A fascinating New Age guide to “sleep divorce” that may be too metaphysical for some readers.
A self-help guide that blends neuroscience, mysticism, and psychology to argue that sleeping alone is the key to well-being for women.
A self-described “ceremonialist,” Zak believes that sleep is a “spiritual practice” that fine-tunes intuition, harmonizes corporeal vibrations, and recalibrates women in body, mind, and spirit. In this book, she offers readers 64 sleep rituals, from “nocturnal feng shui” to “memento mori” to facilitate lucid dreaming, physical restoration, emotional clarity, and spiritual awakening. These small, soothing ceremonies combine mantras, breathwork, mindfulness, and visualization. For example, in a ritual the author calls “conquering the bed,” readers are advised to center themselves on their bed and “lie down as if your body were a four-pointed star with a glowing, beating center.” Then, they imagine themselves as a shining diamond and breathe diaphragmatically until they enter a “state of relaxation and creativity.” Throughout the book, Zak challenges societal norms around sleeping and steers women toward intuitive sleep practices. She also incorporates historical and cultural perspectives to illustrate how sleep habits have changed: from ancient times when “everyone slept together in a jumble,” to the Industrial Revolution’s role in shared marital beds, to modern-day arrangements in which over 60% of millennial and Gen-Z couples sleep separately (according to the National Sleep Foundation). Zak makes a persuasive case for sleeping alone as a radical act. She supports her thesis with both science (e.g., with an in-depth discussion of the five stages of sleep) and metaphysical concepts, like the three energy centers of the Chinese energy practice qigong. Zak’s bedtime rituals are simple and actionable, allowing readers to potentially experience more satisfying sleep with minimal effort. Her tone is warm and invitational in lines like, “This is a sacred space, yours alone; it is a haven where you don’t need to explain anything or justify yourself in any way.” However, claims like “Women who sleep alone are more intelligent and more independent” are not evidence-backed.
A fascinating New Age guide to “sleep divorce” that may be too metaphysical for some readers.Pub Date: Nov. 4, 2025
ISBN: 9798888501863
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Destiny Books
Review Posted Online: July 22, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
The lessons to draw are obvious: Smoke more dope, eat less meat. Like-minded readers will dig it.
The chef, rapper, and TV host serves up a blustery memoir with lashings of self-help.
“I’ve always had a sick confidence,” writes Bronson, ne Ariyan Arslani. The confidence, he adds, comes from numerous sources: being a New Yorker, and more specifically a New Yorker from Queens; being “short and fucking husky” and still game for a standoff on the basketball court; having strength, stamina, and seemingly no fear. All these things serve him well in the rough-and-tumble youth he describes, all stickball and steroids. Yet another confidence-builder: In the big city, you’ve got to sink or swim. “No one is just accepted—you have to fucking show that you’re able to roll,” he writes. In a narrative steeped in language that would make Lenny Bruce blush, Bronson recounts his sentimental education, schooled by immigrant Italian and Albanian family members and the mean streets, building habits good and bad. The virtue of those habits will depend on your take on modern mores. Bronson writes, for example, of “getting my dick pierced” down in the West Village, then grabbing a pizza and smoking weed. “I always smoke weed freely, always have and always will,” he writes. “I’ll just light a blunt anywhere.” Though he’s gone through the classic experiences of the latter-day stoner, flunking out and getting arrested numerous times, Bronson is a hard charger who’s not afraid to face nearly any challenge—especially, given his physique and genes, the necessity of losing weight: “If you’re husky, you’re always dieting in your mind,” he writes. Though vulgar and boastful, Bronson serves up a model that has plenty of good points, including his growing interest in nature, creativity, and the desire to “leave a legacy for everybody.”
The lessons to draw are obvious: Smoke more dope, eat less meat. Like-minded readers will dig it.Pub Date: April 20, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-4197-4478-5
Page Count: 184
Publisher: Abrams
Review Posted Online: May 5, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2021
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