A thorough guide, but it positions its methodology as a panacea.
A self-help book that explores the transformative power of breathwork to unlock human potential.
Sipma combines personal stories and practical exercises in this guidebook that takes readers on a journey of self-discovery and emotional healing. The author experienced a seismic shift in her professional and personal lives following a breathwork retreat in Bali and wants to share her secret with others. “Breathing is much more than a binary, basic function of biological maintenance,” she writes; “it’s a channel through which you can activate your natural capacity for immense healing and personal growth.” If readers release their “blocks,” defined as “patterns, beliefs, or behaviors that prevent you from realizing your full potential,” they can achieve their wildest dreams, Sipma claims. To that end, she created a practice called “hypnobreathwork,” which involves setting an intention, discovering insights, and taking action. Dissolving triggers from childhood trauma and uncovering parental blocks are the primary focuses for healing. Next, she teaches readers how to identify purpose, engage with the shadow self (defined as “the undesirable parts of ourselves that we repress or deny”), and release financial anxiety. Steps for improving relationships include understanding attachment style, or the way one relates to others in relationships, often formed in childhood. Sipma believes one can identify and manifest one’s purpose by tapping into intuition and serving others, and she draws inspiration from thought leaders like Eckhart Tolle, Tony Robbins, and Bessel van der Kolk throughout the book. She also provides QR codes so readers can access guided audio breathwork sessions. The book’s strengths lie in its unique breathwork approach and structured exercises that provide readers with actionable steps to improve their lives. Similarly to other books that espouse the law of attraction, this guide tells readers to “breathe your way to abundance.” Other advice, like “shift to a state of gratitude” and “have a pure intention,” may seem recycled to avid self-help readers. Finally, some of Sipma’s familial and romantic frameworks are heteronormative and use binary gender roles, such as assuming every reader has a mother and a father. Statements like “life does not have to be about sacrifices” don’t acknowledge the impact that systemic inequalities have on people’s circumstances.
A thorough guide, but it positions its methodology as a panacea.Pub Date: Nov. 26, 2024
ISBN: 9781608689262
Page Count: 272
Publisher: New World Library
Review Posted Online: Sept. 4, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
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
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