An engaging and uplifting collection of personal stories about and for women.
In this guide, various women reflect on the key lessons they’ve learned in their lives.
Leid interviewed dozens of women in the course of assembling this string of quick, inspirational life stories. As the various women the author profiles in these pages tell their tales, the book’s central question—“What is the mess that became your message?”—emerges as the motif tying the stories together. Whether it’s Angie coping with the sudden loss of her husband, Rob (“He was in the hospital for only a day. Three surgeries were performed, but he never regained consciousness”), or successful entrepreneur and community organizer Linda, who was temporarily sidelined with an aneurysm (“The message was clear: she needed to take better care of herself and put herself first”), a picture of resilience emerges. Each profile ends with a swift summary, a central message, and an “action step” for readers to implement in their own lives (“Take a walk outside or simply sit outside and listen to your heart”). In this sequel, the combination of these disparate stories makes for an upbeat, wide-ranging narrative intended for female readers. At the beginning of the engrossing book, the author warmly reflects on the problems of gathering the photographs that accompany each profile. The pictures had to be taken during the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, when professional photo studios were off-limits and Zoom technology was sometimes the best option available. This course of action—of gamely embracing challenges and rising above them—is the theme Leid skillfully weaves through all of these intriguing profiles. Readers coming from their own difficulties will find a good deal of inspiration in these tales.
An engaging and uplifting collection of personal stories about and for women.Pub Date: Aug. 23, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-954920-11-8
Page Count: 350
Publisher: Capucia Publishing
Review Posted Online: Dec. 28, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
A sharp, entertaining view of the news media from one of its star players.
The veteran newscaster reflects on her triumphs and hardships, both professional and private.
In this eagerly anticipated memoir, Couric (b. 1957) transforms the events of her long, illustrious career into an immensely readable story—a legacy-preserving exercise, for sure, yet judiciously polished and insightful, several notches above the fray of typical celebrity memoirs. The narrative unfolds through a series of lean chapters as she recounts the many career ascendency steps that led to her massively successful run on the Today Show and comparably disappointing stints as CBS Evening News anchor, talk show host, and Yahoo’s Global News Anchor. On the personal front, the author is candid in her recollections about her midlife adventures in the dating scene and deeply sorrowful and affecting regarding the experience of losing her husband to colon cancer as well as the deaths of other beloved family members, including her sister and parents. Throughout, Couric maintains a sharp yet cool-headed perspective on the broadcast news industry and its many outsized personalities and even how her celebrated role has diminished in recent years. “It’s AN ADJUSTMENT when the white-hot spotlight moves on,” she writes. “The ego gratification of being the It girl is intoxicating (toxic being the root of the word). When that starts to fade, it takes some getting used to—at least it did for me.” Readers who can recall when network news coverage and morning shows were not only relevant, but powerfully influential forces will be particularly drawn to Couric’s insights as she tracks how the media has evolved over recent decades and reflects on the negative effects of the increasing shift away from reliable sources of informed news coverage. The author also discusses recent important cultural and social revolutions, casting light on issues of race and sexual orientation, sexism, and the predatory behavior that led to the #MeToo movement. In that vein, she expresses her disillusionment with former co-host and friend Matt Lauer.
A sharp, entertaining view of the news media from one of its star players.Pub Date: Oct. 26, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-316-53586-1
Page Count: 528
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
The Stoics did much better with the much shorter Enchiridion.
A follow-on to the author’s garbled but popular 48 Laws of Power, promising that readers will learn how to win friends and influence people, to say nothing of outfoxing all those “toxic types” out in the world.
Greene (Mastery, 2012, etc.) begins with a big sell, averring that his book “is designed to immerse you in all aspects of human behavior and illuminate its root causes.” To gauge by this fat compendium, human behavior is mostly rotten, a presumption that fits with the author’s neo-Machiavellian program of self-validation and eventual strategic supremacy. The author works to formula: First, state a “law,” such as “confront your dark side” or “know your limits,” the latter of which seems pale compared to the Delphic oracle’s “nothing in excess.” Next, elaborate on that law with what might seem to be as plain as day: “Losing contact with reality, we make irrational decisions. That is why our success often does not last.” One imagines there might be other reasons for the evanescence of glory, but there you go. Finally, spin out a long tutelary yarn, seemingly the longer the better, to shore up the truism—in this case, the cometary rise and fall of one-time Disney CEO Michael Eisner, with the warning, “his fate could easily be yours, albeit most likely on a smaller scale,” which ranks right up there with the fortuneteller’s “I sense that someone you know has died" in orders of probability. It’s enough to inspire a new law: Beware of those who spend too much time telling you what you already know, even when it’s dressed up in fresh-sounding terms. “Continually mix the visceral with the analytic” is the language of a consultant’s report, more important-sounding than “go with your gut but use your head, too.”
The Stoics did much better with the much shorter Enchiridion.Pub Date: Oct. 23, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-525-42814-5
Page Count: 580
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: July 30, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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