An easily digestible, reliably entertaining appreciation of muscle, “the vivid engine of our lives.”
A celebration of musculature in varying degrees and aspects.
Tsui recalls growing up in the shadow of an “impressively fit father” who lived and breathed exercise, was a tae kwon do and karate brown and black belt, and insisted the author and her brother train with him in a makeshift home gym in the garage. As a result, she grew into adulthood with the same preoccupation with “outrunning death” as her father did. These vivid memories fuel a multifaceted book exploring how the human musculoskeletal system is composed, how it functions, the ways to keep it optimally functioning as we age, and why it’s so critically important to daily life. To elaborate on themes of muscular strength and resilience in relation to the female species, Tsui profiles Jan Todd, the first female weightlifter to lift the Scottish Dinnie Stones in 1979, and Jan Suffolk, who, after embarking on a training regimen, would go on to become one of the world’s strongest women. Sections involving the author’s discussions on anatomical dissection are thought provoking and serve as apt reminders of the voluntary and involuntary muscle control we take for granted in everyday life, such as shoulder movement, heartbeats, posture, jumping, and even smiling and arching one’s eyebrows. The author of Why We Swim, Tsui discusses paralytic diseases and traumatic accidents that profoundly affect quality of life and what neuroscientists have discovered about the benefits of twitchy muscle movements during sleep to update and improve the brain-body connection. Undeniably fascinating is Tsui’s assessment of the biggest human muscle (the butt) and the smallest (the ear’s stapedius or the little muscle “goosebump” fibers). She also elaborates on the endurance of marathon runners and the mind-body connection where the brain interacts with the body to move its complex framework and network of bones, tissue, nerves, and senses. Grafting physical science with smooth, amiable storytelling, Tsui’s study creates a fun and fact-filled physiology lesson for readers of any knowledge level.
An easily digestible, reliably entertaining appreciation of muscle, “the vivid engine of our lives.”Pub Date: April 22, 2025
ISBN: 9781643753089
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Algonquin
Review Posted Online: March 4, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2025
A sweet final word from an actor who leaves a legacy of compassion and kindness.
The late actor offers a gentle guide for living with more purpose, love, and joy.
Mixing poetry, prescriptive challenges, and elements of memoir, Heche (1969-2022) delivers a narrative that is more encouraging workbook than life story. The author wants to share what she has discovered over the course of a life filled with abuse, advocacy, and uncanny turning points. Her greatest discovery? Love. “Open yourself up to love and transform kindness from a feeling you extend to those around you to actions that you perform for them,” she writes. “Only by caring can we open ourselves up to the universe, and only by opening up to the universe can we fully experience all the wonders that it holds, the greatest of which is love.” Throughout the occasionally overwrought text, Heche is heavy on the concept of care. She wants us to experience joy as she does, and she provides a road map for how to get there. Instead of slinking away from Hollywood and the ridicule that she endured there, Heche found the good and hung on, with Alec Baldwin and Harrison Ford starring as particularly shining knights in her story. Some readers may dismiss this material as vapid Hollywood stuff, but Heche’s perspective is an empathetic blend of Buddhism (minimize suffering), dialectical behavioral therapy (tolerating distress), Christianity (do unto others), and pre-Socratic philosophy (sufficient reason). “You’re not out to change the whole world, but to increase the levels of love and kindness in the world, drop by drop,” she writes. “Over time, these actions wear away the coldness, hate, and indifference around us as surely as water slowly wearing away stone.” Readers grieving her loss will take solace knowing that she lived her love-filled life on her own terms. Heche’s business and podcast partner, Heather Duffy, writes the epilogue, closing the book on a life well lived.
A sweet final word from an actor who leaves a legacy of compassion and kindness.Pub Date: Jan. 24, 2023
ISBN: 9781627783316
Page Count: 176
Publisher: Viva Editions
Review Posted Online: Feb. 6, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2023
A very welcome instance of philosophy that can help readers live a good life.
A teacher and scholar of Buddhism offers a formally varied account of the available rewards of solitude.
“As Mother Ayahuasca takes me in her arms, I realize that last night I vomited up my attachment to Buddhism. In passing out, I died. In coming to, I was, so to speak, reborn. I no longer have to fight these battles, I repeat to myself. I am no longer a combatant in the dharma wars. It feels as if the course of my life has shifted onto another vector, like a train shunted off its familiar track onto a new trajectory.” Readers of Batchelor’s previous books (Secular Buddhism: Imagining the Dharma in an Uncertain World, 2017, etc.) will recognize in this passage the culmination of his decadeslong shift away from the religious commitments of Buddhism toward an ecumenical and homegrown philosophy of life. Writing in a variety of modes—memoir, history, collage, essay, biography, and meditation instruction—the author doesn’t argue for his approach to solitude as much as offer it for contemplation. Essentially, Batchelor implies that if you read what Buddha said here and what Montaigne said there, and if you consider something the author has noticed, and if you reflect on your own experience, you have the possibility to improve the quality of your life. For introspective readers, it’s easy to hear in this approach a direct response to Pascal’s claim that “all of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone.” Batchelor wants to relieve us of this inability by offering his example of how to do just that. “Solitude is an art. Mental training is needed to refine and stabilize it,” he writes. “When you practice solitude, you dedicate yourself to the care of the soul.” Whatever a soul is, the author goes a long way toward soothing it.
A very welcome instance of philosophy that can help readers live a good life.Pub Date: Feb. 18, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-300-25093-0
Page Count: 200
Publisher: Yale Univ.
Review Posted Online: Nov. 24, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019
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