A heartfelt, cleareyed guide to fostering a sense of well-being.
A filmmaker and author provides advice for improving happiness and life satisfaction.
In this debut self-help book, Carpenter takes readers through 48 “laws” he says apply to happy people. Each chapter includes Carpenter’s interpretation of the rule in question (such as “True Happiness Comes From Learning To Live for an Audience of One”) along with recommendations for implementing it in everyday life; a first-person anecdote, submitted to Carpenter by a reader (“Jonique from Jamaica wrote to me about her experience with a worst-case scenario mindset”), that illustrates the concept in action; and a review of the topic that concludes with a link to the relevant page on Carpenter’s website. The chapters cover aspects of happiness related to emotional regulation, relationships, career, and physical health, among other themes. Appendices address happiness-related hormones and suggestions for improving happiness through clothing, decor, and music. Carpenter is a strong writer, and his enthusiasm for sharing positive behaviors with others and encouraging readers to pursue their own sources of joy is evident throughout the book. The anecdotes come from people around the world, providing a global context for creating contentment as well as reflecting the universality of problems with self-esteem, misjudgment, and personal growth. Frequent endnotes point readers to citations for further reading, but the associated text is often so general (“Statistically we will spend a lot more time with [co-workers] than our friends and family”) that the citations seem somewhat superfluous while other more debatable statements (“Read for 6 minutes. It can reduce your stress levels by almost 70%”) go uncited. The advice here—develop a strong sense of self; maintain a positive attitude; form connections with others—will not be new to readers of the self-help genre, but Carpenter’s encouraging narrative voice and profound sense of empathy will make this collection of truisms an enjoyable book for many readers.
A heartfelt, cleareyed guide to fostering a sense of well-being.Pub Date: April 27, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-73661-552-2
Page Count: 434
Publisher: Rmc Lit
Review Posted Online: April 26, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
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
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
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