Inspiring, infectious, and at times exhilarating; especially uplifting for anyone tormented by self-doubt.
A punchy, motivational exhortation to think deeply about life.
Wise, a trainer/coach who hosted an online radio show, says his goal for this debut is “to infuse success principles with neuroscience in an easy to understand conversation.” For the most part, he succeeds. Much of the material falls into the power-of-positive-thinking genre; the book boils down to the notion that one can accomplish almost anything with the right mindset. While this is a familiar self-improvement theme, the content is well packaged. There are 21 short chapters; each addresses a particular situation and concludes with specific action steps. This structure allows readers to isolate small, definable areas and resolve them individually rather than feel bulldozed by multifaceted problems that demand complex solutions. There is a great deal of flexibility; chapters stand alone and can be read in any order. The topics are intriguing; “You Have Been Misdiagnosed,” for example, notes how others’ perceptions can skew one’s judgment of oneself. The effect becomes clear in the questions the author asks: “Is there a decision that you made that was not truly what you wanted to do? Was that decision based on what someone else thought you should be doing or would be good at doing?” Some of Wise’s salient observations are eye-opening; e.g.: “When your beliefs are limiting beliefs, you will fight just as hard for them,” and “If you are only doing enough to get what you think you can have, you will never get what you actually want.” The writing style here is engaging and intimate. Wise’s voice is consultative yet friendly; his prose is constructed in “me-to-you” fashion, making it personal and nonthreatening, and he uses examples taken from his own life experience to drive home his points. He is relentlessly positive and encouraging yet has the ability to tell it like it is.
Inspiring, infectious, and at times exhilarating; especially uplifting for anyone tormented by self-doubt.Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-73262-590-7
Page Count: 176
Publisher: WiseDecisions
Review Posted Online: July 8, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.
The legendary booze-addled metal rocker turned reality-TV star comes clean in his tell-all autobiography.
Although brought up in the bleak British factory town of Aston, John “Ozzy” Osbourne’s tragicomic rags-to-riches tale is somehow quintessentially American. It’s an epic dream/nightmare that takes him from Winson Green prison in 1966 to a presidential dinner with George W. Bush in 2004. Tracing his adult life from petty thief and slaughterhouse worker to rock star, Osbourne’s first-person slang-and-expletive-driven style comes off like he’s casually relating his story while knocking back pints at the pub. “What you read here,” he writes, “is what dribbled out of the jelly I call my brain when I asked it for my life story.” During the late 1960s his transformation from inept shoplifter to notorious Black Sabbath frontman was unlikely enough. In fact, the band got its first paying gigs by waiting outside concert venues hoping the regularly scheduled act wouldn’t show. After a few years, Osbourne and his bandmates were touring America and becoming millionaires from their riff-heavy doom music. As expected, with success came personal excess and inevitable alienation from the other members of the group. But as a solo performer, Osbourne’s predilection for guns, drink, drugs, near-death experiences, cruelty to animals and relieving himself in public soon became the stuff of legend. His most infamous exploits—biting the head off a bat and accidentally urinating on the Alamo—are addressed, but they seem tame compared to other dark moments of his checkered past: nearly killing his wife Sharon during an alcohol-induced blackout, waking up after a bender in the middle of a busy highway, burning down his backyard, etc. Osbourne is confessional to a fault, jeopardizing his demonic-rocker reputation with glib remarks about his love for Paul McCartney and Robin Williams. The most distinguishing feature of the book is the staggering chapter-by-chapter accumulation of drunken mishaps, bodily dysfunctions and drug-induced mayhem over a 40-plus-year career—a résumé of anti-social atrocities comparable to any of rock ’n’ roll’s most reckless outlaws.
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.Pub Date: Jan. 25, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-446-56989-7
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2009
IN THE NEWS
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
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