A Hand to Guide Me—Inspiring, Intimate Stories: 70 Top Personalities Honor Their Mentors

We all get where we're going with a push from someone who cares, says acclaimed actor Washington. A national spokesperson for Boys and Girls Clubs of America, he tells how he found his own mentor in the Mount Vernon, N.Y., Boys Club and celebrates the organization's 100th anniversary with this collection of 70 celebrities' accounts of how as youngsters they were guided by a caring adult. Among the contributors are actors, athletes, authors, artists and former presidents. Retired basketball coach John Wooden remembers his hardworking father, a farmer, making the time every night to read poetry and Scripture to his children. Gloria Steinem describes how she saw a commitment to women's rights in the novels of Louisa May Alcott. Whoopi Goldberg credits her mother with teaching her empathy the day she abandoned her best friend to hang out with the popular kids. Bill Clinton was influenced by a great-uncle, an undereducated man who not only taught him to value people's differences but to refrain from making judgments. Washington has produced an anthology that will inspire successful men and women to help and empower the next generation. B&w photos. (Nov.)