A collection of accessible, but sometimes oversimplified, self-help articles.
A public health professional collects her articles about easing stress and enjoying life more by practicing gratitude and other strategies.
Khorrami offers advice on personal growth in a book that gathers 68 of her brief articles from sites like the Huffington Post and Psychology Today. She writes that regularly practicing gratitude promotes optimism, strengthens relationships, and increases motivation as it helps to protect against depression and curb anxiety. As evidence, she cites research showing that being grateful increases dopamine and serotonin levels, creating a sense of contentment. To make the science accessible, she simplifies key findings, breaking her articles into bite-sized sections and highlighting major points in headers. She also describes simple ways to practice gratitude. Her suggestions include appreciating enjoyable aspects of a day, saying thank you more often, complimenting a stranger, and sharing uplifting social media posts. Some tips focus on the Covid-19 pandemic, and others go beyond simply expressing gratitude: They involve letting go of insecurities, achieving goals, bolstering confidence, and building emotional strength. Other suggestions home in on strategies that can help with work, relationships, or healing after a difficult time. Khorrami also celebrates the global mental health movement spearheaded by celebrities like Michelle Obama, Prince Harry, and the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge. She ends with a section called “All Good Things,” which promotes kindness, humility, and giving back. Some readers may see parts of the book as oversimplified or even Pollyannaish, including its idea that they can find “silver linings” in the Covid-19 pandemic, such as opportunities for more sleep, personal growth, or building resilience. Or they may find the by-your-bootstraps approach to problem-solving naïve given the entrenched prejudices or legal barriers that hold back some groups. Overall, however, this book is well designed and easy to use. The articles have a conversational tone and don’t need to be read in chronological order. That user-friendly approach means that even readers who disagree with parts of this book may be able to jump in at any point and find a useful tip or two.
A collection of accessible, but sometimes oversimplified, self-help articles.Pub Date: March 1, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-63755-000-7
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Mascot Books
Review Posted Online: March 1, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Some of Avant’s mantras are overstated, but her book is magnanimous, inspiring, and relentlessly optimistic.
Memories and life lessons inspired by the author’s mother, who was murdered in 2021.
“Neither my mother nor I knew that her last text to me would be the words ‘Think you’ll be happy,’ ” Avant writes, "but it is fitting that she left me with a mantra for resiliency.” The author, a filmmaker and former U.S. Ambassador to the Bahamas, begins her first book on the night she learned her mother, Jacqueline Avant, had been fatally shot during a home invasion. “One of my first thoughts,” she writes, “was, ‘Oh God, please don’t let me hate this man. Give me the strength not to hate him.’ ” Daughter of Clarence Avant, known as the “Black Godfather” due to his work as a pioneering music executive, the author describes growing up “in a house that had a revolving door of famous people,” from Ella Fitzgerald to Muhammad Ali. “I don’t take for granted anything I have achieved in my life as a Black American woman,” writes Avant. “And I recognize my unique upbringing…..I was taught to honor our past and pay forward our fruits.” The book, which is occasionally repetitive, includes tributes to her mother from figures like Oprah Winfrey and Bill Clinton, but the narrative core is the author’s direct, faith-based, unwaveringly positive messages to readers—e.g., “I don’t want to carry the sadness and anger I have toward the man who did this to my mother…so I’m worshiping God amid the worst storm imaginable”; "Success and feeling good are contagious. I’m all about positive contagious vibrations!” Avant frequently quotes Bible verses, and the bulk of the text reflects the spirit of her daily prayer “that everything is in divine order.” Imploring readers to practice proactive behavior, she writes, “We have to always find the blessing, to be the blessing.”
Some of Avant’s mantras are overstated, but her book is magnanimous, inspiring, and relentlessly optimistic.Pub Date: Oct. 17, 2023
ISBN: 9780063304413
Page Count: 288
Publisher: HarperOne
Review Posted Online: Aug. 17, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2023
These platitudes need perspective; better to buy the books they came from.
A lightweight collection of self-help snippets from the bestselling author.
What makes a quote a quote? Does it have to be quoted by someone other than the original author? Apparently not, if we take Strayed’s collection of truisms as an example. The well-known memoirist (Wild), novelist (Torch), and radio-show host (“Dear Sugar”) pulls lines from her previous pages and delivers them one at a time in this small, gift-sized book. No excerpt exceeds one page in length, and some are only one line long. Strayed doesn’t reference the books she’s drawing from, so the quotes stand without context and are strung together without apparent attention to structure or narrative flow. Thus, we move back and forth from first-person tales from the Pacific Crest Trail to conversational tidbits to meditations on grief. Some are astoundingly simple, such as Strayed’s declaration that “Love is the feeling we have for those we care deeply about and hold in high regard.” Others call on the author’s unique observations—people who regret what they haven’t done, she writes, end up “mingy, addled, shrink-wrapped versions” of themselves—and offer a reward for wading through obvious advice like “Trust your gut.” Other quotes sound familiar—not necessarily because you’ve read Strayed’s other work, but likely due to the influence of other authors on her writing. When she writes about blooming into your own authenticity, for instance, one is immediately reminded of Anaïs Nin: "And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.” Strayed’s true blossoming happens in her longer works; while this collection might brighten someone’s day—and is sure to sell plenty of copies during the holidays—it’s no substitute for the real thing.
These platitudes need perspective; better to buy the books they came from.Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-101-946909
Page Count: 160
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Aug. 15, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2015
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