A warmly empathetic and wide-ranging manual for readers debating whether or not to have a baby.
A comprehensive guide focuses on the many variables in deciding to have a child.
In this revised edition of her nonfiction debut, clinical social worker Bombardieri walks readers through every aspect of the decision of whether or not to have a baby, a choice she rightly warns should not be made “lightly, by default, or by blind adherence to custom.” She tackles many of the most essential big-picture issues involving this matter, from whether or not it’s exclusively a woman’s choice to the decision’s alarming potential to “ruin your life” (as worried parents often warn). The fact that the author has had a large amount of experience dealing with all kinds of parents (and prospective parents) in all types of situations is quickly apparent in these pages, where all the basics are covered—questions of infertility, the possibility of adoption, the very real attractions of the childless life, and so on. The book likewise extends its reach to look at possible complications once the decision to have a baby is reached, everything from broad questions of general mental readiness for starting a family to the nitty-gritty of the various responsibilities, such as diaper-changing and mixing parenthood with work routines and career aspirations. Sections explore a wide array of options, including gay adoption and older parenting. In every case, relevant resources and challenges are clearly but not alarmingly examined. Bombardieri handles her extensive amount of information in a readable and smoothly authoritative narrative voice from start to finish, whether she’s discussing volatile emotional questions (her emphasis on partners really working to understand each other before they commit to a baby is refreshing) or blunt medical options like sterilization. The book never shies away from the starker aspects of its subject, touching not only on dark topics like miscarriage, but also on the “poison vials” or negative stereotypes about giving birth. She analyzes the pros and cons of day care, in-home care, and caretakers, but she spends a commendably equal amount of time dealing with the vital emotional landscape of the parenting decision. Her advice doesn't overemphasize the enormous financial cost a baby entails. Monetary planning is placed on more or less equal footing with social and familial preparation, presenting a more rounded picture than many parenting books tend to do. And she can be bracingly direct, as when she addresses the prospect of single parenting: “You may not need a partner’s support, but you will need somebody’s. No happy, single parent truly parents alone.” The book’s steadfast insistence that prospective parents disconnect their choice from undue outside pressures (be they from family or society in general) will doubtless strike many readers as just the breath of fresh air they need. Indeed, the whole guide exhibits that kind of sharp, transparent counsel and good sense. The bibliography and resources section are extensive enough to give prospective parents dozens of avenues for further research, and the volume’s practical optimism will make it invaluable to its target audience. This is the kind of wise and balanced advice many readers have been searching for.
A warmly empathetic and wide-ranging manual for readers debating whether or not to have a baby.Pub Date: June 26, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-9975007-0-7
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Orchard View Press
Review Posted Online: Aug. 29, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.
The legendary booze-addled metal rocker turned reality-TV star comes clean in his tell-all autobiography.
Although brought up in the bleak British factory town of Aston, John “Ozzy” Osbourne’s tragicomic rags-to-riches tale is somehow quintessentially American. It’s an epic dream/nightmare that takes him from Winson Green prison in 1966 to a presidential dinner with George W. Bush in 2004. Tracing his adult life from petty thief and slaughterhouse worker to rock star, Osbourne’s first-person slang-and-expletive-driven style comes off like he’s casually relating his story while knocking back pints at the pub. “What you read here,” he writes, “is what dribbled out of the jelly I call my brain when I asked it for my life story.” During the late 1960s his transformation from inept shoplifter to notorious Black Sabbath frontman was unlikely enough. In fact, the band got its first paying gigs by waiting outside concert venues hoping the regularly scheduled act wouldn’t show. After a few years, Osbourne and his bandmates were touring America and becoming millionaires from their riff-heavy doom music. As expected, with success came personal excess and inevitable alienation from the other members of the group. But as a solo performer, Osbourne’s predilection for guns, drink, drugs, near-death experiences, cruelty to animals and relieving himself in public soon became the stuff of legend. His most infamous exploits—biting the head off a bat and accidentally urinating on the Alamo—are addressed, but they seem tame compared to other dark moments of his checkered past: nearly killing his wife Sharon during an alcohol-induced blackout, waking up after a bender in the middle of a busy highway, burning down his backyard, etc. Osbourne is confessional to a fault, jeopardizing his demonic-rocker reputation with glib remarks about his love for Paul McCartney and Robin Williams. The most distinguishing feature of the book is the staggering chapter-by-chapter accumulation of drunken mishaps, bodily dysfunctions and drug-induced mayhem over a 40-plus-year career—a résumé of anti-social atrocities comparable to any of rock ’n’ roll’s most reckless outlaws.
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.Pub Date: Jan. 25, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-446-56989-7
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2009
IN THE NEWS
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
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