In a society that values youth above all else, Watts celebrates women’s inherent value, no matter their age.
Destigmatizing and demystifying menopause and its effects.
In the voice of a wise but self-effacing older sister, actor and entrepreneur Watts offers an engaging contribution to the growing body of publications that seek to enlarge and center discussions of menopause and the dizzying range of its physical and psychological effects on women and their families. Citing research from more than 50 doctors and credentialed experts on women’s health, Watts elucidates the effects of menopausal symptoms and explores treatments for many of them, including fluctuating sex hormone levels, disrupted sleep, anxiety, hot flashes, brain fog, weight gain, UTIs, and heart palpitations. The roll call of corporeal discomforts is harrowing, but the author shares with brio and humor many of her own experiences with these symptoms and their subsequent remedies, organically interleaving disarming stories about her fertility struggles and the menopausal symptoms she began experiencing in her mid-30s, around the same time she began to seriously consider starting a family. The medical experts Watts interviewed share actionable advice on alleviating menopausal symptoms through diet, exercise, and sleep hygiene. They also discuss hormone replacement therapy at length, which was first available in the 1960s. HRT grew increasingly popular through the 1990s, but in 2002, the Women’s Health Initiative made the now-discredited announcement that HRT had carcinogenic effects on some women. HRT has been making a comeback, aided by Susan Dominus’ 2023 New York Times article, “Women Have Been Misled About Menopause.” Watts herself has been a happy beneficiary of the treatment. Perhaps what’s most winning about this book, ultimately, is its author’s pro-aging message.
In a society that values youth above all else, Watts celebrates women’s inherent value, no matter their age.Pub Date: Jan. 21, 2025
ISBN: 9780593729038
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 8, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2024
It’s not Shakespeare, not by a long shot. But at least it’s not James Franco.
A noted actor turns to verse: “Poems are a Saturday in the middle of the week.”
McConaughey, author of the gracefully written memoir Greenlights, has been writing poems since his teens, closing with one “written in an Australian bathtub” that reads just as a poem by an 18-year-old (Rimbaud excepted) should read: “Ignorant minds of the fortunate man / Blind of the fate shaping every land.” McConaughey is fearless in his commitment to the rhyme, no matter how slight the result (“Oops, took a quick peek at the sky before I got my glasses, / now I can’t see shit, sure hope this passes”). And, sad to say, the slight is what is most on display throughout, punctuated by some odd koanlike aperçus: “Eating all we can / at the all-we-can-eat buffet, / gives us a 3.8 education / and a 4.2 GPA.” “Never give up your right to do the next right thing. This is how we find our way home.” “Memory never forgets. Even though we do.” The prayer portion of the program is deeply felt, but it’s just as sentimental; only when he writes of life-changing events—a court appearance to file a restraining order against a stalker, his decision to quit smoking weed—do we catch a glimpse of the effortlessly fluent, effortlessly charming McConaughey as exemplified by the David Wooderson (“alright, alright, alright”) of Dazed and Confused. The rest is mostly a soufflé in verse. McConaughey’s heart is very clearly in the right place, but on the whole the book suggests an old saw: Don’t give up your day job.
It’s not Shakespeare, not by a long shot. But at least it’s not James Franco.Pub Date: Sept. 16, 2025
ISBN: 9781984862105
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Aug. 15, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
The lessons to draw are obvious: Smoke more dope, eat less meat. Like-minded readers will dig it.
The chef, rapper, and TV host serves up a blustery memoir with lashings of self-help.
“I’ve always had a sick confidence,” writes Bronson, ne Ariyan Arslani. The confidence, he adds, comes from numerous sources: being a New Yorker, and more specifically a New Yorker from Queens; being “short and fucking husky” and still game for a standoff on the basketball court; having strength, stamina, and seemingly no fear. All these things serve him well in the rough-and-tumble youth he describes, all stickball and steroids. Yet another confidence-builder: In the big city, you’ve got to sink or swim. “No one is just accepted—you have to fucking show that you’re able to roll,” he writes. In a narrative steeped in language that would make Lenny Bruce blush, Bronson recounts his sentimental education, schooled by immigrant Italian and Albanian family members and the mean streets, building habits good and bad. The virtue of those habits will depend on your take on modern mores. Bronson writes, for example, of “getting my dick pierced” down in the West Village, then grabbing a pizza and smoking weed. “I always smoke weed freely, always have and always will,” he writes. “I’ll just light a blunt anywhere.” Though he’s gone through the classic experiences of the latter-day stoner, flunking out and getting arrested numerous times, Bronson is a hard charger who’s not afraid to face nearly any challenge—especially, given his physique and genes, the necessity of losing weight: “If you’re husky, you’re always dieting in your mind,” he writes. Though vulgar and boastful, Bronson serves up a model that has plenty of good points, including his growing interest in nature, creativity, and the desire to “leave a legacy for everybody.”
The lessons to draw are obvious: Smoke more dope, eat less meat. Like-minded readers will dig it.Pub Date: April 20, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-4197-4478-5
Page Count: 184
Publisher: Abrams
Review Posted Online: May 5, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2021
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