A serious, comprehensive children’s health reference.
In this health guide, biotechnology patent attorney Fett (It Starts with the Egg, 2019, etc.) advises parents on how best to foster the development of their children’s brains.
The time to ensure the health of a baby’s brain is during pregnancy and in the first year of infancy, says the author. Modern medicine has a better understanding of this period than ever before, she notes, including what nutrients and practices will help nurture early language development, creativity, memory, and attention span, while also decreasing the chances of premature birth, autism, ADHD, and other developmental disabilities. In this book, Fett outlines how parents can create the best possible environment for brain development, from their children’s conceptions to their first birthdays. To that end, she points out what common toxins to avoid, which vitamins to take, how to keep hormones in balance, and how to ensure that a baby’s body maintains a healthy collection of microorganisms. “By the end of the book, you will have learned about many small changes that can have a big impact on the health of your child’s brain,” writes Fett in her introduction. “You will be armed with all the knowledge you need to make truly informed decisions, to give your child the best possible start in life.” Fett, the granddaughter of noted neuroscientist Paul Fatt, holds a degree in biochemistry and molecular biology from the University of Sydney. She appears to feel at home in these fields, effectively elucidating complex jargon for a general audience. Readers who will soon be parents may be familiar with most of the prenatal vitamins, but they may not be aware of the dangers of the flame retardants found in some car seats, for example. The author takes a decidedly better-safe-than-sorry approach, which results in some unexpected restrictions; one chapter, for example, is titled “The Risks & Benefits of Ultrasounds.” All of her recommendations are based on recent research, however, which she documents in extensive endnotes. Although the science behind this advice continues to develop, readers seeking to give their child the best possible start will likely be interested in Fett’s regimen.
A serious, comprehensive children’s health reference.Pub Date: Aug. 27, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-9996761-3-4
Page Count: 322
Publisher: Franklin Fox Publishing LLC
Review Posted Online: Sept. 30, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
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
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