Who is Jose Carreras

Jose Carreras could be talking about himself when he observes here that "tenors . . . are not very interesting." In a disappointingly slight autobiography, the 42-year-old Catalan divo proves guarded in revealing information about his private life, reticent about relating theater gossip, tediously preachy with strictures on his craft (he deplores avant-garde opera staging, for example).

Yet, without overtly exploiting readers' emotions, Carreras won't leave an eye dry as he recalls the ordeal of the bone marrow transplant that hospitalized him at the famed Hutchinson Cancer Research Institute in Seattle for 119 days in 1988. But that wretched experience alone does not add sufficient substance to carry this unsubstantial book.

Jose Carreras is the third of today's trio of famous operatic tenors and friends (the others being Luciano Pavarotti and Placido Domingo) to write an autobiography. Tremendous worldwide interest followed the announcement of his sudden, life-threatening bout with leukemia in 1987 that forced him to withdraw from singing for a year.

Carreras's account of this and subsequent events, from a successful bone marrow transplant in Seattle to triumphant post-recovery recitals in Barcelona and Vienna, is compelling. The elements of great talent, fame, tragedy, and miraculous recovery, combined with the author's zest for life, should earn Carreras the author a new audience, while renewing interest in his many fine recordings. This is the first book on Carreras available in English. - James E. Ross