While a distressing marriage takes center stage, this account offers refreshing takes on starting over.
A memoir recounts a difficult marriage and a woman’s subsequent empowerment through faith.
In 1972, 27-year-old Kurth was reeling from her first divorce in Albuquerque, New Mexico. She then met a man named Jim. There were early warning signs of their incompatibility, like his irrational and overly harsh reactions to food, but the two forged ahead in marriage. As Jim saw his engineering career expand, the author found work as a substitute teacher, a weaver, an interior designer, and eventually a writer. Despite their mutual joy as parents, Jim and Kurth’s marriage deteriorated slowly into increasingly bitter exchanges and signs of his disrespect. The couple eventually moved to California and then back to the author’s home state of Oregon, where they would build their dream home, dubbed “What-a-View.” But Jim’s pattern of unpredictable moods and lack of interest left Kurth wanting to be with a “real man, not like the grown child to whom” she was married. The author goes into vivid detail about every fight and counseling session before their 25-year marriage came to a slow and painful end, leaving the author to seek strength in her Christian faith as she built a new life for herself. Even though Jim’s individual aggressions are never more threatening than cruel reactions to an empty bag of nuts or offhand comments, Kurth delves deep into the emotional state of her household, creating an admirable portrait of how toxic atmospheres have real mental and physical consequences. Nonetheless, the book’s first section can be tedious—at times, it feels like a laundry list of Jim’s faults. More intriguing is the author’s post-divorce evolution on the Christian dating scene. Surrounded by other “beautiful, intelligent women of God” affected by bad marriages, Kurth embraced a range of conservative and liberal schools of Christian thought that will surely speak to readers also questioning what they really want.
While a distressing marriage takes center stage, this account offers refreshing takes on starting over.Pub Date: March 2, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-63195-150-3
Page Count: 282
Publisher: Morgan James Faith
Review Posted Online: Aug. 31, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Some of Avant’s mantras are overstated, but her book is magnanimous, inspiring, and relentlessly optimistic.
Memories and life lessons inspired by the author’s mother, who was murdered in 2021.
“Neither my mother nor I knew that her last text to me would be the words ‘Think you’ll be happy,’ ” Avant writes, "but it is fitting that she left me with a mantra for resiliency.” The author, a filmmaker and former U.S. Ambassador to the Bahamas, begins her first book on the night she learned her mother, Jacqueline Avant, had been fatally shot during a home invasion. “One of my first thoughts,” she writes, “was, ‘Oh God, please don’t let me hate this man. Give me the strength not to hate him.’ ” Daughter of Clarence Avant, known as the “Black Godfather” due to his work as a pioneering music executive, the author describes growing up “in a house that had a revolving door of famous people,” from Ella Fitzgerald to Muhammad Ali. “I don’t take for granted anything I have achieved in my life as a Black American woman,” writes Avant. “And I recognize my unique upbringing…..I was taught to honor our past and pay forward our fruits.” The book, which is occasionally repetitive, includes tributes to her mother from figures like Oprah Winfrey and Bill Clinton, but the narrative core is the author’s direct, faith-based, unwaveringly positive messages to readers—e.g., “I don’t want to carry the sadness and anger I have toward the man who did this to my mother…so I’m worshiping God amid the worst storm imaginable”; "Success and feeling good are contagious. I’m all about positive contagious vibrations!” Avant frequently quotes Bible verses, and the bulk of the text reflects the spirit of her daily prayer “that everything is in divine order.” Imploring readers to practice proactive behavior, she writes, “We have to always find the blessing, to be the blessing.”
Some of Avant’s mantras are overstated, but her book is magnanimous, inspiring, and relentlessly optimistic.Pub Date: Oct. 17, 2023
ISBN: 9780063304413
Page Count: 288
Publisher: HarperOne
Review Posted Online: Aug. 17, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2023
Worthwhile reference stuffed with facts and illustrations.
A compendium of charts, time lines, lists and illustrations to accompany study of the Bible.
This visually appealing resource provides a wide array of illustrative and textually concise references, beginning with three sets of charts covering the Bible as a whole, the Old Testament and the New Testament. These charts cover such topics as biblical weights and measures, feasts and holidays and the 12 disciples. Most of the charts use a variety of illustrative techniques to convey lessons and provide visual interest. A worthwhile example is “How We Got the Bible,” which provides a time line of translation history, comparisons of canons among faiths and portraits of important figures in biblical translation, such as Jerome and John Wycliffe. The book then presents a section of maps, followed by diagrams to conceptualize such structures as Noah’s Ark and Solomon’s Temple. Finally, a section on Christianity, cults and other religions describes key aspects of history and doctrine for certain Christian sects and other faith traditions. Overall, the authors take a traditionalist, conservative approach. For instance, they list Moses as the author of the Pentateuch (the first five books of the Hebrew Bible) without making mention of claims to the contrary. When comparing various Christian sects and world religions, the emphasis is on doctrine and orthodox theology. Some chapters, however, may not completely align with the needs of Catholic and Orthodox churches. But the authors’ leanings are muted enough and do not detract from the work’s usefulness. As a resource, it’s well organized, inviting and visually stimulating. Even the most seasoned reader will learn something while browsing.
Worthwhile reference stuffed with facts and illustrations.Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2005
ISBN: 978-1-5963-6022-8
Page Count: -
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 23, 2010
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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