Life’s Too Short: A Memoir

Hootie and the Blowfish singer Rucker reflects on his professional success and pays tribute to the music that shaped him in this run-of-the-mill autobiography. Rucker grew up in Charleston, S.C., and fell in love early with his single mother’s favorite musicians—especially Al Green—who soundtracked the family’s evenings and weekends. By the time Rucker was in elementary school, he was determined to become a singer; in 1986, he formed Hootie and the Blowfish with friends he met at the University of South Carolina. (The band’s name was inspired by two of the group’s nonmusician friends: one with owlish glasses, another with bulging cheeks “like the jazz trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie.”) After exhausting the Southern college circuit, the band broke through with a 1994 performance on The Late Show with David Letterman. As Rucker catalogs the group’s late-’90s success and his mellower career as a solo country artist after the band broke up in 2011, he speaks candidly about his former cocaine use, his confrontations with racist concertgoers and industry professionals, and his anxieties about fatherhood. Nothing in the account feels revelatory, but it’s a solid enough glimpse at rock stardom. This is best suited for Rucker’s most committed fans. Agent: Anthony Mattero, CAA. (May)