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
The Stoics did much better with the much shorter Enchiridion.
A follow-on to the author’s garbled but popular 48 Laws of Power, promising that readers will learn how to win friends and influence people, to say nothing of outfoxing all those “toxic types” out in the world.
Greene (Mastery, 2012, etc.) begins with a big sell, averring that his book “is designed to immerse you in all aspects of human behavior and illuminate its root causes.” To gauge by this fat compendium, human behavior is mostly rotten, a presumption that fits with the author’s neo-Machiavellian program of self-validation and eventual strategic supremacy. The author works to formula: First, state a “law,” such as “confront your dark side” or “know your limits,” the latter of which seems pale compared to the Delphic oracle’s “nothing in excess.” Next, elaborate on that law with what might seem to be as plain as day: “Losing contact with reality, we make irrational decisions. That is why our success often does not last.” One imagines there might be other reasons for the evanescence of glory, but there you go. Finally, spin out a long tutelary yarn, seemingly the longer the better, to shore up the truism—in this case, the cometary rise and fall of one-time Disney CEO Michael Eisner, with the warning, “his fate could easily be yours, albeit most likely on a smaller scale,” which ranks right up there with the fortuneteller’s “I sense that someone you know has died" in orders of probability. It’s enough to inspire a new law: Beware of those who spend too much time telling you what you already know, even when it’s dressed up in fresh-sounding terms. “Continually mix the visceral with the analytic” is the language of a consultant’s report, more important-sounding than “go with your gut but use your head, too.”
The Stoics did much better with the much shorter Enchiridion.Pub Date: Oct. 23, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-525-42814-5
Page Count: 580
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: July 30, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2018
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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