Snoop Dogg w/ Davin Seay: Tha Doggfather: The Times, Trials, And Hardcore Truths Of Snoop Dogg

At 28, Snoop Dogg has been through enough drama (crack dealing, jail time, superstardom, the dissolution of Death Row Records, the death of friend Tupac Shakur) for several lifetimes. But it often takes more than an interesting life story to make an engaging autobiography. Often, what sets apart a great autobiography from a merely competent one is authorial voice—the ability to recount life's trials and tribulations with authority, conviction, and a strong sense of personality. That voice is missing from Tha Doggfather, Snoop Dogg's chintzy (229 pages, with plenty of photos), unremarkable, ghost-written autobiography. Simultaneously full of embarrassing details—it's difficult to think of anyone other than Snoop Dogg who'd be willing to divulge his predilection for the occasional fling with an ever-obliging crack whore—and unrevealing, Tha Doggfather is frustratingly generic overall. It doesn't help that its subject possesses an irritating self-righteous streak that runs contrary to just about everything the rapper has ever done. If, as Dogg asserts several times, his goal in life is to educate, uplift, and enlighten, he's done a poor job of it, particularly with this book. Maddeningly unrevealing about the details of his Death Row days and his relationship with Suge Knight (whom he chides vaguely for unspecified rough business practices), and vague throughout, Tha Doggfather closes by compacting the last four or five years into five unrevealing pages. But almost no period of Dogg's life is covered here with anything resembling depth. For a better and ballsier account of his Death Row days, read Ronin Ro's excellent Have Gun Will Travel, which says more about the rise of West Coast gangsta rap in one chapter than you'll find in this entire book, while containing far fewer shout-outs to Snoop Dogg's main homey God.