A useful manual that encourages women to create powerful and personal childbirth experiences.
A guide focuses on labor pain strategies.
According to Goer, many women assume, based on personal conversations and popular advice books, that labor pain must be managed with powerful medications—often found in the form of an epidural. During this procedure, anesthesia is injected into the body between the spinal vertebrae of the lower back. Though it may not always be the best approach to managing pain, this common procedure is often prioritized by a medical establishment that emphasizes predictability over personal needs, the author argues. While Goer acknowledges that an epidural can be beneficial, she contends that this strategy has many disadvantages, including increasing the cost of childbirth, delaying labor, impairing breastfeeding, and posing risks to the health of the child and mother. Instead of encouraging women to accept an epidural as the only choice, the author offers some thorough research to steer them on a path to self-advocacy regarding their childbirth experiences. From opioids and nitrous oxide to nonmedicinal strategies, such as warm water immersion, she carefully evaluates the pros and cons of various pain management approaches, revealing a spectrum of options that many women may be unaware of. While the research presented in this helpful guide is balanced, it is important to note that the author—now a seasoned obstetric researcher—is a former Lamaze teacher and doula who backs alternatives to an epidural, recommending the procedure only if it’s truly beneficial. Citing her own medicated labor experience, which left her feeling disempowered and disconnected, Goer conveys a deeply personal motivation for her advocacy. Along the way, the author challenges common beliefs that labor pain is inherently negative and that it is unmanageable for most women (“I believe that working with labor pain using non-drug strategies alone can have its rewards”). Arguing that labor sensations play a vital role in a woman’s understanding of her body, Goer seeks to connect individuals to this experience, creating memorable and meaningful childbirth journeys for mothers of all backgrounds.
A useful manual that encourages women to create powerful and personal childbirth experiences.Pub Date: Aug. 29, 2022
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 157
Publisher: S Press
Review Posted Online: Sept. 13, 2022
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
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
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