A solid guide to storytelling with a purpose.
A debut manual focuses on crafting personal stories for professional success and valuable connections.
In this business book, Rebelo introduces readers to his “PeakStory” model for constructing personal narratives that convey important information about the writers while helping them to land a job, build a network, or attract a client. The guide explains the author’s trademarked “storypathing,” a framework for linking tales to the identity the teller wants to project. Rebelo writes that “by making sense of where you’ve been and where you’re headed, you can show that you have more engagement and more value wherever you land because your story aligns with who you are.” Subsequent chapters take readers through the steps of developing their own tales following the PeakStory model. Each chapter includes a conceptual explanation—much of the model is drawn from psychology research, and a substantial bibliography is included—examples of the technique in action, often drawn from Rebelo’s students, and a guided exercise to help readers implement each step of the process. One of the volume’s strengths is its emphasis on the different contexts in which PeakStory can be applied, particularly the author’s anecdotes about teaching formerly incarcerated people to use the technique to control the tales they tell about their imprisonment and their plans for the future. Rebelo also does a good job of walking readers through the process of fashioning their stories and showing how each element of the model relates to the others. Although the book is full of the author’s specialized jargon (self-event, blue-dot moments), the terms are fairly easy for uninitiated readers to pick up on. Still, Rebelo’s rhetorical style is not for everyone. His enthusiasm is evident in the text, which often feels like a pep talk from a hard-charging coach or a dynamic motivational speaker, but readers who prefer a more straightforward narrative may find the frequent statements of encouragement and assurances of success distracting. Nonetheless, the manual presents a persuasive case for the validity of the PeakStory model and makes it easy for readers to learn.
A solid guide to storytelling with a purpose.Pub Date: Feb. 16, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-5445-1964-7
Page Count: 234
Publisher: Lioncrest Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 18, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An ebullient nature lover’s paean to birds.
A charming bird journey with the bestselling author.
In his introduction to Tan’s “nature journal,” David Allen Sibley, the acclaimed ornithologist, nails the spirit of this book: a “collection of delightfully quirky, thoughtful, and personal observations of birds in sketches and words.” For years, Tan has looked out on her California backyard “paradise”—oaks, periwinkle vines, birch, Japanese maple, fuchsia shrubs—observing more than 60 species of birds, and she fashions her findings into delightful and approachable journal excerpts, accompanied by her gorgeous color sketches. As the entries—“a record of my life”—move along, the author becomes more adept at identifying and capturing them with words and pencils. Her first entry is September 16, 2017: Shortly after putting up hummingbird feeders, one of the tiny, delicate creatures landed on her hand and fed. “We have a relationship,” she writes. “I am in love.” By August 2018, her backyard “has become a menagerie of fledglings…all learning to fly.” Day by day, she has continued to learn more about the birds, their activities, and how she should relate to them; she also admits mistakes when they occur. In December 2018, she was excited to observe a Townsend’s Warbler—“Omigod! It’s looking at me. Displeased expression.” Battling pesky squirrels, Tan deployed Hot Pepper Suet to keep them away, and she deterred crows by hanging a fake one upside down. The author also declared war on outdoor cats when she learned they kill more than 1 billion birds per year. In May 2019, she notes that she spends $250 per month on beetle larvae. In June 2019, she confesses “spending more hours a day staring at birds than writing. How can I not?” Her last entry, on December 15, 2022, celebrates when an eating bird pauses, “looks and acknowledges I am there.”
An ebullient nature lover’s paean to birds.Pub Date: April 23, 2024
ISBN: 9780593536131
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Jan. 19, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.
The veteran actor, comedian, and banjo player teams up with the acclaimed illustrator to create a unique book of cartoons that communicates their personalities.
Martin, also a prolific author, has always been intrigued by the cartoons strewn throughout the pages of the New Yorker. So when he was presented with the opportunity to work with Bliss, who has been a staff cartoonist at the magazine since 1997, he seized the moment. “The idea of a one-panel image with or without a caption mystified me,” he writes. “I felt like, yeah, sometimes I’m funny, but there are these other weird freaks who are actually funny.” Once the duo agreed to work together, they established their creative process, which consisted of working forward and backward: “Forwards was me conceiving of several cartoon images and captions, and Harry would select his favorites; backwards was Harry sending me sketched or fully drawn cartoons for dialogue or banners.” Sometimes, he writes, “the perfect joke occurs two seconds before deadline.” There are several cartoons depicting this method, including a humorous multipanel piece highlighting their first meeting called “They Meet,” in which Martin thinks to himself, “He’ll never be able to translate my delicate and finely honed droll notions.” In the next panel, Bliss thinks, “I’m sure he won’t understand that the comic art form is way more subtle than his blunt-force humor.” The team collaborated for a year and created 150 cartoons featuring an array of topics, “from dogs and cats to outer space and art museums.” A witty creation of a bovine family sitting down to a gourmet meal and one of Dumbo getting his comeuppance highlight the duo’s comedic talent. What also makes this project successful is the team’s keen understanding of human behavior as viewed through their unconventional comedic minds.
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.Pub Date: Nov. 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-26289-9
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 30, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2020
PERSPECTIVES
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