by Sue Marriott & Ann Kelley ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 30, 2024
An encouraging guide to a healthy mindset.
A survey of strategies for self-discovery.
Marriott, a group psychotherapist and clinical social worker, and Kelley, a psychologist, co-host the podcast Therapist Uncensored. In this collaboration, they offer thoughtful, well-supported advice for fostering personal growth and nurturing social bonds. Identifying themselves as a white, cis-gendered, middle-aged, same-sex married couple, the authors aim to be inclusive and supportive of all readers. As they point out, people of color or those who are neurodiverse or genderqueer have been shaped by distinct, sometimes traumatic, experiences. “Plumb your various identities,” the authors advise, and think about “the impact of your experiences on the protective and connective strategies you’ve developed, weighing their current usefulness.” Drawing on modern attachment theory and relational neuroscience, Marriott and Kelley look at how unconscious defensive patterns can be transformed into conscious strengths. The Modern Attachment-Regulation Spectrum (MARS), depicted as rainbow-colored images, serves as a colorful illustration of one’s state of mind, with green being a safe zone, gradations toward red indicating emotional activation, and gradations toward blue indicating defensive withdrawal. In an appendix, the authors provide a detailed analysis of the spectrum and its connection to behavior and emotion. The MARS, they write, can prove useful for readers “to recognize where you are and turn your focus toward scooting back towards the green zone rather quickly.” The authors present ways to reflect on behavior, recognize patterns, and work “to pause and try different strategies,” a process they call rewiring. “A secure state of mind,” the authors assert, “enables you to care about, advocate for and be generous with people close to you and those you’ll never meet. In this way, making the deliberate choice to prioritize secure functioning over falling back into defensive self-preservation is a powerful action that can disrupt, and even reverse” divisiveness and polarization.
An encouraging guide to a healthy mindset.Pub Date: April 30, 2024
ISBN: 9780063334557
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: March 11, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2024
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by Jennette McCurdy ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 9, 2022
The heartbreaking story of an emotionally battered child delivered with captivating candor and grace.
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New York Times Bestseller
IndieBound Bestseller
The former iCarly star reflects on her difficult childhood.
In her debut memoir, titled after her 2020 one-woman show, singer and actor McCurdy (b. 1992) reveals the raw details of what she describes as years of emotional abuse at the hands of her demanding, emotionally unstable stage mom, Debra. Born in Los Angeles, the author, along with three older brothers, grew up in a home controlled by her mother. When McCurdy was 3, her mother was diagnosed with breast cancer. Though she initially survived, the disease’s recurrence would ultimately take her life when the author was 21. McCurdy candidly reconstructs those in-between years, showing how “my mom emotionally, mentally, and physically abused me in ways that will forever impact me.” Insistent on molding her only daughter into “Mommy’s little actress,” Debra shuffled her to auditions beginning at age 6. As she matured and starting booking acting gigs, McCurdy remained “desperate to impress Mom,” while Debra became increasingly obsessive about her daughter’s physical appearance. She tinted her daughter’s eyelashes, whitened her teeth, enforced a tightly monitored regimen of “calorie restriction,” and performed regular genital exams on her as a teenager. Eventually, the author grew understandably resentful and tried to distance herself from her mother. As a young celebrity, however, McCurdy became vulnerable to eating disorders, alcohol addiction, self-loathing, and unstable relationships. Throughout the book, she honestly portrays Debra’s cruel perfectionist personality and abusive behavior patterns, showing a woman who could get enraged by everything from crooked eyeliner to spilled milk. At the same time, McCurdy exhibits compassion for her deeply flawed mother. Late in the book, she shares a crushing secret her father revealed to her as an adult. While McCurdy didn’t emerge from her childhood unscathed, she’s managed to spin her harrowing experience into a sold-out stage act and achieve a form of catharsis that puts her mind, body, and acting career at peace.
The heartbreaking story of an emotionally battered child delivered with captivating candor and grace.Pub Date: Aug. 9, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-982185-82-4
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 30, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2022
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SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
by Anne Heche ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 24, 2023
A sweet final word from an actor who leaves a legacy of compassion and kindness.
The late actor offers a gentle guide for living with more purpose, love, and joy.
Mixing poetry, prescriptive challenges, and elements of memoir, Heche (1969-2022) delivers a narrative that is more encouraging workbook than life story. The author wants to share what she has discovered over the course of a life filled with abuse, advocacy, and uncanny turning points. Her greatest discovery? Love. “Open yourself up to love and transform kindness from a feeling you extend to those around you to actions that you perform for them,” she writes. “Only by caring can we open ourselves up to the universe, and only by opening up to the universe can we fully experience all the wonders that it holds, the greatest of which is love.” Throughout the occasionally overwrought text, Heche is heavy on the concept of care. She wants us to experience joy as she does, and she provides a road map for how to get there. Instead of slinking away from Hollywood and the ridicule that she endured there, Heche found the good and hung on, with Alec Baldwin and Harrison Ford starring as particularly shining knights in her story. Some readers may dismiss this material as vapid Hollywood stuff, but Heche’s perspective is an empathetic blend of Buddhism (minimize suffering), dialectical behavioral therapy (tolerating distress), Christianity (do unto others), and pre-Socratic philosophy (sufficient reason). “You’re not out to change the whole world, but to increase the levels of love and kindness in the world, drop by drop,” she writes. “Over time, these actions wear away the coldness, hate, and indifference around us as surely as water slowly wearing away stone.” Readers grieving her loss will take solace knowing that she lived her love-filled life on her own terms. Heche’s business and podcast partner, Heather Duffy, writes the epilogue, closing the book on a life well lived.
A sweet final word from an actor who leaves a legacy of compassion and kindness.Pub Date: Jan. 24, 2023
ISBN: 9781627783316
Page Count: 176
Publisher: Viva Editions
Review Posted Online: Feb. 6, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2023
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