A book that may appeal to readers who already believe in the power of ESP, but one that won’t convince skeptics.
Silva, with co-author Bernd, presents a guidebook aimed at readers who hope to successfully practice extra-sensory perception.
The author, who teaches branded Silva UltraMind ESP Systems courses, notes that this guidebook is intended to teach all levels of students how to develop their psychic ability. Silva states a belief that all people have untapped psychic faculties, but that 90% of the population only uses the physical senses impressed on the left side of the brain. The psychic senses of the brain’s right hemisphere, he says, can be used to access information in other people’s neurons. Developing this skill, he asserts, will expand one’s consciousness and lead to personal success. The book contains practical training with exercises intended to allow one to mentally project oneself into various objects, including metals, plant life, and animal life. Students are urged to listen to these exercises—as read by another person aloud, or on a recording—to reach the “alpha brain wave,” or prime state for ESP activities. Most intriguing is Silva’s “Laws of Programming,” a moral code for users of ESP, which include the golden rule and a promise to make the world a better place, among other laws. Although the author writes that very few scientists study ESP, the lack of scientific backing in this book may sow doubt among readers who might otherwise be curious about ESP. The entirety of proof for the efficacy of such perception is offered in anecdotes from the author’s former students, all of which are success stories, which results in an imbalanced discussion. Silva’s method also combines aspects of spirituality with ESP, which may alienate some newcomers as well. Finally, the subsections within chapters are short and sequenced in a haphazard fashion.
A book that may appeal to readers who already believe in the power of ESP, but one that won’t convince skeptics.Pub Date: Jan. 22, 2026
ISBN: 9781965725283
Page Count: 350
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: March 23, 2026
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.
The veteran actor, comedian, and banjo player teams up with the acclaimed illustrator to create a unique book of cartoons that communicates their personalities.
Martin, also a prolific author, has always been intrigued by the cartoons strewn throughout the pages of the New Yorker. So when he was presented with the opportunity to work with Bliss, who has been a staff cartoonist at the magazine since 1997, he seized the moment. “The idea of a one-panel image with or without a caption mystified me,” he writes. “I felt like, yeah, sometimes I’m funny, but there are these other weird freaks who are actually funny.” Once the duo agreed to work together, they established their creative process, which consisted of working forward and backward: “Forwards was me conceiving of several cartoon images and captions, and Harry would select his favorites; backwards was Harry sending me sketched or fully drawn cartoons for dialogue or banners.” Sometimes, he writes, “the perfect joke occurs two seconds before deadline.” There are several cartoons depicting this method, including a humorous multipanel piece highlighting their first meeting called “They Meet,” in which Martin thinks to himself, “He’ll never be able to translate my delicate and finely honed droll notions.” In the next panel, Bliss thinks, “I’m sure he won’t understand that the comic art form is way more subtle than his blunt-force humor.” The team collaborated for a year and created 150 cartoons featuring an array of topics, “from dogs and cats to outer space and art museums.” A witty creation of a bovine family sitting down to a gourmet meal and one of Dumbo getting his comeuppance highlight the duo’s comedic talent. What also makes this project successful is the team’s keen understanding of human behavior as viewed through their unconventional comedic minds.
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.Pub Date: Nov. 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-26289-9
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 30, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2020
PERSPECTIVES
Sedaris at his darkest—and his best.
In which the veteran humorist enters middle age with fine snark but some trepidation as well.
Mortality is weighing on Sedaris (Theft by Finding: Diaries 1977-2002, 2017, etc.), much of it his own, professional narcissist that he is. Watching an elderly man have a bowel accident on a plane, he dreaded the day when he would be the target of teenagers’ jokes “as they raise their phones to take my picture from behind.” A skin tumor troubled him, but so did the doctor who told him he couldn’t keep it once it was removed. “But it’s my tumor,” he insisted. “I made it.” (Eventually, he found a semitrained doctor to remove and give him the lipoma, which he proceeded to feed to a turtle.) The deaths of others are much on the author’s mind as well: He contemplates the suicide of his sister Tiffany, his alcoholic mother’s death, and his cantankerous father’s erratic behavior. His contemplation of his mother’s drinking—and his family’s denial of it—makes for some of the most poignant writing in the book: The sound of her putting ice in a rocks glass increasingly sounded “like a trigger being cocked.” Despite the gloom, however, frivolity still abides in the Sedaris clan. His summer home on the Carolina coast, which he dubbed the Sea Section, overspills with irreverent bantering between him and his siblings as his long-suffering partner, Hugh, looks on. Sedaris hasn’t lost his capacity for bemused observations of the people he encounters. For example, cashiers who say “have a blessed day” make him feel “like you’ve been sprayed against your will with God cologne.” But bad news has sharpened the author’s humor, and this book is defined by a persistent, engaging bafflement over how seriously or unseriously to take life when it’s increasingly filled with Trump and funerals.
Sedaris at his darkest—and his best.Pub Date: May 29, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-316-39238-9
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Feb. 19, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2018
PROFILES
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