A debut diet book with an effective method and a warm heart.
A down-to-earth approach to weight loss that begins with loving oneself.
Even a cursory glance at bookstore shelves will reveal a glut of self-help and diet books, and it can be difficult for readers to wade through the competing theories. Kerkhoff, however, has discovered a new way to slim down, not by cutting out a particular food or exercising until you drop, but by listening to the real emotional needs beneath the cravings. Diagnosed with multiple sclerosis as a young woman, Kerkhoff became motivated to take care of herself by drawing emotional strength from the love of others and, eventually, her love for herself. The wisdom she’s gleaned from her own experience may be useful to many, regardless of whether they’re looking to lose weight. The first step in Kerkhoff’s program is to become your “authentic” self by truly engaging with the world and your feelings at any given moment. Once you participate in the present moment, she says, you can form meaningful relationships. She recommends cultivating at least eight such relationships, which show you that you’re worthy of love and have a right to be valued for who you are; they also teach you how to interpret others’ behavior in new, less harmful ways. Other steps include retraining your brain to frame setbacks in a positive light, taking responsibility for your circumstances and setting a course of action to improve them, managing the fear of failure, and exercising your mind. What sets Kerkhoff’s approach apart from others is her philosophy that the self responds best to love and gentleness, not criticism and hatred: “I don’t want you to feel deprived; I want you to feel fulfilled. I don’t want you to feel scared; I want you to feel confident. I don’t want you to feel alone; I want you to always feel good in your own company. Because it matters. It is practice.”
A debut diet book with an effective method and a warm heart.Pub Date: June 1, 2014
ISBN: 978-1614488743
Page Count: 140
Publisher: Morgan James Publishing
Review Posted Online: Feb. 26, 2014
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Skloot's meticulous, riveting account strikes a humanistic balance between sociological history, venerable portraiture and...
A dense, absorbing investigation into the medical community's exploitation of a dying woman and her family's struggle to salvage truth and dignity decades later.
In a well-paced, vibrant narrative, Popular Science contributor and Culture Dish blogger Skloot (Creative Writing/Univ. of Memphis) demonstrates that for every human cell put under a microscope, a complex life story is inexorably attached, to which doctors, researchers and laboratories have often been woefully insensitive and unaccountable. In 1951, Henrietta Lacks, an African-American mother of five, was diagnosed with what proved to be a fatal form of cervical cancer. At Johns Hopkins, the doctors harvested cells from her cervix without her permission and distributed them to labs around the globe, where they were multiplied and used for a diverse array of treatments. Known as HeLa cells, they became one of the world's most ubiquitous sources for medical research of everything from hormones, steroids and vitamins to gene mapping, in vitro fertilization, even the polio vaccine—all without the knowledge, must less consent, of the Lacks family. Skloot spent a decade interviewing every relative of Lacks she could find, excavating difficult memories and long-simmering outrage that had lay dormant since their loved one's sorrowful demise. Equal parts intimate biography and brutal clinical reportage, Skloot's graceful narrative adeptly navigates the wrenching Lack family recollections and the sobering, overarching realities of poverty and pre–civil-rights racism. The author's style is matched by a methodical scientific rigor and manifest expertise in the field.
Skloot's meticulous, riveting account strikes a humanistic balance between sociological history, venerable portraiture and Petri dish politics.Pub Date: Feb. 9, 2010
ISBN: 978-1-4000-5217-2
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Dec. 22, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2010
BOOK REVIEW
A moving, heartfelt account of a hospice veteran.
Lessons about life from those preparing to die.
A longtime hospice chaplain, Egan (Fumbling: A Pilgrimage Tale of Love, Grief, and Spiritual Renewal on the Camino de Santiago, 2004) shares what she has learned through the stories of those nearing death. She notices that for every life, there are shared stories of heartbreak, pain, guilt, fear, and regret. “Every one of us will go through things that destroy our inner compass and pull meaning out from under us,” she writes. “Everyone who does not die young will go through some sort of spiritual crisis.” The author is also straightforward in noting that through her experiences with the brokenness of others, and in trying to assist in that brokenness, she has found healing for herself. Several years ago, during a C-section, Egan suffered a bad reaction to the anesthesia, leading to months of psychotic disorders and years of recovery. The experience left her with tremendous emotional pain and latent feelings of shame, regret, and anger. However, with each patient she helped, the author found herself better understanding her own past. Despite her role as a chaplain, Egan notes that she rarely discussed God or religious subjects with her patients. Mainly, when people could talk at all, they discussed their families, “because that is how we talk about God. That is how we talk about the meaning of our lives.” It is through families, Egan began to realize, that “we find meaning, and this is where our purpose becomes clear.” The author’s anecdotes are often thought-provoking combinations of sublime humor and tragic pathos. She is not afraid to point out times where she made mistakes, even downright failures, in the course of her work. However, the nature of her work means “living in the gray,” where right and wrong answers are often hard to identify.
A moving, heartfelt account of a hospice veteran.Pub Date: Oct. 25, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-59463-481-9
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Riverhead
Review Posted Online: Aug. 2, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2016
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