by Willy Norup ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 28, 2016
A unique, engaging problem-solver, although skeptics may see it as merely a novelty.
An unusual interpretation of the I Ching, devised to aid modern-day readers caring for loved ones.
The I Ching is an ancient book of divinations which provides spiritual guidance. According to pioneering psychologist Carl Jung, writes Norup (I Ching for Wise Living and Aging, 2015, etc.), it’s “based on the principle of synchronicity or meaningful coincidence.” To use the I Ching, one asks a question, tosses three coins six times, records the result in a particular manner, and then uses a “hexagram key” to locate the response that corresponds to those results. What distinguishes this book is the fact that Norup was inspired to write it with his daughter because they were caring for his wife, who was suffering from Alzheimer’s disease. Thus, the I Ching guidance here targets the special challenges of caregivers. The author urges readers to use this manual as a tool to address one question at a time, and as such, it’s quite ingenious; it’s divided into 64 “hexagrams,” each based on an ancient metaphor; for example, “Sun and rain from heaven create changes and nourish life on earth.” Every hexagram features a brief but meaningful section of text that offers contemporary guidance, followed by “Changing Lines” (featuring more detailed advice, such as “Hold fiercely to your vision and goals for your patient and yourself, and refuse to be sidetracked by what is not essential”), plus additional questions to think about. Generally, the hexagrams are positive and uplifting, but at times, they take on a note of caution. In “Resolving Conflict,” for instance, the text advises, “As a caregiver, try to avoid open confrontations.…Stay balanced, listen to your opponents, and try to find out what motivates them.…Listen with goodwill, and consciously look for something positive to emerge from the situation.” If read in sequence, the hexagrams largely offer well-crafted doses of common-sense wisdom. However, as the author points out, the purpose of the book is to offer counsel with regard to specific, not general, questions. Overall, this guide should provide solace and inspiration, particularly to caregivers who believe in its precepts.
A unique, engaging problem-solver, although skeptics may see it as merely a novelty.Pub Date: April 28, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-9969061-2-8
Page Count: 236
Publisher: Norfam Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 23, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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BOOK REVIEW
by Willy Norup with Ulla Norup Milbrath
by Charlayne Hunter-Gault ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 1, 1992
From the national correspondent for PBS's MacNeil-Lehrer Newshour: a moving memoir of her youth in the Deep South and her role in desegregating the Univ. of Georgia. The eldest daughter of an army chaplain, Hunter-Gault was born in what she calls the ``first of many places that I would call `my place' ''—the small village of Due West, tucked away in a remote little corner of South Carolina. While her father served in Korea, Hunter-Gault and her mother moved first to Covington, Georgia, and then to Atlanta. In ``L.A.'' (lovely Atlanta), surrounded by her loving family and a close-knit black community, the author enjoyed a happy childhood participating in activities at church and at school, where her intellectual and leadership abilities soon were noticed by both faculty and peers. In high school, Hunter-Gault found herself studying the ``comic-strip character Brenda Starr as I might have studied a journalism textbook, had there been one.'' Determined to be a journalist, she applied to several colleges—all outside of Georgia, for ``to discourage the possibility that a black student would even think of applying to one of those white schools, the state provided money for black students'' to study out of state. Accepted at Michigan's Wayne State, the author was encouraged by local civil-rights leaders to apply, along with another classmate, to the Univ. of Georgia as well. Her application became a test of changing racial attitudes, as well as of the growing strength of the civil-rights movement in the South, and Gault became a national figure as she braved an onslaught of hostilities and harassment to become the first black woman to attend the university. A remarkably generous, fair-minded account of overcoming some of the biggest, and most intractable, obstacles ever deployed by southern racists. (Photographs—not seen.)
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1992
ISBN: 0-374-17563-2
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1992
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by William Strunk & E.B. White ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 15, 1972
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
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