by Gary Small and Gigi Vorgan ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 1, 2010
A highly personal but generally fascinating memoir spanning more than 30 years.
Psychiatrist Small (co-author: iBrain: Surviving the Technological Alteration of the Modern Mind, 2009, etc.), director of the Memory and Aging Research Center at UCLA, tells the stories of his most intriguing cases.
The book, co-authored with his wife, Vorgan, begins in 1979, when as an insecure trainee in a Boston psychiatric clinic, Small attempted to help one of his first clients, an apparently neurotic housewife suffering from anxiety attacks. Not only was his diagnosis “off the mark”—she turned out to be a potentially dangerous, borderline psychotic—but he was misdirected by his “clueless” supervisor. This was his first lesson in learning to trust his own instincts and look beyond the obvious. Just months later, the naked lady of the title, who appeared to be psychotic, turned out to be a diabetic young actress suffering from an “amnesia-driven delirious state” induced by low brain sugar. The author’s instant cure, a cup of orange juice, was followed by therapy to help her with lifestyle changes. A year later, an apparent incident of mass hysteria at a Boston school—students started fainting, “dropping like flies”—piqued his curiosity, and he volunteered to join a health-department investigative team. This led him to combine his clinical practice with ongoing research projects. Over the years, Small has studied mass hysteria, psychosomatic diseases, brain scanning and geriatric dementia, and he has pioneered in the development of brain-imaging technology to identify Alzheimer’s disease. As a practicing psychiatrist with a specialty in geriatrics, the author’s cases cover a wide terrain—e.g., a young man who developed hysterical blindness when he attempted to confront his father, a patient who shifted from a food disorder to becoming a shopaholic to an addiction to multiple psychotherapists—and Small writes with empathy and humor about the complexity of human relationships, reflecting on his lifelong struggle to help his clients gain insight and surmount their problems.
A highly personal but generally fascinating memoir spanning more than 30 years.Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-06-180378-9
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Morrow/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: June 25, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2010
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by Gary Small & Gigi Vorgan
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by Gary Small and Gigi Vorgan
by E.T.A. Hoffmann ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 28, 1996
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
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by E.T.A. Hoffmann ; adapted by Natalie Andrewson ; illustrated by Natalie Andrewson
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by E.T.A. Hoffmann & illustrated by Julie Paschkis
by Ludwig Bemelmans ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 23, 1955
An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955
ISBN: 0670717797
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955
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developed by Ludwig Bemelmans ; illustrated by Steven Salerno
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by Ludwig Bemelmans ; illustrated by Steven Salerno
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