An informative and useful guide to approaching emotional interactions in new ways.
Couples therapist Giuffra offers a debut guide for those navigating the waters of romantic relationships.
This work draws heavily on the metaphor of Noah’s Ark in the book of Genesis: “Did [Noah] wonder what he needed to learn from all those animals aboard? Clearly the animals had done a far better job connecting and living peacefully with others of their species than humans had.” Giuffra uses such examples to help readers explore what traditional wisdom reveals about modern love, but she also draws on more recent neuroscience research. In five sections, the author lays out a practical “Love Map” for successful relationships, arranged into five distinct advice topics: “Leave Space for Love,” “Operate Your Brain To Love,” “View Your Conditioning With Love,” “Emerge Free To Love,” and “Route and Navigate Life’s Stormy Seas.” Throughout, Giuffra not only provides numerous stories of couples, including her own anonymized clients, as they learn to incorporate various principles, but also clear tips for readers for using these strategies in daily life: “Recall a time when you felt happy, fulfilled, or just pleased….Sense, smell, touch, feel, hear, and imagine that experience again.” At the core of her research is the understanding that, when it comes to love, one’s anxious “reptilian and mammalian brains” dominate; however, she asserts that one can resist one’s natural “fight or flight” response, create new perceptions, and reverse negative relationship dynamics. This meticulously researched but easy-to-follow work is pragmatic and never preachy, and although it’s aimed at those in long-term relationships, its advice will likely be effective for those who are currently in the dating world or simply looking to improve communication in platonic or familial relationships. The broad relevance of Giuffra’s work is due to its focus on self-love, on taking responsibility for emotional outbursts, and on addressing unrealistic expectations of oneself and others. By touching on such topics as attachment styles and birth order, she encourages readers to recognize and challenge limiting beliefs and patterns in their own lives.
An informative and useful guide to approaching emotional interactions in new ways.Pub Date: Feb. 26, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-982256-96-8
Page Count: 272
Publisher: BalboaPress
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A football star’s bracing account of his battle for racial equality—and how powerful forces arrayed against him.
A principled athlete strives for social justice.
Kaepernick forthrightly details the activism that earned him global renown but cost him his NFL career. In 2016, the San Francisco 49ers quarterback “was filled with disgust” after police shootings of fellow Black men in several American cities. Before a preseason game, he made a spontaneous decision: “It hit me in that moment that I should find a seat” during the national anthem. He did the same at two more games before reporters noticed. Kaepernick will forever be associated with “taking a knee” during the anthem, but he credits Eric Reid—a teammate who agreed with Kaepernick’s message—for suggesting that they kneel together during subsequent anthems. The protest changed everything for Kaepernick. President Trump vilified him. Kaepernick and his wife received death threats. And though he’d taken the 49ers to a Super Bowl, no teams would sign him. He will likely make news for his take on Jay-Z, whose lucrative partnership with the NFL was criticized as an attempt to launder the league’s reputation. Visiting Africa, where Kaepernick learns about “African leaders who willingly sold their own people to the enslavers,” he “couldn’t help but to think about Jay-Z and the NFL.” In opening chapters, Kaepernick recalls suffering traumatic racial abuse as a child. Being in “white spaces”—he was adopted by white parents—placed him “under a microscope every minute of every day.” He isn’t always nuanced, depicting some people he disagrees with as cartoonishly clueless. But his writing about how college and pro teams “lied” to him about injuries underlines his “feeling of being a disposable commodity.” A decade has passed since Kaepernick played in the NFL, but he stays fit in case “a team needing a QB” calls.
A football star’s bracing account of his battle for racial equality—and how powerful forces arrayed against him.Pub Date: Sept. 15, 2026
ISBN: 9781538777879
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Legacy Lit/Hachette
Review Posted Online: June 15, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2026
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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
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