A Gaggle of Book Reviews

This review is part of a MotherTalk Blog Tour

The Natural Superwoman: The Scientifically Backed Program for Feeling Great, Looking Younger, and Enjoying Amazing Energy at Any Age is a new book by Dr. Uzzi Reiss (OB/GYN) and his daughter Yfat Reiss Gendell. Dr. Reiss is an Ob/Gyn in private practice Beverly Hills, CA who works with about 6,000 women a year to find natural solutions to women’s health issues. Ms. Gendell is the partner in a literary agency she co-founded, as well as being the co-author of several other health and non-fiction titles. The premise behind The Natural Superwoman is to build on the information in the previously published book, Natural Hormone Balance for Women, and help women be healthy and feel good through diet, exercise, and supplements.

The Natural Superwoman is a very eye-catching book: it has a bright pink cover with gold accents, an eye-catching tagline, and several questions on the back which guide you to “Feel like you again with Dr. Reiss’s groud-breaking program.” Inside, the book is broken into easily-digestible segments, with quizzes popping up every few pages to help you identify trouble areas, and then text to help educate you. The first part of the book focuses on lifestyle changes, part two on bioidentical hormones, part three on balancing mood, and part four on living disease-free. The sections are well-designed and set up so it is a very approachable book - easy to access the information you are looking for, and then get hooked by the text and keep reading.

When I am reviewing a non-fiction book, the first places I look are the resources and index. If a book doesn’t have resources to back it up, and an index that will help you find information quickly, then it isn’t a good resource. At the beginning of The Natural Superwoman, the authors say that a full list of changeable resources was available online, but they do include footnotes and some resources within the book. The index within The Natural Superwoman makes it very easy to find an area of the book that you wish to revisit. The layout of this book makes it very easily approachable and more likely that you will want to keep reading after finding your original answer.

I was prepared to dislike The Natural Superwoman, and I ended up very impressed. Due to our dietary restrictions, my own health issues, and my children’s health, I have done quite a bit of research into supplements and nutrition, and we have surrounded ourselves with others who have done that research as well. I wondered about the quality of information from an M.D., as well as questioning how well a man would understand the needs of a woman’s body. Dr. Reiss credits his wife for helping him understand reach epiphanies about bioidentical hormones because of her experiences, which makes him seem much more approachable. I had also assumed that Dr. Reiss would be affiliated with the source of bioidentical hormones, but he doesn’t even suggest only one answer - he refers readers to compounding pharmacies. After reading The Natural Superwoman, I think it is a valuable resource for women, and a good introduction into thinking differently about health and nutrition.

While I don’t agree with all of the information within The Natural Superwoman, I do agree with a lot of it. If you are looking for a place to start research on non-pharmaceutical options for improving health and mood, this is a great beginning. If you want to learn more about how hormones, vitamins, and minerals work together, The Natural Superwoman is a very useful guide. Much of the information in The Natural Superwoman has been published previously in other, less-mainstream books; it is wonderful to see an approachable book that extols the virtues of Vitamin D and Fish Oils! I recommend checking out a copy of The Natural Superwoman - it is easy find a part that speaks to you, and the writing style will keep you engaged.

This review is part of a ParentBloggers book tour. Visit ParentBloggers for a chance to win a copy of The Sky Isn’t Visible from Here: Scenes from a Life!

To learn more about Felicia and her book, be sure to listen to the Motherhood Uncensored show featuring Felicia, I have a cameo as a caller.

The Sky Isn’t Visible from Here: Scenes from a Life is the newly released memoir by Felicia Sullivan, creator of the Writers Revealed podcast, among other projects. I have been lucky enough to work with on Writers Revealed, and which piqued my interest in her memoir. This is a book about Felicia living through her mother’s addictions and relationships, surviving a very difficult childhood, and then struggling with her own addictions. I have seen friends and family members struggle with addictions, and it was amazing to look into Felicia’s life and read a brutally honest account of living with addiction.

The Sky Isn’t Visible from Here: Scenes from a Life is a particularly apt title. Felicia uses scenes from her childhood mixed together with chapters that follow her adult life through her addiction and into her recovery. In doing so, the book gains depth, as we know some of the “why” behind Felicia’s troubles and addiction. We also see her incredible honesty as she bares her life and soul to the readers, displaying to the world her own wrongs and embarrassing times, which many people would bury. Felicia gives us a window into her world, and then pulls us through the window as we are caught between the memories and her current life.

Felicia worked hard to separate herself from her mother (at the time the book was written, she hadn’t been in contact for in 11 years), and at first I couldn’t grasp why she became an addict. My thoughts are mirrored in the discussions between Felicia and her friends as she is struggling with her own addictions. Felicia is determined not to become like her mother, but the cocaine calls to her:

you wonder how it is you got to this point. Because you told yourself in your bathroom that first time in December … with two rolled bills and neatly cut lines that you’d never be an addict like your mother because you survived the war that was her, because you convinced yourself you were stronger than she was. And then, there go the lines.

Felicia follows this quote a page later with a description of her feelings about cocaine. First, she describes it for her friend, and then she completes the description for the reader:

“It’s like Broadway up my nose,” I say.
What I fail to tell Emily is how many times I’ve tried it since. And although I savored my first glass of red wine and the many that followed, cocaine is different. I like — no, I love cocaine. I tolerate the nausea, the constant swallowing, the teeth grinding — anything for that rush when the world seems simple, beautiful, and large enough to fit me in.

When she is on cocaine, Felicia is able to escape “the awkward, stammering girl who never feels smart enough, white enough, pretty enough.” After struggling to fit in as a child, first alcohol and then cocaine give her the confidence to change her self-image. The change between shy, bullied child and self-confident writer and executive is so well written and well examed that the reader can truly grasp the impact addiction can have. If you are suddenly feeling a sense of self-worth, how do you give that up?

Felicia bares her soul, giving us a good long look at her life. She chronicles her own fight with addiction and mixes in childhood memories. The Sky Isn’t Visible from Here is not an easy read by any means - Felicia’s childhood experiences were not like those of the children of addicts I knew, well-fed and sheltered in the suburbs. These are vignettes of a year eating only potatoes, of shielding her eyes so she wouldn’t see cockroaches scurrying in the floor in front of her, of seeing her friend’s mother unconscious for 36 hours, and of taking her mother to the Emergency Room over and over. I have never read a book that pulled me so far into the real world of addiction; Felicia uses such intense detail when recounting the horrors she survived that I feel as if I was walking in her shoes beside her.

While Felicia has cut off contact with her mother, The Sky Isn’t Visible from Here isn’t a psychobabble “blame the mother for everything” book. It’s an intense look into the dark world of addiction. Readers will walk away from this book with a much deeper understanding of what it is like to be caught in the life of an addict, or caught in an addiction. I highly recommend The Sky Isn’t Visible from Here, to everyone, but especially for anyone who knows addicts or those recovering from addiction.

Harper Collins has made the timely book The Undecided Voter’s Guide to the Next President: Who the Candidates Are, Where They Come from, and How You Can Choose by Mark Halperin available online for free. It’s only available from February 1 through February 11, 2008, though. After that, you’d need to buy it. One might argue that at that point it’s down to only 2 people rather than the 7 in the book. (admittedly, though, a few of the 7 have withdrawn from the race)

Browse Inside this book Get this for your site

I’ve been leafing through it, and it seems to be pretty thorough and unbiased. Halperin has been a political analyst for Time and ABC, and has worked in the field for years.

Halperin has divided the book into 4 main sections - Top Republicans, Other Republicans, Top Democrats, Other Democrats. Each candidate has a brief resumé, notes on where they stand on some top issues (Iraq, abortion, gay marriage, taxes, etc), and then a more in-depth look. The “Other”s don’t get as in-depth, and while one of the current top candidates (Mike Huckabee) is in the “Other Republicans” section, there weren’t many analysts who were expecting that.

If you are still undecided about your vote, seeing the candidates stats lined up neatly might help you make your decision. Plus, it’s free to read online until 2/11/08. If you’re undecided and don’t like reading online, it might be worth picking up a copy of The Undecided Voter’s Guide to the Next President anyhow.

I’m not going to tell you for whom I’m planning to vote, but I will be voting, as should you. Bring a book to read as you wait in line, though!

Lucky reader Katrina won a copy of The Minivan Years. 

I have 3 daughters under age 10, and everyone has playdates, activities, and errands. I know I spend far more time in my minivan than I ever expected! I love being home with my daughters, but there are a few moments here and there that aren’t fun. I was interested in having the opportunity to review The Minivan Years: Celebrating the Hectic Joys of Motherhood, to read another mom’s experiences parenting young children. A minivan can be a small, shrill place for even the loveliest daughters, dogs, snacks, and sand toys!

The Minivan Years: Celebrating the Hectic Joys of Motherhood is a collection of essays by Olivia Bruner which brings attention to the good parts of life with young and busy children. While pointing out the positives, Bruner uses Christian messages as well as anecdotes from her daily life and the lives of her friends and family. You may recognize Bruner’s name from her earlier book Playstation Nation, which she co-authored with her husband, Kurt Bruner. Their names may also be familiar because of their close work with Focus on the Family and Dr. Dobson.

If you are a Christian mom who is feeling frazzled, this is the book for you! Whether you are stressed by the number of things you have to do each bedtime, or having to reheat dinner before eating it, or even simply the amount of time you are stuck in the car, there are simple ideas on how to make you and your family happier. It’s great to see simple, insightful ideas; Bruner knows that giving overwhelmed parents complex ideas to reduce stress would only cause more stress! Each chapter highlights a certain area of life that can be challenging, and then gives tips to help lower your stress level and increase family harmony. Bruner intersperses her tips for keeping a positive attitude during The Minivan Years with quotes from Scriptures and lessons from the Bible. Don’t think because Bruner is quoting Scripture and discussing her faith throughout the chapters, that she has a holier-than-thou attitude; she is funny and self-deprecating as she talks about her own parenting mishaps. You can’t help but laugh with her when her two year old goes outside and knocks on the neighbor’s door dressed only in bubbles!

If you are not Christian, this book is not likely to be a good fit. The religious message is very strongly tied with the parenting tips, so it would be difficult to “bleep” over the Christian aspects. Depending on your comfort level with Christian theology, you may wish to look through it, as Bruner has some wonderful ideas that anyone can use.

Some of the nuggets from The Minivan Years I really enjoyed were:

• “Relax! We must learn to worry less and trust our instincts more.” (p. 97)
• High/Low: “Begin the habit of going around the dinner table and asking each person to take turns sharing his or her high and low for that day.” (p. 28)
• Play together: “When I play a round of Go Fish with Shaun, he learns to enjoy me as a person, not merely obey me as a parent and authority figure.” (p. 55)
• Money Management: “It’s never too early to begin modeling and teaching your children about handling money. Why not start when they are young by setting up a give, save, and spend allowance box?” (p. 64)

If you are a devout Christian with young kids, I highly recommend picking up The Minivan Years. It will give you some ideas about picking your battles and realize that “if a perfect parent like God encounters mishaps, I suppose you and I are in good company.” (p. 15) Olivia Bruner has a lovely sense of humor, and she intertwines real examples of parenting mishaps along with guidance from the Bible and changes her family made so their lives would become easier.

If you have a different belief structure, I recommend looking at The Minivan Years at the library or a bookstore prior to purchasing it. Depending on your comfort level, it may or may not be a book that could give you a some new ideas.

This book was received from the publisher for review

Thank you to everyone who commented!

This book was read as part of the MotherTalk Book Club and Salon, fostering great discussions with readers

The Middle Place talks about that time in your life where you are both someone’s child and someone’s parent. Author Kelly Corrigan is specifically talking about that time when you are new to parenting and you still feel a strong identity to “home” being where your parents live, and instinctively calling your parents to get their approval. As we start The Middle Place, Kelly is living on the west coast with her husband and two young daughters, while her parents live on the east coast. Kelly has just started into the world of balancing being a loving, attentive daughter and a loving, attentive mother.

Kelly weaves a beautiful story about her love for her family through conversations, emails, thoughts, and flashbacks to her childhood. While she has a very close relationship with her mother and two older brothers, she is very attached to her father, George. Greenie (or any of her father’s many nicknames) is an exuberant, gregarious, and optimistic man who loves his youngest child (and only daughter) very much. There’s a sweetness in the father-daughter relationship that lacks the strain inherent in mother-daughter relationships. Just as I think awwww when I see my daughters with my husband, I felt Kelly’s strong love for her father throughout the book. In fact, as soon as I finished it, I called my dad and my step-dad to tell them I loved them.

While all of us deal with being in The Middle Place when we start having children, not everyone experiences the crisis Kelly and her family went through. Kelly was diagnosed with breast cancer, and then a short time later her father was diagnosed with bladder cancer. Kelly’s family had rallied around her, flying out to California to help her and to care for her young daughters Claire and Georgia. However, because of her own treatments, she can’t fly back to the east coast to rally around her father as he goes through similar cancer treatments. George and Kelly have so many deep connections, and while phone conversations helped, you could still feel her sadness over not being physically present.

I’ve known several people with breast cancer, and known even more dealing with other forms of cancer, including my grandmother and her husband. Reading The Middle Place really showed me the emotional and physical cost of the cancer treatments, but in a personal way, not dry and clinical. Kelly’s writing evoked laughter and tears as I read about fun times in her childhood juxtaposed with her reactions to chemo and radiation. While I knew intellectually that it was possible for me to get breast cancer, I felt very removed from the possibility. It wasn’t until I read The Middle Place that it really clicked for me. I could really relate to an author who was my age, with young daughters, brown hair, and glasses, plus a father who really enjoys life and nicknames! This isn’t a memoir that will scare you, though - it was actually quite comforting that Kelly, who admits to being “not stoic”, could deal with everything that was thrown at her. If she can manage to juggle everything, we can probably handle a couple of balls in the air, too.

Kelly has written a memoir that will live in your heart. It feels like I’ve known her family forever, and I kept wanting to scream, “me too!” about all the 1970s and 1980s memories. However, my brother never bought a snake! While my chronic illness isn’t cancer, I have been laid low for 2 years, and I could also understand when Kelly wanted to do things but couldn’t, and hated disappointing her daughters, husband, and parents. The Middle Place is written so beautifully, it intermingles the serious with the silly and the painful with the playful. Cancer is serious business, but Kelly reminds us that no one can be serious constantly.

I am becoming a big fan of memoirs, and this one is fabulous. The Middle Place is engrossing, engaging, and Kelly Corrigan and her family really leap off the page. I really enjoyed her tone, when she was positive and when she was not, it all felt very honest. This isn’t just a memoir about breast cancer, it’s also a tribute to a wonderful family and a beautiful father-daughter relationship. I highly recommend reading The Middle Place, and then taking your dad out for coffee!

This book was read as part of the MotherTalk Book Club and Salon, fostering great discussions with readers
The front cover of Persian Girls: A Memoir by Nahib Rachlin has a quote from a Boston Globe reviewer saying that the “memoir reads like a novel”, which I felt was very accurate. Nahib has provided us with a peek into her world, spanning over fifty years, and immersing us in the culture of Iran and her family.
Nahib pulls us quickly into her world, showing us her split childhood - life with her adopted mother for her first 9 years, and then life with her birth family. Nahib’s birth mother, Mohtaram, was very fertile, she agreed to give a child to her sister, Maryam. It was when Nahib turned 9 that she was considered “of age”, able to legally marry, and that is when her father came to get her. When her father took her from her adopted mother, Nahib lost an attentive mother, she gained a sister and confidante.

Nahib’s relationship with her older sister Pari is incredibly moving. Both girls loved American movies and the idea of new freedoms for women. I look at my daughters, and hope for them to continue their close relationship - one like what Nahib and Pari had. There were many times as I was reading Persian Girls that I wished I was reading a novel, and that the author could guarantee me a happy ending for everyone involved. The relationship between Nahib and Pari was so intense, and yet fraught with obstacles. Their middle sister, Manijeh, was their mother’s favorite, and the obvious favoritism made for a lot of rivalry between them. As time passes, and physical distances between them increase, the bonds between them change and strengthen.

The Iranian Government and its changing laws cast a shadow over the lives of Nahib and her family. Every choice they make has to take the laws and social mores into account. Nahib’s brothers go to college in the US, which is seen as a very modern thing to do. However, her two older sisters are married traditionally - in arranged marriages. While all families worry about appearances, in Nahib’s father seemed to worry even more than usual. His job as a lawyer seemed tied to how his family is perceived, and he must balance the traditional and the modern.

Parts of Persian Girls feel like a mystery, and one that cannot be solved. Without an omniscient narrator, we only know what Nahib has experienced or discovered. I wish I could see into the heads of many of the characters, but there is an intimate feeling reading one person’s memories, one person’s truth.

Nahib states at one point in Persian Girls that she feels like she doesn’t belong in either culture. I know that feeling is common among many ex-patriots, but I have to wonder if the problems in US-Iranian relationships made her transition more difficult. I found myself identifying so much with Nahid, finding many universal truths within her words, no matter your background.

I highly recommend Persian Girls to anyone who enjoys memoirs and non-fiction, as well as to anyone who enjoys women’s fiction or literary fiction - it really is a memoir that reads like a novel. It pulls you in, with vivid imagery of Nahid Rachlin’s world. Watch out, though, once you start it you won’t be able to put it down easily! I look forward to reading Nahid Rachlin’s other books.

I received an advance reader’s copy of Service Included: Four-Star Secrets of an Eavesdropping Waiter by Phoebe Damrosch from Harper Collins for review at the end of the summer. Unfortunately, it got put in the wrong stack of books, and I just now rediscovered it. I’m very disappointed I didn’t read it earlier. Update! Service Included is on the NYT list of top 100 books for 2007!

I don’t want to pigeon hole Service Included into one category. It is a story about a woman’s experience as a “Captain”, or one of the main waitresses, in a four star restaurant in NYC. However, she isn’t a waitress to support another artistic career - she’s there because she’s in love with the food It’s also the story of a woman falling in love with a man who joins her in her food love affair, and brings the wine. This is a non-fiction book that reads as smoothly as a novel.

If you wanted a recipe for Service Included, I would say that it’s got a splash of Kitchen Confidential, a few pinches of Cooking for Mr. Latte, and a twist of Garlic and Sapphires. There’s a secret ingredient in there, too - Phoebe Damrosch’s perspective and personality, which makes everything “just right”.

Memoirs in general can be very tricky. Food-based memoirs especially so - you can lose readers if you talk over their head, or if you talk down to them. Some readers will roll their eyes at a page-long discussion about salt types, where others with luxuriate in it. Damrosch’s self-deprecating attitude and obvious love of the topic makes Service Included shine. I was reading quotes to my unsuspecting husband only a few pages into the first chapter. I felt an immediate connection to Damrosch from the beginning when she discussed drooling over The French Laundry Cookbook, and feeling guilty about her love of food porn. Given that I take pictures of my dinners and recipes, I could relate - I love good food porn in cookbooks or food magazines!

I have had a dream of working in a restaurant - I always pictured myself as either a line cook or a sous chef. I’ve spent far too time reading food memoirs, watching Food Network, and reading cookbooks. Unfortunately, with Celiac Disease, it’s unlikely I’d ever be able to work in a restaurant, so it’s great to get a peek inside without having to do the work! Damrosch gives us an in-depth description of the training to be a part of the Thomas Keller restaurant Per Se from the orientation (”I drank the Kool-aid”) and opening. She continues with an intriguing look at what it is like to be the almost invisible server at a restaurant that has a two month wait for reservations, and yet has regulars, including some who come for lunch and dinner in the same day.

I was drooling at the idea of a 7 course tasting menu, with no duplicated ingredients, but I was feeling somewhat disappointed that I couldn’t experience this joy, given the anti-allergy opinions of other chefs. I was overjoyed to read that Per Se will make gluten-free bread, and asks if anyone has any allergies at the beginning of the meal experience. It was once I knew that I could eat there (you know, if money starts growing on our bushes), that I fell in love with Service Included even more. Damrosch’s point of view on allergies is refreshing - she dislikes people saying they are “allergic” to foods simply because they dislike them, but she is happy to help the kitchen accommodate any real allergies, as well as personal tastes.

I was fascinated to see that the book started with the Diner’s Bill of Rights - the things to which each diner is entitled. As we read on, we find parts of the rule book from Per Se, and the rationale behind the rules. While Rule #4 seems pretty obvious: “No cologne, scented lotions, scented soaps, aftershave, or perfume are to be worn during service.” We want to smell the food, not the server! Rule #25 seems excessive:

Hair must be cut above the ears.

• A. Women’s hair must be neatly arranged off face
• B. Everyone’s hair must remain as it was when hired (Rule #27 explains that the same goes for facial hair

I was boggled by this apparently obsessive micromanagement until I read Damrosch’s explanation:

Of all the rules, 25(b) was the most fascinating to me. I was beginning to understand what the management meant when they spoke of “image”. They didn’t hire someone with pink hair or a scraggly goatee, so they wanted to make sure they didn’t get stuck with one later.

Damrosch might have drunk the Kool-Aid to become a follower of Thomas Keller, but her attitude remains intact. Her snarkiness is also much appreciated - when describing the dining experience at Per Se, she calls her example couple “Mr. and Mrs. Bichalot”. When discussing a failed relationship, she muses, “He was very sweet and very attractive, but he was also a Republican ex-Marine who watched football on television. That didn’t work for about four reasons.”

Food is always connected to love - starting when our parents and grandparents feed us in childhood. How many people practice a dish before cooking it for a date? Or dither for days about where they want to bring their date. Damrosch discusses her unsuccessful relationships and gently introduces us to, and describes falling in love with, her partner. We can follow their relationship (complete with embarrassing anecdotes of Phoebe reading his email!) from first crush to an ongoing relationship.

After reading Garlic and Sapphires, books by Jeffry Steingarten, reading a Per Se review, and growing up as the daughter of a restaurant reviewer, I was fascinated to see the other side - what does the restaurant do in order to prepare for a review? How much can you coddle a reviewer without him or her knowing? How strained does the tension become waiting for the reviewer to arrive? And yes, they really did post pictures of the New York Times reviewer in the kitchen!

I feel privileged and exultant to have been allowed behind “employees only” door of the restaurant, and invited out to one of the late-night bars after work with the Per Se crew via Service Included. I may never work in a restaurant, but I have a much better understanding of what is going on behind the scenes, and have tips on what to do as a diner and what to absolutely avoid.

I’m so glad that Phoebe Damrosch decided to stop waitressing and write Service Included - its a wonderful love story, a wonderful food story, and simply a wonderful book. If you don’t usually like non-fiction, pick this one up and read it as if it were a novel - it isn’t anything like the dry nonfiction out there - Damrosch has made this food memoir nice and juicy.