Life is unraveling on golf writer Dodson—his much-loved father has died (written about poignantly in Final Rounds, 1996), now his wife wants a divorce’so to blow a little clean air through his spiritual fuel lines, he heads west on a camping/fishing trip with his daughter. Dodson only gets to take one of his two kids—Maggie, “seven going on fifteen— while brother Jack spends the summer with his mother, denizens, all, of “the Brave New World of loving coparenting.— Dodson and Maggie loaded their 10-year-old truck with camping equipment, plenty of junk food, and their 14-year-old dog, Amos. It was to be a footloose journey—destination unknown, somewhere out West—with good fishing as their mantra (Maggie had recently become a fly-fishing adept), the campgrounds chosen by serendipity. But Dodson isn’t really a laid-back fellow: He’s wound tight as a clock; he is hyperattentive to his daughter; he is a fussbudget and a worry wart and a know-it-all. Betwixt hitting various fishing venues, Maggie hits Dad with all sorts of precocious question——Do you, like, believe in miracles?” “What’s a Ghost Dance?” “What’s a prude?——and Dodson dispenses bushels of concise, thoughtful, accessible answers, as if reading from an index card set of accumulated wisdom, never at a loss to explain or enlighten, always with the mot juste. It all feels rehearsed, dreamed up after the fact, and the spontaneity of the trip (which was to be its leitmotif), not to mention its credibility, goes to hell in a basket. Dodson writes that they had a fine time, took in lots of historical and contemporary pleasures, successfully turned plenty of philosophical turf, became ever more intimate. Readers will likely suspect the fluidness of it all, particularly under the trying circumstances.
Pub Date: May 4, 1998
ISBN: 0-553-10644-9
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Bantam
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 1998
An absorbing, wide-ranging story of humans’ relationship with the water.
A study of swimming as sport, survival method, basis for community, and route to physical and mental well-being.
For Bay Area writer Tsui (American Chinatown: A People's History of Five Neighborhoods, 2009), swimming is in her blood. As she recounts, her parents met in a Hong Kong swimming pool, and she often visited the beach as a child and competed on a swim team in high school. Midway through the engaging narrative, the author explains how she rejoined the team at age 40, just as her 6-year-old was signing up for the first time. Chronicling her interviews with scientists and swimmers alike, Tsui notes the many health benefits of swimming, some of which are mental. Swimmers often achieve the “flow” state and get their best ideas while in the water. Her travels took her from the California coast, where she dove for abalone and swam from Alcatraz back to San Francisco, to Tokyo, where she heard about the “samurai swimming” martial arts tradition. In Iceland, she met Guðlaugur Friðþórsson, a local celebrity who, in 1984, survived six hours in a winter sea after his fishing vessel capsized, earning him the nickname “the human seal.” Although humans are generally adapted to life on land, the author discovered that some have extra advantages in the water. The Bajau people of Indonesia, for instance, can do 10-minute free dives while hunting because their spleens are 50% larger than average. For most, though, it’s simply a matter of practice. Tsui discussed swimming with Dara Torres, who became the oldest Olympic swimmer at age 41, and swam with Kim Chambers, one of the few people to complete the daunting Oceans Seven marathon swim challenge. Drawing on personal experience, history, biology, and social science, the author conveys the appeal of “an unflinching giving-over to an element” and makes a convincing case for broader access to swimming education (372,000 people still drown annually).
An absorbing, wide-ranging story of humans’ relationship with the water.Pub Date: April 14, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-61620-786-1
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Algonquin
Review Posted Online: Jan. 4, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An intriguing approach to identifying and relating to one’s emotions.
An analysis of our emotions and the skills required to understand them.
We all have emotions, but how many of us have the vocabulary to accurately describe our experiences or to understand how our emotions affect the way we act? In this guide to help readers with their emotions, Brackett, the founding director of Yale University’s Center for Emotional Intelligence, presents a five-step method he calls R.U.L.E.R.: We need to recognize our emotions, understand what has caused them, be able to label them with precise terms and descriptions, know how to safely and effectively express them, and be able to regulate them in productive ways. The author walks readers through each step and provides an intriguing tool to use to help identify a specific emotion. Brackett introduces a four-square grid called a Mood Meter, which allows one to define where an emotion falls based on pleasantness and energy. He also uses four colors for each quadrant: yellow for high pleasantness and high energy, red for low pleasantness and high energy, green for high pleasantness and low energy, and blue for low pleasantness and low energy. The idea is to identify where an emotion lies in this grid in order to put the R.U.L.E.R. method to good use. The author’s research is wide-ranging, and his interweaving of his personal story with the data helps make the book less academic and more accessible to general readers. It’s particularly useful for parents and teachers who want to help children learn to handle difficult emotions so that they can thrive rather than be overwhelmed by them. The author’s system will also find use in the workplace. “Emotions are the most powerful force inside the workplace—as they are in every human endeavor,” writes Brackett. “They influence everything from leadership effectiveness to building and maintaining complex relationships, from innovation to customer relations.”
An intriguing approach to identifying and relating to one’s emotions.Pub Date: Sept. 3, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-250-21284-9
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: June 22, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2019
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