A guidebook to help new members navigate the potential pitfalls of recovery in Alcoholics Anonymous.
Written by two former alcoholics who found sobriety through the program, this slim volume offers both encouragement and caution to those seeking out AA for the first time. After an introductory section that succinctly explains the basics of AA meetings, the authors introduce the system of sponsorship, wherein an established member will take a new member under his or her wing. The cautionary scenarios in the chapters that follow—from the story of “The Abusive Sponsor” to the hyper-friendly control freak in “You Need a Sponsor, Not a Micro-Manager”—are pithy tales from the authors’ personal experiences. In disarmingly candid prose, the next section looks at interpersonal relationships through the AA prism, while offering portraits of the users, freeloaders and seducers the authors have seen prey on fellow members. A subsequent section, which describes professional criminals who target recovering alcoholics, catalogues additional perils. These nightmare scenarios start out offering useful guidance but, as the work goes on, the hopeful balance of the early chapters is lost; this rogues’ gallery of lowlifes could potentially deter some readers. Thankfully, the later portions of the book change focus, with the authors taking AA to task for its cultlike secretiveness, as well as its idolization of cofounder Bill W., who was “no saint” and whose “sexual adventures are a continuing, unwritten AA tradition” often called “13 stepping.” A final section ends on a note of compassion and hope, addressing the role of God in the AA universe. As a guidebook full of practical warnings and suggestions for how the organization can grow and evolve, this work straddles a fine line: new members will be encouraged by the opening and closing sections, but the detailed exploitation of newly recovering alcoholics may be discouraging.
Pub Date: Sept. 20, 2011
ISBN: 978-0615541549
Page Count: 118
Publisher: M&MBLove
Review Posted Online: March 14, 2012
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...
Talk-show queen takes tumble as millions jeer.
Nora Bridges is a wildly popular radio spokesperson for family-first virtues, but her loyal listeners don't know that she walked out on her husband and teenaged daughters years ago and didn't look back. Now that a former lover has sold racy pix of naked Nora and horny himself to a national tabloid, her estranged daughter Ruby, an unsuccessful stand-up comic in Los Angeles, has been approached to pen a tell-all. Greedy for the fat fee she's been promised, Ruby agrees and heads for the San Juan Islands, eager to get reacquainted with the mom she plans to betray. Once in the family homestead, nasty Ruby alternately sulks and glares at her mother, who is temporarily wheelchair-bound as a result of a post-scandal car crash. Uncaring, Ruby begins writing her side of the story when she's not strolling on the beach with former sweetheart Dean Sloan, the son of wealthy socialites who basically ignored him and his gay brother Eric. Eric, now dying of cancer and also in a wheelchair, has returned to the island. This dismal threesome catch up on old times, recalling their childhood idylls on the island. After Ruby's perfect big sister Caroline shows up, there's another round of heartfelt talk. Nora gradually reveals the truth about her unloving husband and her late father's alcoholism, which led her to seek the approval of others at the cost of her own peace of mind. And so on. Ruby is aghast to discover that she doesn't know everything after all, but Dean offers her subdued comfort. Happy endings await almost everyone—except for readers of this nobly preachy snifflefest.
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with syrupy platitudes about life and love.Pub Date: March 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-609-60737-5
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2001
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