less star than I do because of the way the information often veers away from the subject at hand so that Karlen can insert himself as part of the action. A pity, because with that element extracted from the book, This Thing Called Life would've been a real contender.
February 4, 2021
The book offered insight into the mind and life of Prince that one assumes is from the accurate personal experience of the author.
The author tries hard to describe key moments in Prince’s life and introduces analogies that explain Prince while weaving in his personal history and stories of their time together. I found several of those juxtapositions to be creative and thought provoking.
Unfortunately the author’s key points are frequently remade, and collectively I found the style to be frustrating as each repeated story or point is made with little to no additional insight. Perhaps that was the author’s device for confirming that Prince was truly an enigma and not even the author could adequately put his finger on him. The author also seems to look for closure in his relationship with Prince, pointing to missed opportunities and unsaid thoughts that gives the book a depressing tone.
In the end the book leaves you with a reasonable explanation of what made Prince the genius he was and follows the epic tale from success to failure but then a rebirth and ultimately his death. But it’s not gratifying because the reasonable explanation is speculative and the author’s writing undermines his effort to leave you confident in his speculation.
The author tries hard to describe key moments in Prince’s life and introduces analogies that explain Prince while weaving in his personal history and stories of their time together. I found several of those juxtapositions to be creative and thought provoking.
Unfortunately the author’s key points are frequently remade, and collectively I found the style to be frustrating as each repeated story or point is made with little to no additional insight. Perhaps that was the author’s device for confirming that Prince was truly an enigma and not even the author could adequately put his finger on him. The author also seems to look for closure in his relationship with Prince, pointing to missed opportunities and unsaid thoughts that gives the book a depressing tone.
In the end the book leaves you with a reasonable explanation of what made Prince the genius he was and follows the epic tale from success to failure but then a rebirth and ultimately his death. But it’s not gratifying because the reasonable explanation is speculative and the author’s writing undermines his effort to leave you confident in his speculation.
May 12, 2021
To really understand who Prince was and/or who he wanted to be, one book only provides insight by one person and their interactions with Prince during their brief time belonging to Princes “inner world” (although it is still unclear who if anyone was truly in Prince’s inner world. This is certainly true with Neal Karlen’s book, “This Thing Called Life.” This Thing Called Life is Karlens insights into Prince during his years of on and off contacts with Prince. Although it was redundant at times, I appreciated Karlens candid accounts of Prince and those around him. Prince was a musical genius who struggled with his upbringing and artistic expectations from himself and others. He was never satisfied. This Thing Called Life outlines Prince’s life filled with struggles, insecurities, confidence, successes and failures, and grief and pain.
There is a chapter that bashes Minneapolis and Minnesota. Although related to Prince, Karlen uses the chapter to outline all the people that were from Minnesota and became famous, and how they were ignored by Minnesota until they were dead…then they were enthusiastically embraced by the state of 10,000 lakes.
Overall, This Thing Called Life was worth reading, if you are interested in getting another perspective from a Prince connection.
There is a chapter that bashes Minneapolis and Minnesota. Although related to Prince, Karlen uses the chapter to outline all the people that were from Minnesota and became famous, and how they were ignored by Minnesota until they were dead…then they were enthusiastically embraced by the state of 10,000 lakes.
Overall, This Thing Called Life was worth reading, if you are interested in getting another perspective from a Prince connection.
November 30, 2022
NOTE: I DID NOT FINISH THIS BOOK. I got to the chapter titled Baller and had to quit.
I was very eager to learn about Prince, an artist I didn't know well but had heard so much about. Unfortunately, Neal Karlen has made this book almost as much about him as he has about Prince. I almost gave up at page 50, when Neal had yet failed to write anything that was distinctly about Prince, separate from Neal's feelings about his death. Multiple times I found myself asking "Didn't he just make this point two paragraphs ago? I get it, let's move on."
Then, there was a glimmer of hope as Prince' early life came under the lens, but when the chapter titled Baller came around, Karlen started to write about his own journey to the game of basketball, and at that point I knew I had to quit.
Neal, most people picking up this book just frankly don't care about your own personal associations with things that Prince liked. Next time, respect the people paying money for your work and don't make it about you; make it about the actual subject.
I was very eager to learn about Prince, an artist I didn't know well but had heard so much about. Unfortunately, Neal Karlen has made this book almost as much about him as he has about Prince. I almost gave up at page 50, when Neal had yet failed to write anything that was distinctly about Prince, separate from Neal's feelings about his death. Multiple times I found myself asking "Didn't he just make this point two paragraphs ago? I get it, let's move on."
Then, there was a glimmer of hope as Prince' early life came under the lens, but when the chapter titled Baller came around, Karlen started to write about his own journey to the game of basketball, and at that point I knew I had to quit.
Neal, most people picking up this book just frankly don't care about your own personal associations with things that Prince liked. Next time, respect the people paying money for your work and don't make it about you; make it about the actual subject.
November 22, 2023
3.5 stars. I listened to this book as an audiobook and was looking forward to hearing the touted recorded interviews with Prince, but they made up a pretty small part of the book and were not of great quality. I appreciated Karlen’s attempt to present the TRUTH about his relationship with Prince and about the enigmatic musician’s life. I learned some interesting things about Prince and enjoyed Karlen’s matter-of-fact style in writing about his interactions with Prince over many years.
What I didn’t like was the format of the book. It was written as a series of separate sections or essays that were often repetitive and not always compelling. Karlen obviously agonized over the premise that Prince was largely unknowable, but that premise was so overbearing that to me, the book felt like an endless introduction setting up that premise that never fully got going into the meat of Prince’s story. Still, I was interested enough to make it to the end and was glad I did.
What I didn’t like was the format of the book. It was written as a series of separate sections or essays that were often repetitive and not always compelling. Karlen obviously agonized over the premise that Prince was largely unknowable, but that premise was so overbearing that to me, the book felt like an endless introduction setting up that premise that never fully got going into the meat of Prince’s story. Still, I was interested enough to make it to the end and was glad I did.
December 1, 2024
Neal has a huge ego to write a book about himself, but to state it is about Prince. He repeats himself chapter after chapter. The book needed a huge edit, it could have been 50 pages. That was all that was interesting. Neal is one boring dude, who takes a lot of liberties in believing that he alone knew the true Prince. Very laughable. The audio from the interviews were difficult to listen to as they didn't sound to be remastered. It was difficult to hear Prince. This book started out strong, but quickly spinned out into repetition from an ok writer, who thinks he's better than he is. No one is picking up this book to hear about Neal's life, I have never heard of the dude before and honestly don't want to hear about him again. Save your money and don't give this person your money. I can't imagine Prince thinking of this person to be a friend. This dude is the reason Prince enjoyed messing with reporters.
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