An effective memory manual with an unusual approach.
Actress and memory whiz Henner (Wear Your Life Well: Use What You Have to Get What You Want, 2009, etc.) unveils the secrets to unlocking the hidden recesses of the mind.
The author’s awe-inspiring memory skills, profiled in an episode of 60 Minutes, have eclipsed the fame she won for her portrayal of Elaine Nardo on the beloved TV sitcom Taxi. Despite realizing from an early age that she processed memory differently than other people, Henner didn’t know there was a name for her superlative powers of recollection until she began working with researchers at the University of California, Irvine. There, she learned that she is one of a very small number of people classified with Highly Superior Autobiographical Memory. The average person can recall up to 11 events from each year of their life; Henner remembers—in precise detail—every day of her life since the age of 12. By sharing her ability, Henner writes, readers will be able to “use these lessons to transform your memory, your past, and ultimately, your future.” Blending anecdotes from her personal life and career with scientific data and exercises designed to trigger specific types of memories, the author guides readers on a tour through their past. Henner forgoes typical approaches like mnemonics, place pegs and memory palaces. One test stimulates the olfactory nerves to turn up sense memories; another asks readers to revisit their 21st birthdays to uncover the different ways they archive memories. As the text progresses, Henner skillfully demonstrates how memories can help readers process their past, direct their present and shape their future. Other useful chapters address how to effectively record events in a journal and the ways parents can help their children preserve memories. Henner’s enthusiasm is infectious, though the number of exclamation points may distract some readers.
An effective memory manual with an unusual approach.Pub Date: April 24, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-4516-5121-8
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Gallery Books/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: April 20, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2012
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More ugly family secrets are revealed here, though this confessional is tempered by moving memories of the authors’ experiences. Agnew (English/Georgia Southern Univ.) and Robideaux (Writing/Univ. of Missouri, Columbia) are, of course, daughters of alcoholic mothers whose childhoods were miasmas of abuse and humiliation. Estimates are that there are 11 million more women like them. The authors placed ads in local newspapers to ferret out some of them, and 200 of the women who responded filled out extensive questionnaires, while a few cooperated with lengthy telephone or personal interviews. The research and the authors’ personal experiences show that an alcoholic mother is a source of greater shame and humiliation than an alcoholic father: “a double standard endures as much for alcoholism as for sex.” More effort is made to keep the secret in the family, depriving the children of outside comfort and support. The first part of the book is devoted to painful anecdotes of drunken mothers at their best and at their worst, the second and third parts to the consequences of growing up with angry and bitter mothers who took their pain out on their children. The daughters— problems include alcoholism, drug abuse, and eating disorders, as well as ongoing difficulties with relationships with men (an attraction to “bad boys” is common), other women (if you can’t trust your mother, how can you trust a girlfriend?), and their own children (for instance, the urge to fill their own emptiness with a baby’s love). In closing, the book looks at feelings, frequently of relief, about the often terrible deaths of the alcoholic mothers as well as encouragement and advice on “building happy lives.” Most telling are the lengthy and poignant reminiscences of the two authors’set apart in italics throughout the book—about their individual childhoods and struggles as adults. Tragic tales with uplifting endings, best suited for other daughters of alcoholic mothers, who will welcome the company. (TV satellite tour)
Pub Date: March 18, 1998
ISBN: 0-671-01385-8
Page Count: 313
Publisher: Pocket
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 1998
The Cinderella Complex revisited, this time with dollar signs added. In The Cinderella Complex (1981) Dowling hypothesized that even the most liberated woman had a secret hope that The Prince, glass slipper in hand, was en route to rescue her from independence and responsibility. The book was an international bestseller, earning Dowling millions. Ten years later she was broke, owing the IRS more than $70,000. She sold the two houses she owned, moved into a small rental, and paid the federal government $760 a month to retire her debt. At one point, Dowling moans, she had grossed $400,000 a year and ran American Express bills up to $3,000 a month; now she was reduced to shopping at discount stores and coloring her own hair. Sympathy from economically hard-pressed readers is likely to take a deep dive at this point. To her credit, Dowling takes responsibility for her irresponsibility about money and seizes the opportunity to explore why she and other women like her don—t, or can—t, plan ahead. The same yearning to have someone else take care of them, a reluctance to take risks, and an inclination to provide for others lead women toward financial insolvency, as does a pervasive “bag lady” fantasy—that they will end up on the streets, penniless, in their old age. While noting recent research on preadolescent girls’ socially conditioned retreat from competence, Dowling nevertheless rather unconvincingly sets up men as models of financial prudence. Her efforts to present female role models are undermined by her examples, among them the Beardstown Ladies, recently exposed as less than they seemed to be. There is no question that managing money is a cause of great anxiety—but as many men as women have ridden the roller coaster of high times, only to crash and burn. Copying male habits may not be the answer. Engagingly written, but essentially a reworking of the territory of the author’s earlier books, without many surprises. (Author tour)
Pub Date: June 1, 1998
ISBN: 0-316-19120-5
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1998
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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