An uplifting book that views some flawed figures through rose-colored glasses.
A heartfelt collection of life lessons inspired by changemakers.
Ghosh, a social impact strategist, combines memoir, biography, and practical advice in this book about the impact that 30 icons, mentors, and family members have made on his approach to service. “Lessons from others not only sustained me but helped me thrive,” he explains. The book opens with a lesson in empathy from his parents, whose generosity inspired the author to start a local community organization to address sanitation issues in the slums of Kolkata, India (Ghosh’s childhood home). The author recalls hearing the Dalai Lama (who contributes this book’s foreword) speak about the importance of showing respect and compassion for low-income citizens as entrepreneurs undertook various development initiatives across the Indian subcontinent and Africa. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg served as a role model of civility for Ghosh, who cites Ginsburg’s friendship with Justice Antonin Scalia as an example of her ability to respect and work with others across ideological lines. After meeting Pakistani activist Malala Yousafzai in 2013, the author became inspired to speak out about important issues because she taught him that “silence is not an option.” Ghosh concludes with a touching chapter celebrating his son, Ryan, a young man with an adventurous spirit, the ability to embrace diversity, and a passion for fostering connection. The author’s personable voice will make his high-profile life of hobnobbing with globally renowned figures feel relatable to everyday readers—he describes how Mother Teresa made him feel “completely flooded with utter joy at her love, compassion, mercy, and greatness” with just the touch of her hand. However, the narrative occasionally praises controversial figures like Bill Clinton, about whom Ghosh gushes, “It was impossible not to like this man.” Still, the author’s empathy is evident in lines like, “Poverty is a condition created by a social construction that benefits some and not others. It is not a character flaw or a personal failing.” The text lists resources and organizations in each chapter to help readers engage in their own philanthropic efforts.
An uplifting book that views some flawed figures through rose-colored glasses.Pub Date: June 3, 2025
ISBN: 9798888459249
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Post Hill Press
Review Posted Online: July 8, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A short, smart analysis of perhaps the most famous passage in American history reveals its potency and unfulfilled promise.
Words that made a nation.
Isaacson is known for expansive biographies of great thinkers (and Elon Musk), but here he pens a succinct, stimulating commentary on the Founding Fathers’ ode to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” His close reading of the Declaration of Independence’s second sentence, published to mark the 250th anniversary of the document’s adoption, doesn’t downplay its “moral contradiction.” Thomas Jefferson enslaved hundreds of people yet called slavery “a cruel war against human nature” in his first draft of the Declaration. All but 15 of the document’s 56 signers owned enslaved people. While the sentence in question asserted “all men are created equal” and possess “unalienable rights,” the Founders “consciously and intentionally” excluded women, Native Americans, and enslaved people. And yet the sentence is powerful, Isaacson writes, because it names a young nation’s “aspirations.” He mounts a solid defense of what ought to be shared goals, among them economic fairness, “moral compassion,” and a willingness to compromise. “Democracy depends on this,” he writes. Isaacson is excellent when explaining how Enlightenment intellectuals abroad influenced the founders. Benjamin Franklin, one of the Declaration’s “five-person drafting committee,” stayed in David Hume’s home for a month in the early 1770s, “discussing ideas of natural rights” with the Scottish philosopher. Also strong is Isaacson’s discussion of the “edits and tweaks” made to Jefferson’s draft. As recommended by Franklin and others, the changes were substantial, leaving Jefferson “distraught.” Franklin, who emerges as the book’s hero, helped establish municipal services, founded a library, and encouraged religious diversity—the kind of civic-mindedness that we could use more of today, Isaacson reminds us.
A short, smart analysis of perhaps the most famous passage in American history reveals its potency and unfulfilled promise.Pub Date: Nov. 18, 2025
ISBN: 9781982181314
Page Count: 80
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Aug. 29, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular...
A neurosurgeon with a passion for literature tragically finds his perfect subject after his diagnosis of terminal lung cancer.
Writing isn’t brain surgery, but it’s rare when someone adept at the latter is also so accomplished at the former. Searching for meaning and purpose in his life, Kalanithi pursued a doctorate in literature and had felt certain that he wouldn’t enter the field of medicine, in which his father and other members of his family excelled. “But I couldn’t let go of the question,” he writes, after realizing that his goals “didn’t quite fit in an English department.” “Where did biology, morality, literature and philosophy intersect?” So he decided to set aside his doctoral dissertation and belatedly prepare for medical school, which “would allow me a chance to find answers that are not in books, to find a different sort of sublime, to forge relationships with the suffering, and to keep following the question of what makes human life meaningful, even in the face of death and decay.” The author’s empathy undoubtedly made him an exceptional doctor, and the precision of his prose—as well as the moral purpose underscoring it—suggests that he could have written a good book on any subject he chose. Part of what makes this book so essential is the fact that it was written under a death sentence following the diagnosis that upended his life, just as he was preparing to end his residency and attract offers at the top of his profession. Kalanithi learned he might have 10 years to live or perhaps five. Should he return to neurosurgery (he could and did), or should he write (he also did)? Should he and his wife have a baby? They did, eight months before he died, which was less than two years after the original diagnosis. “The fact of death is unsettling,” he understates. “Yet there is no other way to live.”
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular clarity.Pub Date: Jan. 19, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-8129-8840-6
Page Count: 248
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2015
PERSPECTIVES
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