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TURNING

THE MAGIC AND MYSTERY OF MORE DAYS

An upbeat and gently challenging series of observations about growing older.

A personal, faith-oriented self-help book that offers a new way of looking at aging.

Reflecting on her own life as she approaches her 60th year, Blue, a retired nurse and author of Made With Words (2018), wonders what the future will bring: “Will I continue to be healthy?” she asks. “How much help will my children need? Should I start a new career?” As she takes readers through reminiscences about events from the late 1960s to the present, she reflects on changes in her life and how it’s been informed by her Christian faith. She recalls her grandparents, her childhood, and her years as a geriatric clinical nurse specialist, drawing lessons about aging from every stage, always accompanied by practical advice and insights: “If you’ve been sitting and reading awhile, it's time to turn your head, change positions, do some stretches, or stand up and walk a bit,” she writes in one representative passage. “My nursing language would state I need to balance activity vs. rest.” She also frequently talks about how her faith is a part of her daily life: “My daily challenge is to hear Christ’s voice and not my own.” Each chapter ends with a section of direct interaction with the reader, including discussion questions under the heading “Your Turn,” such as “Who are your role models for aging now? Make a list of your top five. Have they changed over the past ten years?” At every stage of her book, Blue effectively combines a funny, happy-go-lucky attitude toward the aging process with an energetic interrogation of what her readers think about getting old. At one point, she intriguingly asks, “What are you hungry for at the age of sixty or seventy?” which can apply both to actual food—her advice on daily matters, such as food indulgences or staying well-hydrated, run throughout the book—and deeper hungers to stay engaged and motivated in later years. Aging Christian readers will likely feel as if they’re reading the advice of an old friend.

An upbeat and gently challenging series of observations about growing older.

Pub Date: Oct. 31, 2022

ISBN: 978-1-63755-055-7

Page Count: 184

Publisher: Mascot Books

Review Posted Online: Sept. 28, 2022

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THINK YOU'LL BE HAPPY

MOVING THROUGH GRIEF WITH GRIT, GRACE, AND GRATITUDE

Some of Avant’s mantras are overstated, but her book is magnanimous, inspiring, and relentlessly optimistic.

Memories and life lessons inspired by the author’s mother, who was murdered in 2021.

“Neither my mother nor I knew that her last text to me would be the words ‘Think you’ll be happy,’ ” Avant writes, "but it is fitting that she left me with a mantra for resiliency.” The author, a filmmaker and former U.S. Ambassador to the Bahamas, begins her first book on the night she learned her mother, Jacqueline Avant, had been fatally shot during a home invasion. “One of my first thoughts,” she writes, “was, ‘Oh God, please don’t let me hate this man. Give me the strength not to hate him.’ ” Daughter of Clarence Avant, known as the “Black Godfather” due to his work as a pioneering music executive, the author describes growing up “in a house that had a revolving door of famous people,” from Ella Fitzgerald to Muhammad Ali. “I don’t take for granted anything I have achieved in my life as a Black American woman,” writes Avant. “And I recognize my unique upbringing…..I was taught to honor our past and pay forward our fruits.” The book, which is occasionally repetitive, includes tributes to her mother from figures like Oprah Winfrey and Bill Clinton, but the narrative core is the author’s direct, faith-based, unwaveringly positive messages to readers—e.g., “I don’t want to carry the sadness and anger I have toward the man who did this to my mother…so I’m worshiping God amid the worst storm imaginable”; "Success and feeling good are contagious. I’m all about positive contagious vibrations!” Avant frequently quotes Bible verses, and the bulk of the text reflects the spirit of her daily prayer “that everything is in divine order.” Imploring readers to practice proactive behavior, she writes, “We have to always find the blessing, to be the blessing.”

Some of Avant’s mantras are overstated, but her book is magnanimous, inspiring, and relentlessly optimistic.

Pub Date: Oct. 17, 2023

ISBN: 9780063304413

Page Count: 288

Publisher: HarperOne

Review Posted Online: Aug. 17, 2023

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2023

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ON FREEDOM

An incisive, urgently relevant analysis of—and call to action on—America’s foundational ideal.

An examination of how the U.S. can revitalize its commitment to freedom.

In this ambitious study, Snyder, author of On Tyranny, The Road to Unfreedom, and other books, explores how American freedom might be reconceived not simply in negative terms—as freedom from coercion, especially by the state—but positive ones: the freedom to develop our human potential within sustaining communal structures. The author blends extensive personal reflections on his own evolving understanding of liberty with definitions of the concept by a range of philosophers, historians, politicians, and social activists. Americans, he explains, often wrongly assume that freedom simply means the removal of some barrier: “An individual is free, we think, when the government is out of the way. Negative freedom is our common sense.” In his careful and impassioned description of the profound implications of this conceptual limitation, Snyder provides a compelling account of the circumstances necessary for the realization of positive freedom, along with a set of detailed recommendations for specific sociopolitical reforms and policy initiatives. “We have to see freedom as positive, as beginning from virtues, as shared among people, and as built into institutions,” he writes. The author argues that it’s absurd to think of government as the enemy of freedom; instead, we ought to reimagine how a strong government might focus on creating the appropriate conditions for human flourishing and genuine liberty. Another essential and overlooked element of freedom is the fostering of a culture of solidarity, in which an awareness of and concern for the disadvantaged becomes a guiding virtue. Particularly striking and persuasive are the sections devoted to eviscerating the false promises of libertarianism, exposing the brutal injustices of the nation’s penitentiaries, and documenting the wide-ranging pathologies that flow from a tax system favoring the ultrawealthy.

An incisive, urgently relevant analysis of—and call to action on—America’s foundational ideal.

Pub Date: Sept. 17, 2024

ISBN: 9780593728727

Page Count: 368

Publisher: Crown

Review Posted Online: June 25, 2024

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2024

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