A creative depiction of dealing with trauma that may be too abstract for some readers.
A clinical psychologist explores trauma through an illustrated allegory in this book from Lim.
“For some, home is a refuge. For others, it’s a maze of locked doors and broken windows. A place where we spend a lifetime trying to leave,” Lim’s prologue states. With these words in mind, readers soon meet Isabel, a young woman who returns to an ominous, symbolic house haunted by a critical mother, a distant father, and oppressive cultural influences. Inside the home, Isabel encounters Crane, who helps her unpack what’s behind her perfectionism. Isabel then converses with an ox carrying heavy chains and stones inscribed with words like “duty,” “humility,” and “legacy,” representing the expectations passed down through her family. Isabel then descends into the basement, where she confronts Wolf—the embodiment of her anger—and learns that it has been trying to protect her from pain all along. Eventually Isabel gets to Rabbit, who represents her fear, and they discuss how to embrace her vulnerability. Isabel and all the creatures ascend to the rooftop garden, where they encounter the Celestial Whale, who reminds Isabel that “your healing reaches farther than you see.” Ultimately, Isabel successfully integrates the many facets of her identity, emotions, and history, recognizing that “everything held its place. Everything belonged.” Lim concludes the book with brief reflections on the existential weight we carry, the inheritance of pain, and becoming whole. The author elegantly combines allegory, therapeutic insight, and cultural reflection, while Joel Timpson’s atmospheric illustrations mirror the book’s emotional landscapes and complement the story’s symbolism. Lim makes understanding trauma accessible, and her narrative also authentically conveys the weight of cultural expectations, like how Isabel’s name, Meilin, was akin to “a family heirloom passed down like an old jade pendant: precious, but heavier than it looked.” However, readers seeking a practical guide to trauma recovery may find the book’s symbolism challenging to interpret and apply to their own lives.
A creative depiction of dealing with trauma that may be too abstract for some readers.Pub Date: Jan. 13, 2026
ISBN: 9781761452871
Page Count: 104
Publisher: Hardie Grant Books
Review Posted Online: Oct. 19, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
It’s not Shakespeare, not by a long shot. But at least it’s not James Franco.
A noted actor turns to verse: “Poems are a Saturday in the middle of the week.”
McConaughey, author of the gracefully written memoir Greenlights, has been writing poems since his teens, closing with one “written in an Australian bathtub” that reads just as a poem by an 18-year-old (Rimbaud excepted) should read: “Ignorant minds of the fortunate man / Blind of the fate shaping every land.” McConaughey is fearless in his commitment to the rhyme, no matter how slight the result (“Oops, took a quick peek at the sky before I got my glasses, / now I can’t see shit, sure hope this passes”). And, sad to say, the slight is what is most on display throughout, punctuated by some odd koanlike aperçus: “Eating all we can / at the all-we-can-eat buffet, / gives us a 3.8 education / and a 4.2 GPA.” “Never give up your right to do the next right thing. This is how we find our way home.” “Memory never forgets. Even though we do.” The prayer portion of the program is deeply felt, but it’s just as sentimental; only when he writes of life-changing events—a court appearance to file a restraining order against a stalker, his decision to quit smoking weed—do we catch a glimpse of the effortlessly fluent, effortlessly charming McConaughey as exemplified by the David Wooderson (“alright, alright, alright”) of Dazed and Confused. The rest is mostly a soufflé in verse. McConaughey’s heart is very clearly in the right place, but on the whole the book suggests an old saw: Don’t give up your day job.
It’s not Shakespeare, not by a long shot. But at least it’s not James Franco.Pub Date: Sept. 16, 2025
ISBN: 9781984862105
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Aug. 15, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
A conversational, pleasurable look into McConaughey’s life and thought.
All right, all right, all right: The affable, laconic actor delivers a combination of memoir and self-help book.
“This is an approach book,” writes McConaughey, adding that it contains “philosophies that can be objectively understood, and if you choose, subjectively adopted, by either changing your reality, or changing how you see it. This is a playbook, based on adventures in my life.” Some of those philosophies come in the form of apothegms: “When you can design your own weather, blow in the breeze”; “Simplify, focus, conserve to liberate.” Others come in the form of sometimes rambling stories that never take the shortest route from point A to point B, as when he recounts a dream-spurred, challenging visit to the Malian musician Ali Farka Touré, who offered a significant lesson in how disagreement can be expressed politely and without rancor. Fans of McConaughey will enjoy his memories—which line up squarely with other accounts in Melissa Maerz’s recent oral history, Alright, Alright, Alright—of his debut in Richard Linklater’s Dazed and Confused, to which he contributed not just that signature phrase, but also a kind of too-cool-for-school hipness that dissolves a bit upon realizing that he’s an older guy on the prowl for teenage girls. McConaughey’s prep to settle into the role of Wooderson involved inhabiting the mind of a dude who digs cars, rock ’n’ roll, and “chicks,” and he ran with it, reminding readers that the film originally had only three scripted scenes for his character. The lesson: “Do one thing well, then another. Once, then once more.” It’s clear that the author is a thoughtful man, even an intellectual of sorts, though without the earnestness of Ethan Hawke or James Franco. Though some of the sentiments are greeting card–ish, this book is entertaining and full of good lessons.
A conversational, pleasurable look into McConaughey’s life and thought.Pub Date: Oct. 20, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-593-13913-4
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Oct. 27, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
