Trauma survivors reveal how to live fantastic lives in this useful, if quote-heavy, guide.
This self-help book invites readers to transform their lives by embracing qualities like vulnerability, tenacity, and enthusiasm.
After his wife noticed him walking with a foot drop while vacationing with his family, Lycka, a cosmetic dermatologist, was diagnosed with Lou Gehrig’s disease and given six months to live. Unwilling to accept this diagnosis, he sought other opinions, only to find out it was actually chronic Lyme disease causing the foot problem. Similarly, former Vogue model Tinka survived her own trauma when she was brutally attacked by a former friend whom she had a restraining order against. Lycka and Tinka have come together to share 13 “golden pearls,” a metaphor for the lessons they learned through adversity. They remind readers that a pearl is created when a foreign body enters and irritates an oyster. Each chapter, named after one of these pearls, begins with a story related to that principle. For example, the chapter on inspiration begins with Lycka’s daughter learning to tie her shoelaces, followed by an explanation of the moral of the tale. The nonnegotiables chapter begins with a parable of a young man learning the secret of happiness from a wise man.
The guide consists of a dialogue between Lycka and Tinka, with playful banter. For instance, at one point, Lycka says: “Seeds are often best planted in the morning for the fruit that will grow later in the day.” Tinka calls the observation “a great vision.” Lycka replies: “Of course, I said it.” There is an appealing conversational tone throughout the volume. At one point, Lycka starts talking about his favorite movies, and in the chapter on laughter, he tells a joke. The way this work is written as a transcribed conversation between two trauma survivors certainly makes it unusual, but this format may not appeal to all readers. Still, the authors share some valuable advice here when they recommend that readers embrace vulnerability, exercise forgiveness, and keep a gratitude journal. But the authors’ approach to using epigraphs and quotes in the text becomes extremely heavy-handed. In the second chapter, there are six quotes in just five pages. An appendix compiles all of the quotes used in the text from people like Reese Witherspoon and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. as well as additional ones that the authors couldn’t fit in the dialogue. In some passages, Lycka and Tinka even quote themselves, which seems unnecessary in a work showcasing their own words. The volume would have benefitted from the authors being more judicious in their use of the quotes to support their themes. In addition, there are many intriguing books mentioned throughout the dialogue; it would have been helpful to include a further reading section at the end of the manual.
Trauma survivors reveal how to live fantastic lives in this useful, if quote-heavy, guide.Pub Date: May 11, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-989849-00-2
Page Count: 164
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: Aug. 21, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.
Greed, depravity, and serial murder in 1920s Oklahoma.
During that time, enrolled members of the Osage Indian nation were among the wealthiest people per capita in the world. The rich oil fields beneath their reservation brought millions of dollars into the tribe annually, distributed to tribal members holding "headrights" that could not be bought or sold but only inherited. This vast wealth attracted the attention of unscrupulous whites who found ways to divert it to themselves by marrying Osage women or by having Osage declared legally incompetent so the whites could fleece them through the administration of their estates. For some, however, these deceptive tactics were not enough, and a plague of violent death—by shooting, poison, orchestrated automobile accident, and bombing—began to decimate the Osage in what they came to call the "Reign of Terror." Corrupt and incompetent law enforcement and judicial systems ensured that the perpetrators were never found or punished until the young J. Edgar Hoover saw cracking these cases as a means of burnishing the reputation of the newly professionalized FBI. Bestselling New Yorkerstaff writer Grann (The Devil and Sherlock Holmes: Tales of Murder, Madness, and Obsession, 2010, etc.) follows Special Agent Tom White and his assistants as they track the killers of one extended Osage family through a closed local culture of greed, bigotry, and lies in pursuit of protection for the survivors and justice for the dead. But he doesn't stop there; relying almost entirely on primary and unpublished sources, the author goes on to expose a web of conspiracy and corruption that extended far wider than even the FBI ever suspected. This page-turner surges forward with the pacing of a true-crime thriller, elevated by Grann's crisp and evocative prose and enhanced by dozens of period photographs.
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.Pub Date: April 18, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-385-53424-6
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2017
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
Not so deep, but a delightful tip of the hat to the pleasures—and power—of glamour.
A coffee-table book celebrates Michelle Obama’s sense of fashion.
Illustrated with hundreds of full-color photographs, Obama’s chatty latest book begins with some school portraits from the author’s childhood in Chicago and fond memories of back-to-school shopping at Sears, then jumps into the intricacies of clothing oneself as the spouse of a presidential candidate and as the first lady. “People looked forward to the outfits, and once I got their attention, they listened to what I had to say. This is the soft power of fashion,” she says. Obama is grateful and frank about all the help she got along the way, and the volume includes a long section written by her primary wardrobe stylist, Koop—28 years old when she first took the job—and shorter sections by makeup artists and several hair stylists, who worked with wigs and hair extensions as Obama transitioned back to her natural hair, and grew out her bangs, at the end of her husband’s second term. Many of the designers of the author’s gowns, notably Jason Wu, who designed several of her more striking outfits, also contribute appreciative memories. Besides candid and more formal photographs, the volume features many sketches of her gowns by their designers, closeups on details of those gowns, and magazine covers from Better Homes & Gardens to Vogue. The author writes that as a Black woman, “I was under a particularly white-hot glare, constantly appraised for whether my outfits were ‘acceptable’ and ‘appropriate,’ the color of my skin somehow inviting even more judgment than the color of my dresses.” Overall, though, this is generally a canny, upbeat volume, with little in the way of surprising revelations.
Not so deep, but a delightful tip of the hat to the pleasures—and power—of glamour.Pub Date: Nov. 4, 2025
ISBN: 9780593800706
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 7, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2026
SEEN & HEARD
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