Let Us Share

Reading Lou Dunn Diekemper’s latest book Let Us Share: A Conversation on Growing Older (Synergy Books, Texas, 2007) rolls your fear of aging one-eighty degrees to bring the bright side of aging to the attention of your thought. And thinking is what her viewpoint underscores: ‘introspection can increase our victories.’ Admit it or not, we are in constant fear of aging and death, suppressed consciously or unconsciously to some dark corner of our mind whence it pokes at our ease off and on. But Let Us Share is a book, by a 78 year old lady, that shows us how we can easily transform our fear of old age into enjoyment and peace.

Diekemper’s book is very different from the many self-help books where an author assumes authority over a particular sphere of life and starts casting pearls of wisdom. Let Us Share is what its name reveals: sharing with a senior friend whose number of years of life has not marred her love and enjoyment of it. By simply thinking over our life’s experiences in a new optimistic light, we can take pride and happiness in each day added to our age. In 180 pages of Let Us Share, Lou Dunn Diekemper shows us the beauty of aging and you realize, for the first time perhaps, how evanescent and unnecessary was our fear of getting older.

ISBN: 1-933538-76-7

Availability

http://www.shop.com/+-a-let+us+share+book-p68706932-k36-st.shtml

Good-bye, Baby Max

Many children books are printed each month to amuse kids of varying ages. This colorful, hardcover children’s title Good-bye, Baby Max (Bridgeway Books, Texas, 2007) by Diane Cantrell & Heather Castles is special in its purpose of teaching an invaluable lesson: that of properly saying the final farewell to a loved one who is no more. The book tells the story of the unfortunate baby chick Max who doesn’t make it into life while his twins Dora and Spiderman appear healthy out of their shells. The kids, eagerly awaiting the birth of the chicks, are heartbroken over the death of Baby Max and so their teacher uses her wisdom and care to lead them toward the appropriate way of showing their love and expressing their grief.

The importance of involving children in mourning is increasingly being acknowledged by developmental psychologists since children do sense the loss no matter how much they are coaxed into believing that ‘everything is ok.’ By being left out with the ‘mystery’, their wee minds are inclined to conclude that something terribly wrong has happened; something that is not worth speaking. This sows the seeds of fear and detachment in their mental development. Being a Licensed Professional Counselor and former KG teacher, Diane Cantrell has created a very purposeful book for children-one that is at once a story, a poem, and a healthy course of helping children get over grief. The book’s illustrations by Heather Castles are very appealing to a child’s imagination. There is a good deal here in Good-bye, Baby Max to learn for children ages 4 to 8 years and the 32-pages book is a must read for all kids of this age category.

ISBN-10: 1933538953
ISBN-13: 978-1933538952

Book Details and Availability
http://goodbyebabymax.com/

Literal Translations: Issue 8

Litmocracy’s quarterly literary supplement Literal Translations’ 8th issue is out with the 13 finest entries to the site printed in a mini paperback form. Including mostly short stories and poems, Literal Translations gives voice to the ‘personal’ in the world of amateur literary expression. From the provocative to inspirational and nostalgic to inquisitive, these literary tidbits make a great reading for a couple of hours.

This latest issue of Literal Translations includes vibrant shorts like Maureen Wilkinson’s Recreational Sex, Brian Brown’s Dinner Alone, Dave Scotese’s Befriending Dead Uncle Joe, Les Dalgliesh’s The Farmer Cut the Rye, Robin Reed’s The Ultimate Cell Phone, and more. Each page is a unique experience with thoughtfully created characters and questions that tend to stay with the reader after he/she is through the edition’s 50 pages. Brief bios of the author are included at the issue’s end.

Availability

http://www.litmocracy.com/weblog/purchase/

Litmocracy’s Homepage

http://www.litmocracy.com/

The Disposable Male

Compared with medieval, Victorian, and early-20th-century times, women today enjoy an awesome degree of freedom with work, relationship, and individual life choices. Or is it an awful and undue burdening of the female members of society at the expense of men? In the context of evolutionary biology, Michael Gilbert, of the University of Southern California, presents some seriously challenging questions to modern men and women of urban societies. In his book The Disposable Male: Sex, Love, and Money (The Hunter Press, Atlanta, 2006), he defies the prevailing hard-shelled feminist attitudes that are confusing gender roles and subjecting both sexes, especially the male, to a dysfunctional status in both individual and social lives.

Michael Gilbert is concerned with the imbalance of gender-based responsibilities for which both sexes are biologically and socially yet unprepared: women suffering from multiple duties at work and family while most men having little to do while biologically though equipped for doing a lot. Adding to this is the Second Wave’s feminist aggression that has supported an invasion of the formerly male spheres of activity by women while providing no alternative to positively channelize the masculine energy. Hence the disposable male!

Mr. Gilbert’s writing style is hip and absorbing; making an enjoyable story of the early beginnings of life on our planet and its evolution to the modern human form. At times, while touching on feminist attitudes, the author’s tone does assume a slightly bitter feel. The book also challenges the rooted beliefs of a divine origin of life and the various conventions that attribute existence to supernatural forces. To the author, life and humanity are natural, not divine, and in their naturalness lies their great appeal to respect and conservation.

After a thorough discussion of the gender-based problem, very little of which is uninteresting, the book lists some remedial measures for a more peaceable and stable social life in modern urban settings. This calls for a greater understanding between both sexes, a careful consideration of the existing needs and sources of living, and mutual cooperation of both genders for meeting the inescapable demands of their evolutionary heritage.

The Disposable Male is targeted at any educated reader who likes to appreciate the flip side of gender issues and for all those who are interested in human sociobiology, current events, and relationships at large.

ISBN-10: 0977655237
ISBN-13: 978-0977655236

Availability

http://www.amazon.com/Disposable-Male-Money-Your-Through-Darwins/dp/0977655237

Book Details and Discussion

http://www.thedisposablemale.com/

Temples, Tombs, & Hieroglyphs

In her revised and updated second edition of Temples, Tombs, and Hieroglyphs (HarperCollins, New York, 2007), Egyptologist Barbara Mertz (also known variously as Elizabeth Peters and Barbara Michaels) takes us back to antiquity on a new journey through the ancient Egyptian civilization. This publication on Egyptian history is written with all the objectivity of a scholar combined with the story-telling skills of an author and the orderliness of an organizer. It is to the latter of these that the book owes its success of completeness while covering thirty-one dynasties and reaching the Roman conquest of Egypt by Julius Caesar.

Egyptology is a vast subject-a whole field of knowledge within the broad realm of history. It may be approached as a science or art, always in danger of biases, nescience, pedantic exaggeration, or even political partiality. Barbara Mertz accomplishes a balanced roundup of the genealogical, political, cultural, intellectual, and archaeological history of Egypt through 5000 years. She speaks to her readers through the pages of the book and maintains her personal voice-much like a learned commentator does in a documentary video.

While Mertz’s imagery is concise, her book carries a number of sketches, some maps of ancient Egypt, and some high-quality colored photographs-all illumining the important archaeological details of the ancient Egyptian civilization. For the interested reader, the book includes a list of useful readings on related topics along with an index to the book’s key topics at the end.

Temples, Tombs, and Hieroglyphs also deconstructs some popular myths about the Egyptian history and civilization. This is one good reason why the speculating mind should go through this book. By her explanatory, easy-to-grasp style of writing, Barbara Mertz makes Egyptology easy and interesting with this latest, hard-cover edition of Temples, Tombs, and Hieroglyphs.

ISBN: 9780061252761

Availability

http://www.amazon.com/Temples-Tombs-and-Hieroglyphs/dp/B000XUAD1I/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1200746741&sr=1-2

Author Website

http://www.mpmbooks.com/

And Then It Was Teatime

Tea, reading, and conversation go so perfectly well together in literature and real life that teatime has become just another term for get together. And if that sounds a contrivance, take an enjoyable walk across the sundry scenes of teatime depicted in some of the much celebrated works of English literature, as compiled by Laurie Nienhaus in her latest book And Then It Was Teatime (Gilded Lily Publishing, Florida, 2007).

And Then It Was Teatime includes a collection of choice excerpts from literary works along with several sketches, illustrations, and vignettes that produce the ambience of timeless classicism. The scenes painted in the words of famous authors relate to tea-its making, serving, effect, taste, aroma, and its place in one’s very sensibilities. Through the common flair of this universal drink, the author connects her readers to the history of ideas and the view and norms of our past. A remarkable job of its own kind!

In the pages of this book, one finds an appeal to a more peaceful demeanor: teatime had and still has its set of manners to be observed by men and women. It is a social platform for conversation and, as one writer points out, teatime signifies a time of peace. The cup of beverage cherished by millions of people around the world is a powerful therapeutic means for dissipating their worries, anxieties, apprehensions, and bitterness. And Then It Was Teatime instantiates this quality of tea in only 100 pages.

Laurie Nienhaus’s book renovates the passion for two fine things in its readers: a nice cup of tea and fine literature.

Availability

http://www.glily.com/andthenitwasteatime.htm

Author Website

http://www.glily.com/

Bullets

Physical and emotional traumas inhibit the normal psychological development of many victims. However, some people emerge more confident and beautiful after the hardest of physical and emotional crises; the latter include individuals like Kat Hibbard, author of the recent autobiographical book Bullets: Growing Up in the Crossfire (Bridgeway Books, Texas, 2007). In her short but brilliant book, she relives the traumatic experiences of growing up as an abused child who does not lose her path to a normal life despite every chance of being led astray by the troubled waters of her existence.

Born of and living with an abusive father, Kat tells the story of her life from an accidental birth to the helpless web of threads that she fumbled at in the hope of seeing a better day. Drugs, sexual harassment and abuse, and juvenile delinquency, all occupied the center of her life’s stage while she kept looking for the innocent joys of trust and friendship that her situation denied her as a child. After years of coping with fear and stress, Kat gradually came out of the horrible environment of her family house and devoted time to share her story with other people, aiming at preventing future traumas to children.

Bullets is a poignant account of the author’s life story, though she attains a prodigious way of narrating the painful memories in a way that absorbs much of the emotional shock of those unbearable events. At the same time, it is a book that performs an autopsy of drug abuse and delinquency to unmask the factors responsible for unhealthy behavior among children and teens of our modern societies. The inference is so cogent and heart winning: the bad ways will not be there for a child if he/she is loved and cared for in a proper way.

Most insightful, perhaps, is Kat’s experience of having ‘no personality’ when it came to her choice of things; abuse and trauma can kill the real person in you and let your remains wandering around for putting on some face. Still, those remains have the power to grow into a more beautiful and more mature form of life and the author demonstrates this fact by her own example. As she ultimately got over the fears of her earlier life, pursued education, brought up two kids of her own very lovingly and caringly; she grew once again along with her kids and is now an inspirational figure for all people, especially women, whose lives have been touched by abuse and trauma. Her book Bullets is a gift to every individual who cares about love, trust, and peace in life.

ISBN: 978-1-933538-82-2

Availability

http://www.amazon.com/Bullets-Growing-Crossfire-Kat-Hibbard/dp/1933538821/ref=tag_stp_st_edpp_url/102-1355476-8916132

Author Website

www.kathibbard.com

departures

Linda Benninghoff’s departures (March Street Press, North Carolina, 2004) is a chapbook of 19 poems, along with some images, that are themed on the feelings connected with the act of ‘leaving’. Some of the poems address those who are no more but whose memories still ache in the heart and mind of the poet. Other poems focus on people, places, things, and animals that have been part of a lasting memory but that have left the author behind, or have been left behind the by author, and are now being missed since life has moved on.

The most inspiring quality of all the poems in departures is the respect with which the poet treats her referents. Not only people but also pets, places, and simple and seemingly unimportant objects are held as something worth loving. Since one has to move on as a necessity of life, holding things and people in respect allows leaving with good memories. This positive way of looking at things is a great attribute that we need to improve in our lives; departures achieves it in only 39 pages.

The smooth and unaffected poetic style of departures carries well-known eternal codes of hope, fear, memories, family, love, friendship, and above all-respect. The mode is dominantly nostalgic and an aching sweetness caresses the reader’s heart in several sets of lines. In There Is No Stillness, we read:

‘You said then
you once made
A vow to be silent
till the world changed
and only broke it,
When you came up with a better idea.’

ISBN: 1-59661-011-5

Availability:

http://www.amazon.com/Departures-Linda-Benninghoff/dp/1596610115

Author Bio
http://www.electrato.com/art/poetry/dialogue/benninghoff/index.html

E-Mails From Hell

The Internet is our day’s most precious technological gift, both for communication and for wasting our precious time. David Earthman’s latest humor book E-Mails From Hell (Synergy Book, Texas, 2007) takes up the latter aspect of online communication via e-mail. Through a series of biting e-mails and their replies, Earthman’s book makes a light-hearted spoof on the abuse of Internet correspondence for commercial purposes.

The subtitle of Earthman’s book ‘The Wrath of William Wyndell’ points to the book’s central e-mail bugger William Wyndell whose first messages start with greetings and final ones with abuse. This guy is a nutty Internet user who has nothing better to do than pestering others of his kind. So this craziness turns out to be fun!

The language of the E-Mails From Hell goes adult at a few places but doesn’t reach extremes of obscenity. Not all the 11 chapters sound equally witty; a few are really hilarious and some rather dull. The book as a whole is not very disappointing and for fans of humor books with a satirical tone, E-Mails From Hell can be an enjoyable read.

ISBN: 1-933538-45-7

Availability
http://www.amazon.com/E-mails-Hell-Wrath-William-Wyndell/dp/1933538457

Sleep Before Evening

In her debut novel Sleep Before Evening (Bewrite Books, United Kingdom, 2007), Magdalena Ball probes into the psychic maze of teenage delinquency. The book shows the angst of the heroine Marianne Cotton, a 17-year old girl of artistic aptitude, who grapples with the emptiness of life by resorting to drugs and ends up close to death. From the death of her affectionate grandfather to the nearly fatal drug overdose, Marianne’s life instantiates the pattern of disrupted attachment that underlies most (if not all) cases of juvenile delinquency. It is a fictional but thoroughly investigative case study of the tenderest age of life and the elements that render its disintegration.

Set in the year 1982, Sleep Before Evening is a an engaging character-driven narrative, focusing on the images, speech, feelings, and dreams of Marianne, turning the inside of her mind out for the readers to explore. The emerging talent of her artistic spirit is checked by the death of her mentor-her grandfather-and her mother’s failure to provide the necessary love and care. Soon Marianne’s quest for peace and human attachment begins, carrying her astray like a detached leaf in a wild wind. The author’s control of the story is masterly; her insight combining with her exceptional narrative skills to write a story that presents the case of millions of young drug addicts, right here amidst us.

Sleep Before Evening is certainly more than a novel. It is an honest piece of commentary on familial and societal elements that tear apart the tender fabric of innocence off youngsters’ lives. Marianne comes to the readers as the true picture of loneliness, her survival resting on the development of a human connection. Yet, her failure to find one in a crowded city because people are insecurely and frantically looking for career, fame, and money, is a thought-provoking tragedy. Whether or not she comes out these tempestuous waters is a separate issue; the need to understand her, look for her in our homes and lives, and help her out of her throes is crucial to our own survival as humans on this planet.


ISBN-10: 1904492967
ISBN-13: 978-1904492962

Availability

http://www.amazon.com/Sleep-Before-Evening-Magdalena-Ball/dp/1904492967

Author Website: http://www.compulsivereader.com/

Mindful of Madness

Ida-Rose Mead’s humorous fantasy Mindful of Madness (Outskirts Press, Colorado, 2007) has all the idiosyncrasies of a literary work that results from out-of-the-box thinking of a creative writer. In both language and thought, Mead exhibits her highly developed creative imagination.

Mindful of Madness is the unusual story of Conrad Buncombe whose continual dream about a sapphire-eyed beauty leads him into an egoistic quest for finding the means to master his desire. While he takes to tapping and encounters a number of fantastic characters, his desire for tapping turns out to be a self-defeating quirk. The author’s fancy is on high grounds here!

With all its novelty of thought and freshness of language, Mindful of Madness does not have a grand plot to offer and will best suit readers who enjoy ‘the moment’ in humorous readings. It is a different sort of comedy, very unconventional, with a heavy bent on figurative characterization. Mead’s book is for the readers who are ready to experiment with reading. For one quality, though, it is highly recommended: thinking beyond the usual limits of imagination.

ISBN-10: 1598001590
ISBN-13: 978-1598001594

Availability

http://www.amazon.com/Mindful-Madness-Ida-Rose-Mead/dp/1598001590

Langenscheidt Pocket Phrasebook of Italian

If you are planning a trip to Italy for the first or perhaps second time, one thing you’d need is a good guide. In the form of Langenscheidt Pocket Phrasebook of Italian, accompanied by an audio cassette that runs an hour, Langenscheidt Publishers (New York) provide you with the best companion you may carry in your pocket on your trip to Italy. The glossy phrasebook of Italian, over 250 pages, teaches you how to communicate in Italian by including essential words and phrases for you to travel in Italy without any problem of basic verbal interaction. You can introduce yourself at the airport, find yourself a suitable accommodation, travel through the county and shop, dine, and get back to your residence-all without any snag by taking along your Langenscheidt’s Jiffy Travel Pack. The colorful illustrations and short dialogues let you have a fun-to-learn practice of Italian language.

The phrasebook has an English-to-Italian dictionary of all the important words and phrases at the end of the book. The really wonderful feature of this phrasebook is that it carries transliteration of all the important words you’d need to use in communicating with someone who speaks this language. Listening to the cassette will reinforce the sound patterns you learn from the book. So there is no problem of correct pronunciation. If you know English, Langenscheidt’s Jiffy Travel Pack will readily teach you Italian. The phrasebook includes an alphabetic index of important words. A guide to Italian grammar and conversion charts check your mistakes. So you go perfect with your Italian!

ISBN: 1-58573-509-4

Availability

http://www.langenscheidt.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=3044

http://www.amazon.com/Langenscheidt-Pocket-Phrasebook-Italian-Dictionary/dp/1585735094

Berlitz Scandinavian Phrase Book and Dictionary

Berlitz is a landmark organization in teaching foreign languages. It publishes glossy, easy to follow, and easy to carry language course books and phrase books, all carrying the Berlitz motto 'Helping the World Communicate'. This is met with full promise as far as the pocket size Scandinavian Phrase Book and Dictionary shows us. While the small size is in itself a great convenience, this publication is attractively designed and made special with several unique features. Words and phrases of daily use from 5 related languages have been included along with a guide to pronunciation and a brief English-Scandinavian dictionary at the end.

The languages selected are: Danish, Swedish, Finnish, Icelandic, and Norwegian. A map of the region where these languages are spoken is the guiding page at the book's end. Various sections are categorized and guiding boxes within the pages instruct on making sentences with important words/phrases. A special feature of the book is the color coding scheme that makes words and phrases easy to find. Seek the Danish in purple, Finnish in orange, Icelandic in green, Norwegian in yellow, and Swedish in red. It is the expertise of Berlitz to wrap the most important cultural tools of five of the world's most beautiful countries in a sleek gift of 192 pages. A wonderful gift for travel and learning!

ISBN: 2831577381

Availability

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/2831577381/ref=nosim/porfessionalp5-20

http://www.powells.com/biblio?isbn=2831577381

Your Boy

Vicki Courtney's Your Boy (B&H Publishing Group, Tennessee, 2006) is one of the books that have a specified target audience: Christian mothers. The book aims at educating moms on raising a godly son in an ungodly world. Mrs. Courtney combines advice on ways to develop godly qualities in their sons with accounts of personal views and experiences on the topic.

A large part of Your Boy is directed towards personal refinement and conscious effort in the direction of a virtuous life. The author has a heartwarming sense of family sanctity and righteous conduct. Her effort in writing this book sparkles to the reader's attention by its keenness about the subject of spiritual education and her courage to stand and speak in the face of a culture that has gone amok under the rubric of 'freedom'.

With its lively humor, the introduction and ending acknowledgement of the book, Mrs. Courtney transmits a live, charming aroma of motherhood. She makes nice spoof on the aspirations of becoming a super mom and moms wanting perfect kids. Her own experience with her family gives her the confidence to tell how to win the heart of your kids and help your son become a real man; how to share and soothe the aches of your children and how to avoid getting on their nerves.

What makes the admiring readership of Your Boy limited is the book's later part where the author adopts a highly conventional stance against forms of excessive freedom, especially sexual freedom, criticizing feminists in particular. A proponent of the ethical absolutism, Vicki Courtney rejects moral relativism, pre- and extra-marital sex, negative uses of the Internet technology, and the general waywardness of today's youth. These points certainly are going to be of interest to feminists and other non-conventional thinkers who may frown at the book's frequent resort to religious appeals and personal views. But one thing that makes the book special is that it will make one think either way. Like all good books, this one from Mrs. Courtney tends to bring things up for a serious debate.

ISBN: 0805430555


Availability

http://www.amazon.com/Your-Boy-Raising-Godly-Ungodly/dp/0805430555/sr=8-1/qid=1163770719/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/102-6024235-7268167?ie=UTF8&s=books

Author Website: http://vickicourtney.com/

Dinner with Da Vinci: The Road Royale Through Rebirth

The name of da Vinci has reached an acme of attention with Dan Brown's pop buster The Da Vinci Code. Now used in a radically different mode, it shows up in Leslie J. Mcclinton's snazzy title Dinner With Da Vinci (Great Reading Books, Texas, 2006). Combining autobiographical nonfiction with science, history, anthropology, journalism, and spiritual quests, Mcclinton has strummed the thread of rebirth and its conscious experience.

The core significance of Dinner With Da Vinci lies in the uniqueness with which the work has been designed. The author's interdisciplinary approach dissolves epistemological boundaries in a way rarely seen before. This is a book like no other books. Mcclinton has depersonalized the names of icons like Cicero, da Vinci, Hitler, Yeats, John F. Kennedy, Shakespeare and several others to weave a tapestry of mystique that borders on personal belief and anthropological universals. The essential idea is more than one human form for the same person. The message is simple: look around you and find out who it is that you are again living with.

Of particular interest to many readers will be Mcclinton's intriguing concept of alternate sexual forms for the same person that reappears in human form. The soul or (for the hard shelled anthropologist) the set of core features of one human being appears in a different sexual identity in the next episode of existence. But this is exactly where the book demands too much of a reader: deep knowledge of the life of historical figures. For a layman, not a single chapter of this book will be an enjoyable read. The other thing that makes Dinner With Da Vinci a hard to swallow work is the peripatetic style of narrating events and inculcating implications of personal observations. At times, we find it hard to adjust our relation to the book's content.

While spurious correlations and quasi-fideistic assumptions appear to the skeptic reader, there is no denying that the book is rich in matter for the lover of knowledge. There is a passionate account of several people who had a cause in their lives and who were self-motivated to pursue it. The inspiration of loving knowledge of esoteric topics filters through the author's writing.

ISBN: 1933538554

Availability
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1933538554/theosophicsoc-20?creative=0&camp=0&adid=0A9RW502YJWXG389QAW0&link_code=as1

Pacifist Chicken And Other Largely Humorous Stories of small Hopes

Andrea Kampic has extended the title of her debutant book of humor Pacifist Chicken (Blue Agave Press, California, 2006) to specify that the stories are largely humorous but also include pieces that fall into the genre of monologues bordering on the line of cynicism. This book by Andrea Kampic is an enjoyable addition to humorous-satirical literature of our time on account of the many individual oddities and collective madness that we are all living with.

The individual stories of the book vary in mood and tone from the lambent My Dream Dog to pure maniacal ranting like Don't Make Me Hate You. The two things that connect the pieces are character driven nature of the situations and the intensity of consciousness to the lag between an idealized perfect life and the many holes in the shroud of perfection. The author has touched on a number of social issues and personal discontent in a light mood. Marital problems, parental relationships, artistic inspiration, narcissistic needs, pets, politics, meditation, and the ways in which modern urban society affects the inner world of its members are the sundry themes presented in Pacifist Chicken.

Andrea Kampic's book is made livelier by the addition of simple photos at the start of each new story. The stories themselves are short enough not to bore the reader. The author, or anyone, did not include a preface or introduction. Perhaps none was needed since Andrea Kampic has worked in Hollywood as a photographer and this first book of hers shows the insightful lens of her observation penetrating the habits of living our kind of life. It’s a book worth reading.

ISBN: 0976790939

Availability

http://www.amazon.com/Pacifist-Chicken-Largely-Humorous-Stories/dp/0976790939

Author Website

http://kampictures.com/

A Boy From Lawrence: The Collected Writings of Eugene F. Connolly

Sally A. Connolly has collected and edited the writings of her late husband Dr. Eugene F. Connolly in the form of a book titled A Boy From Lawrence (TypeStyles Desktop Publishing Services, USA, 2006), copyrighted 2005 but now available afresh as a second edition. The book carries entries from Dr. Connolly's journal: short passages of memoir, poems, recollections, letters, family photographs, and quotes of wisdom by icons of literature.

Two motifs of A Boy From Lawrence account for its value as a worthwhile read: love and education. The nucleus of Eugene's involvement with love is family, especially the sanctity of marriage. He lovingly writes about his children, wife, parents, and other kin. However he remembers to include his feelings of deep love for his friends, colleagues, students, and other figures in his life and those preceding it. For education, Dr. Connolly's quest of learning is aimed at the 'mystery of man', the reality and nature of existing as humans. Having served thirty years as an English Professor at a Massachusetts community college, Dr. Connolly had a passion for spiritual growth and had an intuitive sense of the God's eternal presence.

Mrs. Connolly has included some very touching memories of her husband's life in his own words. The winsome look of the professor, as adorns the cover title, is a reflection of the innocent pleasures of his childhood and the benevolent inspirations of his life as a grown-up, responsible individual. And of course, he was the man with a hunch. He taught an English class while acting dumb on account of throat problem. Even as a teacher, we feel the professor's role as more of a father who considers all students as God's children. Eugene Connolly was an inspirational teacher.

Letters of this 'Boy from Lawrence' come at the end of the book. The last two letters are of eulogy, written by his daughter and his friend, and they pay an enviable tribute to this wonderful man who lived a good life both for himself and for those who knew him.

A Boy From Lawrence comes off as an inspirational gift of wisdom and feelings that furbish the life in this world and promises a blissful life ahead. By Mrs. Connolly's book we meet a good man, something not very easy to find in our time.


ISBN: 0977265315

Availability

http://www.amazon.com/BOY-LAWRENCE-Collected-Writings-Connolly/dp/0977265315

Admit It, You’re Crazy!

Ever heard of someone who makes holes in her socks? A person who irons his newspaper? What about a cat who runs a treadmill? These and many other quirks are now available in one book to tickle your sane nerve. Author Judy Reiser brings to public notice the many quirks and idiosyncrasies of people in her recent book Admit It, You’re Crazy! (Andrew McMeel Publishing, Missouri, 2005).

Judy Reiser’s book is a collage of interview clips of numerous individuals, all adults, in first person. These run the gamut of humor from real crackers to slightly off-the-track peculiarities of living. Obsessive thinking and resulting compulsion is the recurring motif in most of the instances included. At times, the behavior will not seem so irrational as some of the persons relate it to their early experiences and some of them definitely reflect the reader’s own quirks.

As far as goes the fun part of the book, it will depend on the reader’s own rationality whether the instances scribed elicit a guffaw or a sigh out him/her. More matter-of-course response from the reader, more reason to suspect one’s normality. Grins! But the book is certainly unique in that the author’s absence is nearly fixed (except in occasional questions); in some ways a short coming because after reading over fifty pages you feel lost in a deluge of voices popping in and out incessantly.

One beautifying feature of the book is the adornment with colored headings, fun figures, and vignettes that go in perfect accord with the business of going bananas. Money, eating habits, bathroom behavior, travel, and germ-response stories are presented with the profession, gender, and age of the people involved. Judy Reiser has done a nice job in letting people put on the make-up of self-critical smile before they stand under their shower. Wink!

PS: Judy Reiser is open to receiving more quirks and idiosyncrasies from people. She can be reached by e-mail given at the end of her book.

ISBN: 0740751093

Availability

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0740751093/sr=8-1/qid=1155650412/ref=pd_bbs_1/104-0041724-3788727?ie=UTF8

http://product.ebay.com/Admit-It-Youre-Crazy_ISBN_0740751093_W0QQfvcsZ1388QQpdqueryZAdmitQ20ItQ2cQ20YouQ27reQ20CrazyQ21QQsoprZ43826068

Author Website: http://www.katalinmedia.com/

Admit It, You’re Crazy!

Ever heard of someone who makes holes in her socks? A person who irons his newspaper? What about a cat who runs a treadmill? These and many other quirks are now available in one book to tickle your sane nerve. Author Judy Reiser brings to public notice the many quirks and idiosyncrasies of people in her recent book Admit It, You’re Crazy! (Andrew McMeel Publishing, Missouri, 2005).

Judy Reiser’s book is a collage of interview clips of numerous individuals, all adults, in first person. These run the gamut of humor from real crackers to slightly off-the-track peculiarities of living. Obsessive thinking and resulting compulsion is the recurring motif in most of the instances included. At times, the behavior will not seem so irrational as some of the persons relate it to their early experiences and some of them definitely reflect the reader’s own quirks.

As far as goes the fun part of the book, it will depend on the reader’s own rationality whether the instances scribed elicit a guffaw or a sigh out him/her. More matter-of-course response from the reader, more reason to suspect one’s normality. Grins! But the book is certainly unique in that the author’s absence is nearly fixed (except in occasional questions); in some ways a short coming because after reading over fifty pages you feel lost in a deluge of voices popping in and out incessantly.

One beautifying feature of the book is the adornment with colored headings, fun figures, and vignettes that go in perfect accord with the business of going bananas. Money, eating habits, bathroom behavior, travel, and germ-response stories are presented with the profession, gender, and age of the people involved. Judy Reiser has done a nice job in letting people put on the make-up of self-critical smile before they stand under their shower. Wink!

PS: Judy Reiser is open to receiving more quirks and idiosyncrasies from people. She can be reached by e-mail given at the end of her book.

ISBN: 0740751093

Availability

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Author Website: www.katalinmedia.com

Dying to Be Free: A Healing Guide for Families after a Suicide

Mental health nurse Beverly Cobain and crisis intervention specialist Jean Larch have authored a short but inspiring paperback book Dying to Be Free (Hazelden Foundation, Minnesota, 2006) that will serve as a healing guide for suicide surviving families and friends.

Dying to Be Free is a book written in the ink of humanistic spirit, featuring stories of survivors of suicide and how they reunited with life while befriending the memories of their loved ones. The author Beverly Cobain tells of her own cousin’s death by suicide and presents a moving picture of what it means to be touched by such a death in family. Of course, the authors do not mean to merely console the survivors but strongly advocate identification of suicidal signs and possible preventive measures.

Suicide is alarming not only in that it brings an insufferable shock to the deceased’s kin and pals but more so due to the fact that suicide can be contagious: guilt, sorrow, and confusion combine to press the survivor(s) to enter the dark tunnel that ends in self-inflicted death. What are the signs of such cases? Can it be prevented? If yes, how to proceed? These questions are all answered clearly by Dying to Be Free and that is where the significance of the work lies.

One important element the authors elaborate in educating about suicide situations is the prevalence of what they call ‘Myths about Suicide’. For example the thought that talking about suicide results in a self-fulfilling prophecy. That these myths can in fact lead indirectly to the killing tunnel is one alarm the authors alert the readers with so as to remind all that ignorance might be an excuse but a fatal one for someone’s life.

Every sensible and caring soul needs to hear the cry of Cobain and Larch and restructure their behavior in order to prevent the deadly pain that drives one we know to death and the pain that follows thereafter.

ISBN: 1592853293

Availability

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