An informative reference tool filled with positive messaging.
Federico, a clinical sex therapist, and Morgan, a midwife, join forces to create a guide for women to better understand their bodies by tracking their menstrual cycles.
The author’s collaborative effort was inspired by their own frustrations (and those of their patients) in dealing with the traditional medical community regarding issues of fertility and more broad-based gynecological difficulties. Women, they assert, are not given the necessary tools to understand the messages their bodies are sending them. Federico and Morgan write, “Cycle tracking is a direct pathway to reclaiming ownership over our bodies.” (“The menstrual cycle,” they continue, “can act as a signifier of overall health and an early communicator when other systems in your body are overwhelmed.”) In addition to recording the usual data associated with menstrual tracking, the authors encourage making notes about one’s “thoughts, feelings, and bodily sensations” throughout the cycle, creating a more detailed portrait of one’s physical and psychological condition. This information, they state, will enable women to tune in to the routine but complicated hormonal changes they experience throughout their cycles—with this data in hand, women will be empowered to self-advocate when dealing with health care providers. Eight stories based on the experiences of patients treated by the authors illustrate a variety of gynecological issues faced by women, and the individual stories are referred to periodically throughout the book. The guide is designed to be interactive, gently leading readers through the daily process of tracking. It includes embedded questions—the prompt “when I start paying attention to my senses, a feeling I notice is” is followed by space for readers to jot down their own answers. Numerous illustrative tracking charts (noting temperature, bodily fluids, emotional states, and more) allow readers to fill in their own information. The authors maintain an upbeat tone, packed with copious, albeit repetitive, affirmatives to remind readers that they “deserve to be taken care of and [they] are perfect.” Detailed anatomical drawings of the gynecological system are accompanied by descriptive text, and the discussions of fertility and birth control are comprehensive.
An informative reference tool filled with positive messaging.Pub Date: Jan. 28, 2025
ISBN: 9780593717059
Page Count: 336
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: Nov. 10, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 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
An ebullient nature lover’s paean to birds.
A charming bird journey with the bestselling author.
In his introduction to Tan’s “nature journal,” David Allen Sibley, the acclaimed ornithologist, nails the spirit of this book: a “collection of delightfully quirky, thoughtful, and personal observations of birds in sketches and words.” For years, Tan has looked out on her California backyard “paradise”—oaks, periwinkle vines, birch, Japanese maple, fuchsia shrubs—observing more than 60 species of birds, and she fashions her findings into delightful and approachable journal excerpts, accompanied by her gorgeous color sketches. As the entries—“a record of my life”—move along, the author becomes more adept at identifying and capturing them with words and pencils. Her first entry is September 16, 2017: Shortly after putting up hummingbird feeders, one of the tiny, delicate creatures landed on her hand and fed. “We have a relationship,” she writes. “I am in love.” By August 2018, her backyard “has become a menagerie of fledglings…all learning to fly.” Day by day, she has continued to learn more about the birds, their activities, and how she should relate to them; she also admits mistakes when they occur. In December 2018, she was excited to observe a Townsend’s Warbler—“Omigod! It’s looking at me. Displeased expression.” Battling pesky squirrels, Tan deployed Hot Pepper Suet to keep them away, and she deterred crows by hanging a fake one upside down. The author also declared war on outdoor cats when she learned they kill more than 1 billion birds per year. In May 2019, she notes that she spends $250 per month on beetle larvae. In June 2019, she confesses “spending more hours a day staring at birds than writing. How can I not?” Her last entry, on December 15, 2022, celebrates when an eating bird pauses, “looks and acknowledges I am there.”
An ebullient nature lover’s paean to birds.Pub Date: April 23, 2024
ISBN: 9780593536131
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Jan. 19, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
