Category: Book Reviews

Breast Cancer Answers Practical Tips and Personal advice from a Survivor

Breast Cancer Answers
Practical Tips and Personal Advice from a Survivor

Judy King

PRESS RELEASE

Breast Cancer Patients May Suffer from Lack of KnowledgeCommon Sense Reference Guide Picks Up Where Doctors Leave Off

When journalist Judy King was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1999, she was advised by her insurer to undergo an immediate mastectomy.  She intuitively balked at this knee-jerk course of treatment and, despite the refusal of her insurer to cover the cost, consulted three breast cancer specialists. Her persistence paid off, as she soon discovered that chemotherapy was the best first treatment for her situation.

In the United States a woman is diagnosed with breast cancer every two minutes.  As a result, women all over the country are working hard to raise awareness about this deadly disease and to help others through it. One such woman is Judy King, author of Breast Cancer Answers—Empowering and Encouraging Patients and Their Caregivers, a new release from Listo Publications.

King’s work offers common sense solutions to the everyday challenges faced by the 211,000 women and men diagnosed with breast cancer each year.  Her personal experience and subsequent research uncovered a surprising difficulty in finding information addressing common quality-of-life issues that arise during and after treatment

The doctor’s staff may be so familiar with cancer that they forget new patients aren’t and they need to know some basic information.  King says, “The newly diagnosed don’t even know what questions to ask beyond treatment decisions—questions that are as basic as, ‘Will I be able to continue working?’ or ‘What should I tell my friends—or should I even tell them at all?’ Women wonder about reconstruction, what they’ll do if they lose their hair, or what to eat at various stages of treatment.”   Many patients are surprised at the anger they feel or the depression that comes after treatment is finished.

Breast Cancer Answers began with Judy’s personal journey and is the culmination of four years of research and consultations with medical experts in many fields, who enthusiastically endorse the project.

-Excerpted from an Event Management Services Inc. Press Release

1127 Grove Street

Clearwater, FL 33755

For more information, please see www.breastcanceranswers.info

Dying Was the Best Thing that Ever Happened to Me: Stories of Healing and Wisdom Along Life’s Journey – Author William E. Hablitzel, MD

DYING WAS THE BEST THING THAT EVER HAPPENED TO ME
Stories of Healing and Wisdom Along Life’s Journey

William E. Hablitzel, MD

This book will come as a surprise to many people who have not experienced the spirituality of a physician.   Dr. Hablitzel’s belief in miracles and a higher power comes as no surprise to me, however, having been told a number of years ago by the surgeon who performed the triple bypass on my husband, “It was worse than we thought.  It’s now all up to him and….”  He knew I knew he meant God.  I suppose being a scientist he was reluctant to name this higher power.

Dr. Hablitzel in this beautifully written self-help motivational first book with a carpe diem theme (Do not put off for tomorrow what you can do today), readily acknowledges the existence of a higher power, God, in the scheme of life.  He tells the story of lessons learned from his patients, how many of them did not know how to live until they were near death, or in the case of the title story, actually experienced death.

Until Alexander Kipton experienced full cardiac arrest, he had never really taken time to enjoy life:  Alex Kipton found uncertainty through death.  It was the best thing that ever happened to him, not because he got a second chance for life, but because he began experiencing life for the first time.  With the uncertainty of tomorrow, he learned to make use of each day, and in all of those days he found meaning and happiness.

Each of the other twelve chapter titles is either a summation of a patient’s experience or a direct quote from a patient, one or more of the many teachers in the form of patients his practice of medicine brought to him:  this doctor was changed by his patients; his patients were changed by him.

Carol, another of his patients, was diagnosed with a terminal illness.  She had been too busy to marry her fiance of many years, but when faced with her mortality, having been diagnosed with aneurysms on the brain, she threw caution to the wind and planned to get married the next day and travel.   When told that the neurosurgeons didn’t think she needed to stay in the hospital—but they do want you to think about going to the specialty center in Baltimore as soon as possible.  They might have something to offer that we don’t—Carol smiled and said, “Thanks, but maybe later.  First, Troy and I are getting married—tomorrow.  Then we are going to travel.  We don’t know where, or for how long.”  Later, she tells her doctor, “When you always have tomorrow, it’s too easy to waste today.  I’ve spent so much time looking ahead that I couldn’t see happiness right in front of me.”

A medical doctor at peace with himself, who in spite of science is able to experience and embrace the spiritual, has given a profound insight into the examination, prognosis, and care required for healing of most of his patients.   Other patients who had bad news coming were treated with the caring that made the next step easier to bear, even when the next step was death.

“There are no coincidences” was quite a unique way of expressing the power and relationship of God in our daily lives.  The peace on the faces of those who were dying knew of God’s peace.  The meaning and role of religion in living, in sickness, and in dying proved to be most valuable in the stories of this book.   The reader is given a new appreciation for the beauty of life, the creation, and the Creator.  The value of listening, forgiving, living now ( carpe diem ), and the power of prayer are extraordinary lessons presented in the stories.

This book is a must read, especially if you yourself or a loved one is faced with a serious illness.  Were it not for my personal experience, I would probably have found it hard to believe that a scientist—a medical doctor—could be so spiritual, and as a result, so compassionate.

Contributing to this review is my brother-in-law Linon Loyd, who was here during the death of my younger brother.  He picked up the book and could not put it down until he finished.  We predict a best seller.

Reviewed by Lee L. Peoples

Divorce: It’s All about Control – Author Stacey D. Phillips

Divorce – It’s All About Control
by Stacy D. Phillips

Stacey Phillips’s book is not just for couples contemplating divorce.   It is beneficial for anyone in a relationship, for heeding her advice can in many cases avoid that dreaded breakup.   Taking a good look at one’s interaction with his/her mate can definitely give insight into a better relationship.

This is a book “that fully explains the single most important aspect of understanding what lies beneath the surface of the marriage wars—be they legal, psychological or emotional—the ‘X’, or should I say ‘Ex’ factor:   Control!”

At the heart of control the author says are the big six:

•  Money/Property/Wealth

•  Children

•  Health (Physical and Mental)

•  Loss of Love/Intimacy

•  Growth (Personal and Professional)

•  Fear (Physical/Emotional/Psychological)

Not only does this self-help book make for interesting, engrossing reading, but complete with worksheets, it personally involves the reader.   The author addresses control as it relates to the dating relationship or marriage or divorce.   She notes “…control does not have to be a problem so long as the dynamic between couples is working…if couples cam come to terms—if they can implement more quality in their relationship—control tends to take a back seat.   Such couples stand a very good chance of keeping control issues under control!”

So the goal of the lessons and the hands-on assignments in the book is that anyone who is out of control, whether it is in marriage/love relationship or in the process of divorce, will be motivated to take complete control, not of others but of self.   Examples of assignments come under headings such as Money/Assets/Liabilities, Children, Health, Loss of Love/Intimacy, etc.

Stacey Phillips is a certified family law specialist, who in her practice witnesses the wars between couples divorcing.   She wrote this book in hopes of making a positive difference in the lives of her clients.   While the book is nonfiction, and some of the characters and scenarios depicted are real, others are fictional.   A sincere reading of the book can quite possibly lead to a reconciliation, or if not, a more peaceful divorce.   Her advice always is “Work it out.   Settle your case if you can.”   This book shows the reader how.   She even gives advice on choosing the right attorney should the divorce be inevitable.

Reviewed by Lee L. Peoples

Boy with an ‘i’ – Author David Montalvo

Boy with an ‘i’
by David Montalvo

A new kind of book—or at least new to me, as I have not read one like this before—is David Montalvo’s   boy with an ‘i’ .   It is a “partial fictional autobiography,” told with more than words. A multi-media work, there are eight tracks of art-music and an online photo-album accompanying the journal entries, emails, instant messages, and blogs that tell the moving story of David’s breakdown and recovery.

The story begins in Seattle, where David meets for the first time the young man Chasten, with whom he has been communicating on the Internet.   They fall in love, are briefly happy, then break up. Unable to reconcile himself to his loss, David goes through quite an emotional breakdown.   The reader follows these changes through the dramatics of the Internet and David’s journal entries.   In an attempt to deal with his loss, David moves to Boston and finally, to New York, where three years later, he finally believes he has overcome his breakup with Chasten—only to have Chasten reenter his life.

In the final chapter of the book, boy with an ‘i’ , his email address, takes on a new meaning:   “Boy with an Eye.”   David discovers finally the true meaning and worth of his experience and is now truly on the road to recovery.   The reader, too, will be moved to discover how good can come from a failed relationship.   As David says, “It isn’t the idea of success or wealth or achievement that I find addicting—it’s the idea that I am now determined to climb those newer, higher mountains.   …   Leaving Chasten, I found, put me in a state of no-fear, sans fear, where I know that nothing I fail at will ever be as painful as our failed relationship.   So I do things now.   I walk!   And it feels so good.”

(Reviewed by Lee L. Peoples)

Book Review – A Million Little Pieces – Author James Frey

A Million Little Pieces

James Frey

Reviewed by Lee Lemon Peoples

I thoroughly enjoyed this book and was not at all bothered by all the controversy. Yes, I agree Frey should have called it fiction––autobiographical fiction––because even without being told, I knew that much of what he wrote had to be an embellishment of the truth or just downright fiction. As Gabriel Garcia Marquez notes at the beginning of his memoir Living to Tell the Tale, “Life is not what one lived, but what one remembers and how one remembers it in order to recount it.” (He received the Nobel Prize for his novel One Hundred Years of Solitude.)

James Frey in A Million Little Pieces tells the story of how he overcame his drug and alcohol addiction. Upon entering the rehab center, his life was virtually in a million little pieces, echoed by his simple style of writing. Simple, staccato-like sentences, dialogue without the usual quotation marks move the action steadily along. I have great empathy for anyone who fights to overcome an addiction of any kind, especially one that is as destructive as the drugs to which he was addicted. During the initial screening, he admits to the nurse his use of “alcohol, cocaine, pills, acid, mushrooms, meth, PCP, and glue.”

James at the time was twenty-three and resided in North Carolina. Someone had put him on an airplane from Washington, D. C., to Chicago. He was badly beaten and bleeding, and he had no recollection of what had happened to him. When he arrived in Chicago, his parents convinced him to enter the clinic. They had received a call from the friend who told them he had fallen face first down an elevator shaft and that he thought they should find him some help. Given the only choice he had, James agreed to seek help. He entered the oldest residential drug and alcohol treatment facility in the world. The facility, located in Massachusetts, has the highest success rate of any other facility: about seventeen percent––patients who are sober one year after they leave. Both men and women are treated here, and one of the strictest rules is there is to be no contact between the sexes other than hello and good-bye. However, very early in his rehabilitation, he meets Lilly. They fall in love, further complicating both their recoveries.

He forms close friendships with other recovering addicts, among whom was Leonard, a special friend and the subject of another book My Friend Leonard.

Many of the personnel are former addicts: Ken, his counselor; Lincoln, his unit supervisor; Joanne, a staff psychologist.

In the end, James is successful in overcoming his addiction, and that is what matters.

Twilight – Stephanie Meyer

Twilight

Stephanie Meyer

Twilight is the first of a book series by author Stephanie Meyer. The novel is centered around a teenage romance between a vampire named Edward Cullen and the shy Bella Swan.  Bella leaves her hometown to live with her father in a small, misty and rainy town named Fork, where Bella is forced to make a whole new set of friends. Bella sees Edward Cullen, a stunning, good-looking teenage boy sitting with his friends in the cafeteria and is immediately intrigued. Even though he lived with his family in Fork for over two years, he was still somewhat of an outsider. Bella attempts to become his friend, but Edward at first seems put off by her. However the two soon become good friends, and eventually Bella falls hopelessly in love. But there’s a problem. She can’t seem to figure out what is it that makes Edward so different.

One day Bella learns of a legend about the “cold ones,” a group of vampires that only feed off the bare minimal animal blood, not human blood. Even though they do not hunt human blood, these vampires are not welcome. Bella realizes Edward is one of those ‘vegetarian’ vampires, but this knowledge of his not being human changes nothing for her. She is still irrevocably in love with him.

Twilight is told in first person from Bella’s perspective with a very sarcastic inner voice. Since we only read what’s going on in Bella’s head, Edward and his family remain a mystery for most of the novel. But slowly his back story is revealed.

Twilight starts out slow, but once you get into it, you will not be able to put it down. There are plenty of scary moments in this book to keep you on the edge of your seat, especially the scene where Bella is running away from threatening vampires that want to kill her; and even though she has Edward and his coven protecting her, there is a time in the story where she is defenseless and has to fight off her adversaries on her own. There is no shortage of bone-chilling, hair-raising moments. Twilight is a special book that’s easily relatable and surprisingly universal, crossing all age barriers. Bella herself is a well developed, realistic character. Twilight is beautifully written, full of descriptive details. There are touching moments when you feel the urgency of the two main characters refusing to give up on their impossible love but desperately trying to make it work. You are taken to extreme moments of passion to the frantic will to survival. Even if you don’t care for vampire stories, I guarantee you’ll really like Twilight .

ISBN: 978-0316160179, Little, Brown, October, 2005

Check out the other books in the series: The Host , Eclipse , and newly released Breaking Dawn .

Reviewed by Nicole Mouser and Kaylene Peoples

TIPS FOR TEENS – Been There, Survived That Joe Pinsker, Hannah Shr, Carolyn Hou, Maxfield Peterson

TIPS FOR TEENS – Been There, Survived That

Joe Pinsker, Hannah Shr, Carolyn Hou, Maxfield Peterson

Subtitled Getting Through Freshman Year of High School, Been There, Survived That is a how-to manual for the student just entering high school. Written by four teenagers who were once freshmen themselves, the ninety-six page pamphlet is divided into three sections: Social Advice, Academic Advice, and Practical Advice. Quoted from page 5, “It includes tips on everything from how to deal with failure and survive group projects to how to make up good excuses for teachers and fake sick days.” Humorous and captivating, the manual is very easy to read. The new high school student will find it very helpful, as it will contribute to his/her ease of adjustment.

ISBN-13:978-097901737-7

ISBN-10:097901737-8

Fashion 101, A Crash Course in Clothing, written by Erika Stalder with illustrations by Ariel Krietzman, is a catalog of 300+ illustrated wardrobe items: dresses and skirts, tops and coats, pants and shorts, shoes, and underthings. With the exception of underthings,accessories are also included. This catalog will appeal to the young fashionista in that for each of the wardrobe items, four topics are covered:

What They Look Like and How to Wear Them

The Eras That Inspired Them

The Designers Who Made Them

The Celebs Who Made Them Hot

ISBN-13:978-097901734-6

ISBN-10:097901734-3

For more information on both of these books, visitwww.zestbooks.net.

The Chronicles of Narnia – Author C. S. Lewis

How grateful I am for the recent movie The Chronicles of Narnia:The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe! No, I have not yet seen the movie, but because I had been planning for many years now to revisit the series, some of whose novels I had enjoyed with my son who is now thirty-two years old, I found the Christmas season the appropriate time to do that, as well as introduce my two youngest granddaughters to the masterful art of C. S. Lewis. My Christmas gift to them was a beautiful collector’s item that contained all seven novels: The Magician’s Nephew, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, The Horse and His Boy, Prince Caspian, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, The Silver Chair, and The Last Battle. My gift to myself was a less expensive version, which I just completed.

You see, great-grandmother that I am, I am just as enamored of fantasy as the many young people today, and like them, I eagerly await J. K. Rowling’s seventh Harry Potter. When J. R. R. Tolkien’sThe Lord of the Rings was re-popularized by the movies, I reread all three of those books. One day I plan to reread The Hobbit.

What is the appeal for The Chronicles of Narnia? For children, of course, it’s pure fantasy! They will simply enjoy the adventures of the children of Adam and Eve in the paradisiacal world of Narnia, that C. S. Lewis so beautifully peopled with talking animals, mythological figures such as satyrs, centaurs, dryads, naiads . . . legendary dwarfs . . . He has masterfully woven religion, legend, mythology into a beautifully written fantasy adventure. For the more sophisticated reader, it is allegory. Each of the characters and each of the events represent (symbolize) a human character and an event in the chronology of our world. Aslan, for example, may be viewed as a Christ figure. Killed by the wicked witch very early in the chronology, like Christ, he is resurrected. No matter your religion, you will see the parallels.

Because reading is so important, I celebrate anything that entices young people to fall in love with books. So if you haven’t discovered The Chronicles of Narnia, do run out and buy the series. You will be richly rewarded while you wait for the nextHarry Potter.

Written by Lee Lemon Peoples

The Mermaid Chair – Author Sue Monk Kidd

The Mermaid Chair
Sue Monk Kidd

Reviewed by Lee Lemon Peoples

Jessie was nine years old when her father’s boat exploded, reportedly because of a leaking fuel line, ignited by a spark from the pipe she had given her father as a gift for Father’s Day. At forty-two years old, happily married with her only child, a daughter, now in college, Jessie experiences a feeling of restlessness, which she does not understand nor does she confront until she is called back home to take care of her mother. For some unknown reason, Nelle Dubois, her mother, has chopped off the index finger (the “pointing” finger) on her right hand. Returning to Egret Island, a tiny barrier island off the coast of South Carolina, where she grew up, she meets and falls in love with Brother Thomas, a Benedictine monk with conflicts of his own.

Sue Monk Kidd, the best-selling author of The Secret Life of Bees, has this novel, The Mermaid Chair, set in the winter and spring of 1988. A year later her main character, Jessie Sullivan, looks back on the incident in an attempt to bear it by telling about it: “They say you can bear anything if you can tell a story about it.”

I’ve always admired people who were willing to take chances and suffer the consequences, but never did I dream I’d admire a woman (or a man for that matter) for infidelity, nor did I ever dream I’d admire the husband his forgiveness of that wife’s infidelity. While this novel has elements of mythology and legend (the mermaid chair, Saint Senara, a former mermaid), it is about Christianity, more specifically, Catholicism.

When Jessie was a child, her father told her the story of mermaids living in the waters around the island. Their main job was to save humans, he said, and years later, she wonders if they didn’t save her. Never ever having done anything out of the ordinary, she, at forty-two years old “dove” into impropriety:

World Without End – Ken Follett

World Without End

Ken Follett

World Without End, Ken Follett’s sequel to The Pillars of the Earth, is a must-read. It is the continuing story of the Kingsbridge Priory and its continuing powerful political and religious influence in Kingsbridge, England, beginning in 1337, one hundred years after the end of the prequel.

One hundred years or so before, one of the greatest cathedral—and the central driving force of this historical novel—was built. It was the culminating dream of then Prior Philip and Tom and Jack Builder. Follett has created counterparts to these three main characters in this sequel in the persons of Godwyn, who becomes prior, and builders Merthyn (hero) and Elfrin (villain). Counterparts to other important characters are Caris, Gwenda, and Ralph. This is a must-read, especially if you enjoyed The Pillars of the Earth. Kingsbridge is a “world without end” in this well researched novel. Much of the plot is dominated and driven by the plague, which rages during this period in history. You will enjoy every page of this 1014-page novel, which I highly recommend.

Reviewed by Lee Peoples