Reviewed by Gail Bradney

One month after her husband-to-be proposed to Dr. Diana Denholm, he was diagnosed with colon cancer. She married him, and for the next 11 years until his death she was his primary caregiver as he suffered through surgery, chemo, and congestive heart failure, followed by a heart transplant, skin cancer, a choking disorder, Parkinson’s, and many more dire conditions—ranging from gout to osteoarthritis—too numerous to name here. Upon hearing this story, is it so wrong to feel sympathy for the wife?

Now working as a medical psychotherapist, Dr. Denholm has become a pioneering thought leader in the field of caregivers’ health. In a new book, The Caregiving Wife’s Handbook (Hunter House Publishers, December 2011, ISBN: 978-0-89793-605-7), Dr. Denholm draws from her own experiences and interviews with six real-life caregiving wives. She shares strategies, inspiration, and stories of success designed to help women struggling with the multiple challenges of being a caregiver to a husband or partner with a serious long-term illness.

And there are many such women—more than 30 million women are caregivers for an ill loved one. When that dying loved one is your husband or partner, the day-to-day matters of life get to be a challenge: your role in their care, your self-care, your ongoing lives, household management, sleep, sex, changes and strains on your marriages, and current and future finances, to name just a few.

Although there’s a lot of information and help available for those “final days” and the grieving afterward, this is the rare book that offers practical written instructions for making life and marriage work during the long months and years wives face as a caregiver.

Dr. Denholm’s approach is refreshingly realistic and practical. It’s not written from a rah-rah cheerleader’s perspective. She doesn’t try to tell her readers to be upbeat and positive. On the contrary—she advises them to acknowledge and embrace all of their emotions, including difficult ones such as anger, guilt, annoyance, grief, stress, and resentment. And she doesn’t shy away from hot-button topics, nor does she pretend that it’s going to be easy to tell him he shouldn’t drive anymore, or that you need to discuss funeral arrangements, or that you’d like to go away with friends for the weekend. Instead, she offers readers creative ideas and lots of practical tools wives can use to deal with the most common issues women face when their husbands suffer from a protracted illness.

Specifically, she presents a six-step process to help women problem solve with their husbands. It’s a model she developed and has used successfully with her therapy clients. It helps them prioritize their “issues”—in other words, figure out which topics are best left unsaid or shared only with a close friend, and which ones need to be worked out one-on-one with the husband. It gives them a toolkit of communication tips and techniques to make “the talk” easier. And it enables them to learn a method for coming to “Understandings” with their husbands on everything from in-law interference to cleaning his ostomy bag.

There’s a whole section of the book devoted to the big C—in this case not cancer, but codependency. Dr. Denholm helps wives take an honest look at whether their actions are keeping the husband weak or are in fact appropriate to his real needs and abilities. And she shows how she and others have navigated around the most common obstacles, including driving, eating, sex, hygiene, and financial and legal matters. Readers also learn how to bring more balance, fun, and free time into their life as caregiving wife.

Although the intended audience for this book is wives, Denholm’s ultimate aim is to help husbands and wives work through the hardships of long-term illness so they can regain their love, respect, and compassion for each other. Yes, caregiving can destroy lives and marriages, but it can also be a cathartic driver of change and growth. That’s her big message.

Dr. Denholm believes two partners can and should both take responsibility for keeping the marriage healthy, even if the husband may be dying. Her approach teaches women “compassionate empowerment.” She says it is possible to have a healthy marriage with a husband who is gravely ill. When the caregiving wife is ready to be honest with herself and her husband, Dr. Denholm’s book will give her the tools, tips, and structure to do it.

Reviewed by Gail Bradney

The Shaman and the Ironman—it sounds a bit like a pair of superheroes. But when shaman-healer Brant Secunda and six-time world champion triathlete Mark Allen teamed up to write their newest title, Fit Soul-Fit Body: 9 Keys to a Healther, Happier You, they really did create something extraordinary.

As a reader of 40-50 health books a year, it’s a pleasure to come across one that’s so different, fresh, and original. Not surprisingly, it’s been endorsed by heavyweights of the health and business world, including Steven R. Covey (The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People), who wrote the book’s foreword, and bestselling women’s health author Christiane Northrup MD.

The authors themselves have a compelling back-story. Secunda lived among the Huichol people of Mexico for 12 years and studied under their 110-year-old shaman. There he learned how the Huichols live to unbelievably old ages, are rarely sick, walk up steep mountains carrying heavy loads well into their 80s, laugh all the time, and are calm and serene.

When he came back to America, Secunda began translating the health secrets of the Huichols into strategies that Westerners of the 21st century could understand and put into practice. During this time he met Mark Allen, dubbed “The World’s Fittest Man” by Outside magazine and “The Greatest Triathlete of All Time” by Triathlete magazine. (Okay, maybe they are superheroes.) To make a long story short, Secunda helped Allen soar to greatness on the Ironman world championship circuit, and Allen helped Secunda understand the psychology, physiology, nutrition, and fitness requirements of an ultra athlete.

Now they travel the country teaching workshops on the successful approach they developed and on which Fit Soul-Fit Body is based. Reflecting their backgrounds, their book is a terrific blend of ancient shamanic wisdom and the latest scientific findings on nutrition, fitness, mood, and stress. One of their big messages is that to be healthy, you can’t just change your diet and exercise. You have to address your spiritual health as well. The idea is to forge a powerful connection between your physical body and the inner, intangible part of you—call it your “soul”—that allows you to do just about anything. When you do, you accomplish more at work. Lose unwanted weight. Sleep like a baby at night. You feel light-hearted and optimistic. Suddenly, your relationships are more satisfying. And you’re in the best shape of your life.

To help you accomplish all of this, Secunda and Allen present nine keys that address different aspects of physical, mental, and spiritual health. These include everything from stress reduction and coping with difficult emotions, to goal setting and changing your eating habits. Some of the most interesting parts of the book deal with the health benefits of nature. They show readers, even city dwellers, how to reconnect with the natural world to boost your moods, get smarter, and improve your performance.

Each chapter of the book tackles one of the nine “keys” and includes activities, tips, specific recommendations, scientific studies, interesting anecdotes, and tools to help you achieve mastery before moving to the next one. I’ve often thought that if one could find the perfect health, diet, and fitness book and actually follow every one of its recommendations to the letter, it could be life changing. Fit Soul-Fit Body might very well be that book.

It’s Flu season again!  That time of year when most of us get a yearly shot at our workplace or local pharmacy.  That time of year to invest in extra Clorox wipes, Purell, and any other disinfectant that claims to fight viruses. That time of year to pull out the ole chicken noodle soup recipe from Mom’s recipe box, which you only make at this time of the year anyway.

But if you are like me, you can still plan on getting sick each and every year.  I usually catch a bug when the seasons drastically change in November and then again right before Spring.

That’s one reason why I wanted to read and review Tom Ingegno’s book, You got Sick – Now What?  Working by day in the medical textbook field, I have no interest whatsoever in pouring through volumes of fine print on how to treat minor ailments and sicknesses.  That’s the first reason Mr. Ingegno’s book appealed to me.  It’s a quick 68 pages with not a one of them wasted.

The book is divided up into 9 simple, easy-to-read and understand chapters starting with a nice introduction explaining why you might want to give these simple secrets a try to combat the next cold season:

It seems as if somewhere along the way, we have forgotten to take care of ourselves. We quickly grab over-the-counter drugs to alleviate the symptoms of a cold or fl u: coughs, congestion, aches, pains, chills, and fevers. We line up every fl u season to get a shot, which is the medical community’s best guess at what the next fl u strains might be. Th is shot has even been linked to causing fl u-like symptoms in adults. Being a true holistic practitioner, I am not saying that these modern remedies are unsafe or ineffective, but what if you took control of your health using some safe and effective traditional cures to eliminate—or at least shorten —the course and alleviate the symptoms of cold-weather diseases?

 For me, the book was also organized into sort of a “level of difficulty” as each chapter progressed.  It starts with more simplistic techniques like heat therapy and soups.  There are also some awesome soup and tea recipes included that I want to try.  Then the book progresses into breathing techniques and scraping.  Finally, it ends with some more advanced techniques that may even require professional assistance like acupressure, cupping, and moxibustion.

We all have those old time family remedies that have been passed down generation to generation, or we’ve read those emails that get forwarded around about all the household grocery items that are good for curing and treating different ailments. My mother always treated a sore throat with hot salt water.  My dad treated a cold or the sniffles with a shot of whiskey before bed. While Ingegno’s therapies are not that simple, they do focus on traditional oriental medicines that are not as complex as you would think.

If you are seeking new ways to start combating the flu and cold season, I’d definitely recommend a dose of Tom Ingegno’s book.

Joel Friedlander is a well established authority in the self-publishing world and the force behind The BookDesigner website. His old-school self-publishing efforts, before Print On Demand, led to his becoming a provider of customized self-publishing services—a book producer, to use his term. Much of his new book is culled from blog posts of the past years, with an emphasis on the why of self-publishing more than the how.

A Self-Publisher’s Companion is not a technical guide and leans more in the direction of the Chicken Soup for the Soul series than . . . For Dummies. Even so, it provides thorough coverage of what’s involved in self-publishing for an author, with an informative introduction followed by sections on Bookmaking, Social Media, E-Books, the self-publishing experience, and marketing. By avoiding technical specifics, this book should remain relevant in the volatile self-publishing world for a long time.

For one thing that will never change for an author is that understanding the rationale for choosing to self-publish is vital. Any author committing to this route, after relishing that initial surge of independent spirit, inevitably feels alone. He faces self-doubt and even fear when circumnavigating all the options and information available out there. Most sources of ‘advice’ are self-serving, more interested in the author’s money than his art. Early on, Joel makes a key observation only someone with his experience could grasp fully:

. . . the modern notion of self-publishing depends on the opposition of this type of book publishing to traditional publishing.

Many take the self-publishing route because of rejection from or disdain with traditional publishing. As such, the choice to self-publish is often a reaction, consciously or subconsciously, not an action. A Self-Publisher’s Companion, as its author did many years ago, works on the positive, more self-inspiring notion of choosing independence, not out of frustration, but initiative. It’s not an ‘us’ vs. ‘them’ world, but a ‘me’ world.

That means the author willingly takes on the role of publisher—assuming responsibility for the production of his book, making business and publishing decisions accordingly, with full awareness and control of each stage, determining with self-honesty what he is capable of doing and affording himself. The road may lead him to realize he can do everything himself, or that he can benefit from a subsidy publisher, or that he’s better off involving a book producer like Joel Friedlander.

Part of the downsizing of the publishing industry has been the upsizing of the freelance marketplace.

This is only natural as is Friedlander’s persuasive soft-selling of the services he provides. But authors need to know what is possible and the availability of these services can get lost in the great promises of AuthorHouse, Createspace, and other self-publishing services companies, each of which carry financial or quality risks. In the end:

You need to produce a high-quality book to have a chance in the market.

A Self-Publisher’s Companion gives an author the information and confidence to make solid choices. It can help an author determine his desired degree of involvement in the publishing process. Even if that choice turns out to be no involvement and that he’s better off with traditional publishing. After all, that too is an independent decision.

I’d been following the journey of Judith Schwartz’s book for several months now, mainly because she used the Espresso Book Machine to publish it. The first Espresso Book Machine in the U.S. belongs to the Northshire Bookstore in Vermont where copies of Judith’s book can be born in a matter of minutes.  The word therapist in the title pretty much kept me away from reading it, but after Mrs. Schwartz’s approached me with her book, I decided to give it a try.  And I’m glad I did.

At 148 pages, it’s a short and quick read and some readers may frown at that list price, although E-readers can download it at Smashwords for $9.99,  but keep in mind what it takes to put this book together.  And I’m not just talking about the physicality involved: the cost of paper and ink, time and payroll to run that nifty little book machine, electricity and maintenance, packing and shipping.

Most readers don’t consider the effort that is placed into a book beyond a writer spending hours sweating over a keyboard, and then I don’t even think they take that into consideration sometimes.  But those, like me, who support the indie community do know what it takes and can certainly appreciate a book like Judith’s.  And just by reading Judith’s book, you do get a sense of the blood, sweat, and tears she put into the story that lies on the page.

The story evolves around Judith’s on self journey to mental health.  Deeply affected by her grandmother’s suicide, Judith finds that happiness escapes her and is always out of reach.  As she matures, marries, and has a child, the new focus in her life sadly does not help her succeed at finding the meaningful connections she longs for outside herself.  She’s good at putting up a front, but she is a ticking time bomb on the inside on the verge of emotional breakdown. She seeks therapy to extinguish that fuse, and on the road to recovery, she decides to become a therapist herself.

The book begins with Judith, all dressed up in new clothes which she hopes will make her look and feel like a real therapist, about to meet her first patient who, like Judith once was, is lost and becomes a metaphor for what Judith has just gone through.  From there, the book switches back and forth between past and present as Judith recounts her own journey through therapy, education, and ultimately happiness.

This book is an ideal guide book through self-awareness for those who may be experiencing the same problem, and in today’s society, who isn’t?  But that’s what makes this book so personal for Judith and for the reader. As you read it, you’ll be saying, “Oh my, that’s me!”  As a therapist herself, Judith admits that her journey is not complete.  Happiness in life can be achieved, but it is not always a final destination.  Instead, we must conquer those bumps in the road that stand in our way of trying to get there.  And instead of finding happiness at the end of the road, the journey becomes more about those obstacles – not just solving them but discovering how they got there in the first place, facing up to them and owning them. Here’s a bit near the end of the book that couldn’t ring more true:

One bit of wisdom was that psychoanalysis could not promise freedom from sadness and care, rather that one went from neurotic misery to “ordinary unhappiness”. Glad I got that misery out of the way.

And as I said, I’m glad I read this book.  Divided into “three years,” this is not your typical self-help book sectioned with outlines and motivational quotes.  It’s actually far from it, and I wouldn’t even classify it as self-help.  Instead, the book is one person’s story who was in search of help and succeeded in getting it, and ultimately succeeded in helping others along the way.  If you don’t read any other nonfiction book this year, read this one.  Like I said, it’s a quick read.  It’s also heartfelt and not a word is wasted.  Judith’s new “clothes” make her look like a winner, and so does this book!

Read a preview of Judith’s book here!

Buy Judith’s book here!

Want to learn more about Judith, The Therapist’s New Clothes, and her experience with publishing using the Espresso Book Machine?  Check back tomorrow for an author interview!

The subtitle of Marc Zirogiannis’s book is A Guide to Life Outside the Asylum.  I admit it was this subtitle that immediately caught my interest.  After reading the preview, I decided to commit to reading the full book.  The manuscript is packed into only 78 pages, which is a bit unfortunate because there is a lot of good material here which I believe the author could build upon in order to give us a more full bodied story.

In the beginning, we are introduced to the author and told that he spent 14 days as a psychiatric patient at North Shore – Long Island Jewish Hospital (The psychiatric ward is called 1 North.).  At 41 years of age, he is a professor, a published author, and a lawyer who has just tried to commit suicide.

What follows is a prologue that begins like an itinerary from a businessman’s blackberry.  It’s a detailed account of times and places where Marc was a few months prior to his attempt on taking his life. In March 2009, a private police force bursts into his office with guns drawn in an attempt to gather evidence of crime against one of Marc’s corporate clients.  Four months later Marc is “criminally indicted in connection with a white-collar crime” that he had nothing to do with. Marc’s personal and professional life begins to spiral downward after newspaper photos of him in handcuffs begin to circulate in his industry.

The tide immediately turned against me. The local newspapers printed misinformation and outright fallacies about the case and my role in it. Clients began turning their backs on me in droves. Colleagues refused my phone calls or formalized their intent to distance themselves from me until my case was resolved. Supposed friends stopped calling. Even banks were refusing to do business with me, freezing my accounts, closing my credit lines, and acting as if I had been convicted of an egregious crime. What happened to the American way “Innocent until proven guilty?” What happened to that age-old principal upon which our justice system was forged? Even my seemingly closest of allies had begun to reach the conclusion that I must be guilty of something. After all, the Grand Jury would not have indicted me for no reason. I suppose I can understand. Prior to living the experience I might have felt the same way. I would have believed where there was smoke there must be fire. This was different though. I knew the truth. This was a bad dream. It had all the makings of one of those television or movie mysteries I used to love to watch, only this was no dream and no movie, it was my life.

Now, we aren’t treated to a lot of detail of the “crimes” here, probably for obvious legal reasons, but since Marc is a lawyer I kept questioning how much of the truth is in this.  After all, lawyers are paid to convince us of “innocent until proven guilty.”  I’m not saying that Marc is guilty of anything here.  He tells the reader he isn’t.  But the tone of the introduction in general definitely had me question how much of this is true.  Yes, I know there are two sides to every story and here we are only treated to one side, but it is hard to determine if it is the side of the victim or the guilty.

Three events follow that push Marc closer to the edge:  His ten year old son is told at a birthday party that “Your father is a crook.” Marc’s biggest client, who is (was) a close friend, drops him. And the final event was when Marc’s partner and bookkeeper “orchestrated the stealing of (his) life’s work and business.”   Rather than fight, Marc felt beaten.  He decides to end his life in August 2009.

Now, there’s enough information here to give “Law & Order” and entire season of shows.  But Marc tells us the story rather than showing, and so all of this is packed into a five page prologue.  And we are already 15 pages into the 78 page manuscript.  Having not read another single page yet, I was already feeling cheated on the story.  Like I said before, I can guess that because of Marc’s position and oath, he can’t share certain details of his background.  However, he has only scratched the service here of what could still be an amazing story that really draws the reader in.

The rest of the book is Marc recounting how he got there, goals he has to accomplish to get out, and what a typical day at 1 North was like (which again reads like an hourly itinerary), while offering bits of advice and positive reinforcement along the way for his target audience. The book ends with a “Top Ten” Lesson of 1North and a list of helpful phone numbers readers can contact for assistance.  For me the significance of this book came from the second sentence of the first chapter: Everyone’s problems are real to them no matter how insignificant they seem to others.

That being said, this book suffers from a lot of problems.  First, it is not formatted properly.  Mainly, there is no right justification of the text and the entire body is double spaced, which means it’s actually only about 35 pages long if spaced properly. Being nonfiction, this book would really benefit from a table of contents just to give the reader a sense of organization of the material. Though the story is very personal for the author and he tries very hard (and sincerely) to keep his reader in mind, he still tells the story rather than show us.  There were so many scenes throughout where I begged for more from the scene but always came up empty handed. The reader is never really given a sense of setting and place, or feel for the psychiatric ward although it’s the basis for the title of the book.  Instead, we are left with lists and schedules and brief descriptions of what it’s like.  We don’t feel connected to the patient, and therefore the reader isn’t connected to the story.

A few chapters are also introduced with a motivational quote.  I would have preferred to see every chapter begin with a quote just to offer some balance to the text. I also noticed that the book’s cover presented above from Lulu is not the same cover of the book as on Amazon.com. This is probably because the author changed the cover on Lulu after having already published his book through Lulu with an ISBN. The cover above is much better than the plain parchment feel of the one on Amazon, but it could still be better. The trees and stone wall are a bit too generic for the material presented here.

Honestly, right now this book is like one of those free brochures you pick up from a table in a hospital waiting room.  I know that seems a bit harsh, but I would not pay $16 for a 78 page book.  As I said before, Marc has barely scratched the surface of his story here.  There may be parts of it he can’t share with his audience, or doesn’t want to, for obvious reasons.  But this book has the potential to be so much more.  I know the story is here; I just haven’t been given the chance to read it.  Otherwise, this is the beginning of a book that definitely has a spot in the marketplace.  With a bit of work, and a bit more writing, its potential starts with just a bit more honesty.

The Curable Romantic
Katharine Miller
ISBN 978-0-557-06535-6
KLM Design
Copyright 2009
100 Pages
Paperback
$17.50

The Curable Romantic is an amusing and insightful look at relationships and the people silly enough to have them. It’s harder to write humor than just about any other genre. Humor has to connect to an absurdity that other people can relate to and find a common ground. Luckily human relationships are imbued with enough silliness that poking fun of them usually strikes a chord.

In her book, Katharine Miller does a great job of not only writing funny essays, but also illustrating them with clever pictures. Her essays reminded me of the insightful humor of Erma Bombeck and I found myself turning the page to see what the next illustration would be.

The book started life as a series of articles and blog posts that Miller penned over the years, starting in her High School days. Loosely assembled as a “How To” book for navigating the rapids of dating and mating, the book also contains lists such as ‘topics to avoid on the first date’ (quantum physics, your sister’s failing marriage) and a guide to pet names (good – tiger, bad – dodo, questionable – platypus).

Throughout the book is an undercurrent of cynicism as seen in this introductory paragraph to considerations about moving in together:

After an unspecified amount of time – and countless walks of shame – you’ve finally decided to try living together. But cohabitation is more than being able to tolerate his morning breath and no longer needing to slather on a face full of makeup before dawn. There are things to consider before loading up the moving truck.

Most of the articles are written from the perspective of a female who is dating a man. Although Miller says right up front that she isn’t a professional therapist or psychologist, she does offer up nuggets of common-sense wisdom. Here, she gives advice about how to get to the second date:

Keep the conversation current and relevant. Don’t delve too much into your past and do not discuss previous relationships. It is common to have a first date with someone following a breakup, but your new beau doesn’t need to hear all the gory details of the old one. He does need to hear how his shirt complements his eye color.

Practical snippets of advice, humorous observations of the human condition, and clever illustrations combine to make The Curable Romantic a quick but enjoyable read. I recommend it for anyone who is in a relationship or may be at some point. In other words, just about all of us.

Reviewed by:
Harry E. Gilleland, Jr.
Poet, Author

As a grandfather to five grandchildren, aged seven to ten, I was interested to learn what this book has to offer in the way of advice on how to be a grandparent. The answer is it has much to offer. The two authors offer great insight with ideas and suggestions that should be beneficial to any grandparent, but especially to the new grandparent.

The 124-page book is arranged into four sections. The first section has eight chapters with suggestions of things to do before the baby arrives. The helpful ideas range from pampering the expectant mother in various ways to preparing yourself to be the family historian for the grandchild by starting a time capsule on the day of the birth and gathering family history. One chapter lists potential memento gifts to commemorate the birth, as well as ways to make the first meeting with the new baby more enjoyable for the new mother (flowers, food, keep the visit short, take charge of any older siblings). I’m sure if these suggestions are followed, the first meeting will go smoothly.

Section two has the meat of the book. Its dozen chapters cover the philosophy of being a good grandparent and discuss how you can best interact with the grandchild as an infant, a toddler, the middle years, the teen years, through their becoming grownup grandchildren. Weis and Johnston offer great advice on communicating with the parents and working with the parents for the best interests of the grandchildren. This section has suggestions for how best to handle babysitting. It even presents the authors’ thoughts on diverse topics like adopted grandchildren and long-distance grandparenting. I especially liked the notion that grandparents could take the lead in starting and/or maintaining family traditions with the grandchildren. As a poet myself, I was particularly fond of the authors’ proposal that the grandparent could be the family storyteller that introduced the grandchild to the older family history and fleshed out their impression of other family members. With my own grandchildren soon to become teenagers, I found their advice to listen without being critical or “parenting” since the teenager needs someone they can trust to talk to about things that they may not want to discuss directly with their parents to be great advice. I plan to remember their advice!

The six chapters of section three provide useful ideas for hosting baby showers, stocking the freezer, creating floral arrangements, gift giving, vacationing with the grandchildren, and being a “spontaneous grandparent”. It is a section that would be referred to often by the grandparent.

The fourth section has one whimsical chapter entitled “If Grandmothers Ruled the World”. Oh, if only they did!

“Welcome to Grandparenting” is truly a useful guide filled with great suggestions and ideas for activities appropriate for any age grandchild. It would be a wonderful introduction into the world of grandparenting for any new grandparent. Even experienced grandparents would benefit from reading this book. I know I did. Although the book is aimed mostly at grandmothers with its numerous suggestions for food preparation, flower arrangements, shopping and gift giving, throwing baby showers, there are still plenty of suggestions contained within the book to make it useful for grandfathers to read it also. In summary, I heartily recommend this book, especially for any new grandparents, but also for experienced grandparents. You are never too old to learn new ideas. The authors are to be commended for a job well done. This book would make a great gift as well as a valuable addition to one’s own library.

My own golfing experience is lacking. Remember what I said in Review 14? I’m no sports fan! I had an uncle who let me drive the cart when I was ten, and run out and remove the flag for him. I remember games of putt-putt at the lake during holidays. I was damn good at that windmill! But with all the news of Tiger Woods winning the U.S. Open a few weeks ago, the game of golf is in our face and all over the television. Like anything in our face, new interest in the subject is born. And right about that same time, an author by the name of Stephen Outram published his book, There’s No Sex in Golf. What a prime time (and excellent marketing opportunity) for a book review!

One look at Stephen’s website, and you’d think he’s a business man or some marketing mogul offering speaking engagements on positive thinking, maximizing web presence, creative writing, and publishing. And maybe he is. But all the while, Stephen’s Lulu book is right there and in your face as a tool for all of these things. While researching it, I had a hard time figuring out if this was a “how-to” book actually about the game of golf, or was it using golf as a metaphor for improving your life. It’s actually both!

Stephen begins the book with a detail description of how his father built the first golf course in Port Hedland, Western Australia in 1966. Stephen gives an immense detailed account of the experience, and how it wasn’t the best top-notch course, but it made people happy because they could finally enjoy what the area had been lacking.  Each year, the heavy rains washed all of his father’s hard work away, but when the season allowed his father and a few others got back out there and started all over again.

In the introduction, Stephen mentions that a few years ago he wanted to walk away from golf.  His own words really stuck out at me as something that is very true for any game, or for any part of our life where we have exhausted on means of pleasure or triumph.

…we give up on something when it is no longer working for us and we have absolutely no idea what else to do. Having tried everything I could think of, I simply had no choice but to walk away. Did I really have no choice, or was I just unaware of any other possibility?

We all know the answer to his question, and just a few pages later Outram brings his concept home with the notion of replacing the word “golf” with the word “life” throughout his book.  His ideas for improvement work both ways.  He asks, what would you like your golfing realty to be like, and what else is truly possible for you with golf?

Outram then presents the game itself, divided into two sections: child’s games and adult games and their differences with a sincere focus on winning and losing.  He notes the majority of golf players lose at the game.  And as we all know, winning or losing is not an indication of how we played the game.  And so is life.  There are rules, standards, judgements, presentation, and even cheating both in the game and at life.  We all know the outcomes of the latter. Outram points out that the fun of it is breaking the rules and getting away with it.  There’s an even a whole chapter devoted to Winning & Losing, and the different types of golfers there are.

I found the chapter on Golf & Sex to be quite funny, and yet quite true.  Outram compares the excitement of the game for some golfers to be “better than sex” when they get that hole-in-one, and pokes fun at how sexy golf courses can be.  Now for me, watching golf or playing it would be time better spent napping, but the author makes a good point.  Things we take pleasure in doing can have an “orgasmic” quality to them, and there’s no reason why are life shouldn’t be the same each and every day.  He closes by encouraging us to ask questions and seek answers.

I particularly liked the part about creativity.  Outram asks the following:

What creative energies do you refuse or deny, that if you received them, would manifest as the creation of YOUR golf?

Taking his advice and replacing the word “golf” with the word “life” really hit home for me.  I commend Stephen Outram for his fun and enlightening book which, being a golf fan or not, anyone can apply to in their daily lives in some way.

Since beginning this review blog, I’ve probably read more nonfiction than I’ve ever read in my life.  The success of authors telling their stories about overcoming obstacles in their everyday lives has been astonishing, such as Shirley Cheng who used Lulu to share her words, enthusiasm, and spirit.  Writers like her constantly reiterate why I started this blog in the first place.

Jack Orchard is another such author who tops the list.  He is a writer, a hero even, who deserves to be read.  His book, Extra Hands, will change you.  It is a story of overcoming adversity like none other. Like many, Jack’s life was the all American dream.  He was a teenage football player who did well in school. Jack graduated from Harvard and moved to Moscow to start a successful financial business.  While in Moscow, he met the love of his life and got married, ready to start a new journey in life.

But that all American dream soon took a different path which was totally unexpected.  In his early 30s, Jack was diagnosed with ALS (Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis) which is also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease.  ALS causes extreme muscle cramps and weakness.  It leads to total loss of muscle control, and eventually the loss of speech, the ability to walk, and to breathe.  It is a death sentence of which there is currently no cure.

Jack wasn’t ready to give up though.  He’d worked too hard in life to throw his hands up in the air and call it quits.  Since ALS patients are in need of constant care, Jack decided to start a volunteer organization to help other ALS victims.  The name of his organization is Extra Hands for ALS.  Extra Hands prides itself on turning young volunteers into leaders who are capable of facing challenges in their own lives and communities thanks to their charitable work.  Jack hopes these volunteers will help raise awareness which will ultimately lead to a cure.

Jack cannot speak or use his hands, and yet his positive attitude comes across in his words so strongly.  There are life lessons here for everyone.  As a writer, I cannot imagine not having control of my own hands in order to bring my story to life on the page in front of me.  How did Jack do it, you ask?  With the aid of  amazing technology, a special camera, using an Eyegaze Communication System, tracks the movement of Jack’s eyes as he spells words on a keyboard control panel shown on his monitor.  He can type about 35 words a minute. Not only can he write with this technology, but he can operate his computer, respond to emails, and synthesize a recorded voice in order to communicate out loud.

Jack’s biggest regret?  Not being able to put his arms around those he cares about. “When my time comes I would like to be surrounded one way or another by the people who have meant so much to me who have shaped my life”, he writes at the end of his book. “There is so much left to do. So for now–back to work.”

Jack’s book proves that we can each make a difference.  I encourage you to buy a copy of his book today, if for no other reason than to support his wonderful charity.  A proceed from each book sold helps support Extra Hands for ALS.  Go to their website to learn more and to watch a video about Jack.

]]> http://llbookreview.com/2008/05/review-9-extra-hands-by-jack-orchard/feed/ 0