5 comments about Daughters of Men: Portraits of African-American Women and Their Fathers.

1. I gave this book to our son-in law for Father's Day. He was very touched, especially since it focused upon the relationship of Black men to their daughters. He has two girls. I also gave a copy of the book to my husband who is the father of our two grown daughters. I often tell him that I have no doubt that my daughters chose the men they did because of him.



2. It's very touching how each woman, known and unknown spoke with passion about the relationship they had with their father.



3. I was in a bookstore and happened to glance down and see the cover of this book. I picked it up, browsed through it, and immediately scurried to buy it shortly after. What a great idea to highlight Black men who are not fitting the stereotype of not taking care of their children, showing how daughters and fathers can be so tight, and giving readers a little personal view of some of our favorite female celebrities. By me being from a family full of responsible fathers, I was thinking "Finally!" It was fun for me to read about other proud daughters like myself. The story that stood out to me the most was one of the saddest ones: Cathy Hughes of Radio One, Inc. I was terrified for her father during his audit, and for him to live through that and still be such a phenomenal father makes me want to curtsy for that man. There were plenty of other good stories from celebrities I'm a fan of (Beyonce and Kelly of "Destiny's Child," Tisha Campbell-Martin, Nicole Ari Kodjoe, Aisha Tyler, Malinda Williams, and Meagan Good).
   
   I was a little bored with the celebrities I didn't know. However, by me reading this book, it was also a Black history lesson to me to be introduced to sistas who have done such positive things in the community and to learn about their success.
   
   I took the idea from this book, thought about the uncreative Christmas gift that I got my father (i.e., gift card), and immediately found a picture of him and I to print out. Before long, I had an essay for him too, and I will present it to him on Christmas Eve (when we open our gifts). I also decided to read "Pop: A Celebration of Black Fatherhood" and both books gave me the motivation to create a dedication page/picture for my brother, my godfather, and my grandfather too. I hope they appreciate their gifts the same way I appreciated this book. Thanks for the idea and your work, Rachel Vassel.



4. This book is very inspirational in terms of outlining the many facets of relationships between dads and daughters. I liked the fact that the author chose from several different genres of women. I wished, however, that there were some common women amongst the group. Each of these women were celebraties, CEOs or claimed some high-powered position in their respective fields. It would've been nice to include highlights of the very average relationships that go on everyday with women and dads who are not at all famous. Overall, however, the book was very gratifying. I am giving it to my daughter's father for Christmas, along with my own essay on what a great dad he has become thus far.



5. I really enjoyed this book. I gave a copy to my husband. The photos are great, the words often brought me to tears. This is a book that praises the efforts of good fathers and gives fathers-to-be a glimpse of what it takes to have a positive impact on their child--so little, yet sooo much.

5 comments about Gorgeous Disaster: The Tragic Story of Debra Lafave.

1. I was really looking forward to reading this book, but was a little disappointed in it. I agree with "DF"'s comments. The book comes across as a little self-serving on Owen LaFave's part. He paints himself as the long-suffering good guy of a husband, which he may be, but there are generally 3 sides to every story - his, hers and the truth (not minimizing what Ms. LaFave did). Also, Mr. LaFave needs to purchase a thesaurus if he plans on writing any more books - the use of the word "gorgeous" becomes trite and tedious. There are many other words that can be used to convey that something or someone is appealing to the eye. Overall, it is a pretty good book, but it smacks of using his personal adversity to make a few bucks.



2. Incredible book. I was totally intrigued. Debra really was sick but I feel that her husband was most likely rough to live with also.



3. The story was interesting and an easy read, however as others have mentioned the constant references to her beauty are very distracting and annoying. She is a cute girl, but gorgeous and model-like are certainly generous compliments. I think it's more clown-like with the oversize eyelashes. Owen certainly thinks very highly of himself and it shows over and over, and the personal insight on their sex life left me feeling icky. Curiosoity wise it is a good read, however I think it would have been better if written as a fact-based story without the personal and ego building comments of Owen. I suggest borrowing it from the library though like I did. I would have really been disappointed had I bought it.



4. First, this book is badly edited -- or, frankly, I truly wonder if anyone even made an attempt at it. No publisher should be in that much of a hurry.
   
   Second, I read this book because Debra LaFave came before the court again very recently. Only then did I become curious enough to look into the story.
   
   And finally, in Gorgeous Disaster, here is the voice I hear from Owen LaFave:
   I loved this gorgeous creature, couldn't help it really, married her as a test, which incidently didn't take. Mostly, I did well as a husband to this beauty. She needed training. I put up with it all because, aside from her obvious problems, she had many good qualities.
   
   You know, now that I'm writing this, he makes his relationship to Debra sound like owning a dog. Perhaps it's just the manner in which the book was written. But, often I found myself wincing rather than being sympathetic to his feelings. I would say that this man is simply not too deep. It's easy to conjure up the image of someone falling down, jumping right up, brushing off his clothing, finding a lottery ticket at his feet, and cashing it in as fast as he can.
   
   So, in conclusion, this book does not offer anything but a somewhat whiney, salacious exerpt. The last chapter will give you some hints on what to look for in a teacher predator.



5. so what.. We don't really need to read a book about him being unable to satisfy his wife causing her to seek out minors..lol.. waste of paper.. this guy needs to move on..

5 comments about Incest: From "A Journal of Love" -The Unexpurgated Diary of Anaïs Nin (1932-1934).

1. Anais simply put was a grand master artist and her medium was words. I fell in love with her writing within the first two pages. She just lulls you, comforts you, titillates you and completely entertains you in this volume of her diaries.



2. I have read this two or three times in the past five years, and I never tire of Anais's breathless, poetic style and the amazing fluidity with which she exposes contradictory sides to her personality. This is a real diary written by a real woman, and memoirs and other published diaries seem diluted and prepackaged in comparison.
   
   However, the sexual content here is highly charged and not for the squeamish. Only open minds need apply.



3. Wow!! what a LOVELY review!! thanks K. for your boldness and clear audacity and intelligence! i haven't read this one yet but i will. Anais is a phenomenal being who brought to life the inner life so honestly. She should be studied as part of a way to be a better human in my oppinion...
   
   Why???
   
   Because it is only through deep reflection, through willing honesty that we can actually IMPROVE ourselves as human beings.... i.e. EVOLVE. She is an unending inspiration of self-acceptance and shear divulgence that can awaken our society to become more enlightened instead of hiding behind the lies of dominance birthed only by pathological insecurities.
   
   Let us all write our own diaries so that we can see ourselves for what we are actually doing instead of hide behind pretense and the perpetuation of initimidation that keeps the secrets alive and in the shadows... out them through self-acceptance and the desire to change!
   
   Read Anais Nin to know yourself better, even if you think you have nothing in common with what seems so outrageous. Many children are concieved in rape with their "lawful" mates... Wake up and understand humanity still further than you ever imagined!! ENJOY!!



4. In general I find Anais Nin's work to be self-indulgent and her subject matter (largely herself) trivial. Her portraits of others are frequently lightweight and lack perceptiveness. Her Diaries are overwrought and sometimes unintentionally funny but in general aren't worth the time it takes to read them. These previously unpublished sections of her Diaries, in which Nin describes her incestuous relationship with her father, are however the most compelling segments of her writing in the whole canon.
   
   She describes with great insight her father's character, and she sketches his physical attributes with great economy yet enables us to see the man as she saw him - frail, a hopeless narcicist and an aging dandy, yet compelling and vital despite the betrayals of his body (and his betrayals of all those who ever got close to him). Her account of her own feelings is also economical for once, and we don't have to labor through over-written descriptions of her emotional condition in order to get to the point.
   
   While the subject matter may not be to everyone's taste, I would argue that if you have any interest in Nin's work and times, this is the book above all others that you should read.



5. You're generally in one of two camps when it comes to Nin. It was true when she was alive and it seems to be just as true now that she's dead. If you're in the camp that loves her, you will love this diary. Her writing is beautiful. I've read the biographies of her and I know that she had a tendency to embellish the facts or even to outright lie, but that doesn't destroy my enjoyment of her diaries in the least. If the pages contained in her journals are not an exact representation of the reality she was living (is there such a thing?) they are a representation of her life the way she wanted to see it...and really, isn't that what being an artist is all about? She gives a very clear image of a world that is completely alien to most of us; a world that many of us might like to find but have never had the courage to seek. She writes of a world full of artists and lovers and intellectual friends...a world full of life and eaters of life. It's magnificent. Truth or fiction, it doesn't matter to me.

No comments about A Great Cloud of Witnesses: Life Lessons from Women of Faith.

5 comments about Things We Couldn't Say.

1. I bought this book at the American Book Center in The Hague, Netherlands, a few years ago. As I knew many of the places mentioned in the book, it took on an even deeper meaning for me. I love this book, and I list Diet Eman and Hein Sietsma as heroes. Definitely 5+ stars!



2. The true story of true Christians, and Dutch patriots, Diet Eman and Hein Sietsma, and their courageous risk of everything to resist Nazi tyranny and hide thousands of Dutch Jews.
   True Christians always love the Jewish people and Israel, and true nationalists are opposed to both Communism and Nazism, both the antithesis of national self-determination.
   Diet recounts her own life, and experiences and what she saw and heard, as well as her deep faith in G-D, that guided her in all she did and thought.
   Diet recounts her experiences in Scheveningen prison, where she describes how Jewish families, who were caught in hiding, were hauled into the prison, mothers, fathers and children: 'On the nights the guards brought Jews in, we always heard the children crying all through that place. It was bad enough for us to have to suffer through a place, like Scheveningen, but it was terrible to hear those poor innocent children crying.'
   It is up to true Christians and righteous gentiles to stand by the State of Israel today, in the struggle for her survival and that of her children, against the monstrous Islamic-extreme leftist hate machine.



3. Excellent book. The book is fast paced, exciting and touching.
   
   The risks and sacrifices that the author and her fiance went through for their beliefs and for unkwown people amazed and inspired me. Highly recommended.



4. The account of the author and her experiences fighting the German occupation of Holland during WWII is harrowing. It is hard to imagine that any human being can display so mush courage at such a young age.



5. I have read more than 75 books of this genre depicting this period of history. "What would I have done under the same circumstances?" That is the question I am always asking of myself whilst reading these stories. This is the story of a group of people with the courage of their convictions...Diet's story is inspiring and touching. It illustrates perfectly that the power of prayer is undeniable and when 'all one can do is pray' one has done everything.

5 comments about The Stoning of Soraya M..

1. This is a well written, compelling account of the ugliness of fundamentalist Islamic mob justice in Khomeini-era Iran. With no way of verifying its complete veracity - e.g., the author writes about Soraya's thoughts from her pit of impending slaughter - there is nothing in this book that conflicts with Islam's teachings through its Koran, Hadiths, and most importantly, the Sunnah of Mohammad. I'm pretty well numbed to the horror stories coming out of Islam, because of the conditioning of reading al kortoby, al tobary, ibn katheer, Jalalayn, and Ibn Abass (all available online), but this book still ripped at my heart with the mystery and tragedy of it all.
   
   Of benefit to me, and maybe others, is it is a very fast read. Good backround on this village provides a foundational understanding (as much as anyone not living under Sharia can understand) of the herd-mentality, the dangers of its gender apartheid, and the absolute suffocating environment such ignorance breeds.
   
   Fact or fiction, or a little of both, this story opens up a painful glimpse into a society so steeped in the misogynist teachings of Islam, it should drive us all into more than just a casual peek into the Koran. Dig deep into Ishaq, read Bukhari and Muslim as needed, then scratch your head that any religion so ensconced in 7th century superstition, is now a world threat.



2. In response to a book that documents utter barbarity occuring in Iran, Ariana chooses to spit at the West. Sorry Ariana, this is your cultural tradition, you have to account for it or change it. It is very telling that ARIANA writes from SWEDEN, a civilized country that respects human rights and women's rights in particular. Perhaps the available Islamic paradises are not to Ariana's taste. Unfortunately Sharia law, an invention of Islam is spreading in Nigeria and is very present in Sudan where stonings just like this are occurring now in March of 2002. The author was brave to document this atrocity and should be commended.



3. I'm an iranian women who has a strong opnion about this book. First of all, it makes me sick, almost as much as when I read this book, to have to listen to americans and other non-iranians to talk about how iranian culture must change. There is NOTHING wrong with iranian culture thank you very much, we like it a lot.. However must these 22 year old laws (yhays how old they are) in Iran allows such crime against human beings, including stoning BOTH men AND women (guess you didn't know that, did you???) And these laws will change, there are people in iranians prisons right this minute who are in there only because they have tried to make the country democratic. And they (we) will succed sooner or later (hopefully without another interference from the big country in the west). Yes, the laws suck, but reasons why writers like Fereydoun Sahebjaam or movie makers like Jafar Panahi brings up this subjects is not for world to feel sorry for Iranian women (and men who also suffer) but to know what's going on. These moviemakers and writers put their lifes at stake to help us, not to bring down our culture who all iranians love. And for all of you who think: "Well wasn't it nice of betty mahmoody(when will she change her last name?) to write about iranian womens situation", then I have only one thing to say. If she had wrote a similar book about lets say our jewish brothers and sister then that book would have not make it to the market. It would have been considered anti-semitic but I guess we're not that lucky. Like I said, this book is about power abuse NOT about culture. After all, the american soldier raping women in Vietnam(an example) wasn't a cultural act was it? I didn't think so. Ariana (=daughter of Iran)



4. You will be shocked by this sotry if you have basically adhered to la-la land stories and main stream best seller novels. Otherwise if you have travelled and have read other similar tragic stories and crimes committed again woman in most parts of the world, this is just another barbaric tragedy. What I found amazing was the review of the American reader who wrote that next time he/she hears "fuzzy nonsense about accepting all cultural diversity" he/she will remember this book.... How typical of an American to judge and comment on a culture and cultural diversity by just reading one book about it. Aren't similar crimes happening on a daily basis all over the world? If I remember correctly from living in the States for 7 years, New York City used to be called the world's murder capitat. Are gang rapes and murders that unheard of in the States? This book is not about an acceptable ritual or custom in Iran; this book is about dark crimes committed against single individuals.



5. Well written, factual and horrific account of how, in many countries today, religion has been twisted to suit the needs of certain people, namely men. Having lived in a few Muslim countries, I can factually state that this sort of event is not that uncommon. It is, however, uncommon, and most likely unknown in the Western world. The reason this book is so good is that hopefully it will bring more exposure to what is happening in these third world countries. Maybe by exposing it more and more, it will, eventually, be eradicated.

5 comments about Uppity Women of the Renaissance.

1. The idea for this book is wonderful and the research exhausting. However, Ms. Leon tries so intensly to be clever that it is terribly annoying. Examples: "The case spread faster than Lyme disease at a tick convention." Or "Mother Eulaia might have been called on to apply a little spiritual soft soap of her own-some extra innings at the cathedral, praying to her namesake." Or "Born into a Jewish family so tight with Catholic bigwigs." Every page has to have one or more of her display of forced cotemporary pseudo wit that shocks the reader out of his/her Renaissance mood. It is a shame.



2. This book is more like bathroom reading than anything else. Each Uppity Woman is given one or two pages of text. The text is full of not-funny puns and not-very-clever comments. At times it felt disrespectful of the women who, in some cases, were dealing with incredible hardships. The good thing about the book is that it covers a lot of women, so at least it gives you a starting point to further your reading.



3. Prior to reading "Uppity Women of the Renaissance", I'd only ever heard of Vicki Leon's "Uppity Women" series, but hadn't read any of them. I found the title to be both intriguing and amusing. Having finished "Renaissance", I'm not really sure whether I want to read the other books in the series or not. In only 300 pages, Leon covers the lives of 100 of the Renaissance's most uppity women. As you can imagine, 100 women crammed into 300 pages doesn't leave much room for a lot of detail. Many of the women discussed seemed to have been mentioned briefly in old records and not much is actually known about them, other than the fact that they may have, for example, owned a successful business.
   
   Leon attempts to weave modern jokes and cynicisms into the stories, as in "Busier than a two-career car-pooler with three kids, La Grosse Margot was one of many women who...". Sometimes I found these dashes of humor to be laugh-out-loud funny; other times, they were annoying.
   
   It was really nice to read about so many interesting women. I'd never read or heard anything about most of them before. I just wish there had more detail...a lot more detail. Much of the time, the brief stories seem like sketches or outlines for a wonderful full-length book. Won't some kind-hearted author out there please write a nice full-length book on one of these women? The life of Christian Davies would be a good one to start with!



4. Another entertaining collection of mini biographies of women from the well-known to the obscure. one or two of the stories slightly puzled me. For instance, there is an interesting story about a doctor trying to concot a remedy for the plague out of badgers, but his wife's role seems to consisted of dying of the plague, not a particularly uppity thing to do, couldn't quite see what she was doing there. Also Vicki leon, rather oddly ,seems to have swallowed all that nonsense about the Renaissance being a time when individuality was born etc, it's as if she hasn't read her earlier book 'Uppity Women of Medieval Times' which is full of individuals. @Renaiisance' was a term invented in the 19th century to describe something that never actually happened, individuality, art.learning etc flourished throughout the Middle Ages, there was no 'Renaissance'. Also she is still going on about witchhunts being a 'holocaust'(insulting to vicitms of the real holocaust. The number of people executed as witches wasfar fewer than she claims, they were not all women, and the imputus for witchhunts came from commoners, not from the church or the state. But anyway, these stories of interesting women are fun to read, and I always find lots of women I'd never heard of before. Another fun read.



5. Uppity Women of the Renaissance by Vicki Leon is a pleasure to read and it's a book you'll keep going back to. Leon knows how to make history fun and she has a knack for finding the most interesting characters from the past, and then bringing them back to life.
   If you've never read one of Vicki Leon's books, you're in for a real treat. Give one as a present to a reluctant reader, give one to yourself!
   Ms Leon is not just an excellent writer, but is also a fine historian. She has made it her mission to discover long lost women with spunk and brains, and to bring them to the public's eye. I'm a big fan of her's and have every book she's written. I especially like to give them as gifts since they are that rare combination of spirit, fun, frolic, sassiness, seriousness, and real history. Uppity Women of the Renaissance is one of Ms. Leon's very best. Highly recommended.

5 comments about Confessions Of an Art Addict.

1. I became curious about Peggy Guggenheim, when last year, I visited her former home - Palazzo Venier dei Leoni, on the Grand Canal in Venice. Now a beautiful and exciting museum, made up of a great collection of paintings and sculptures.
   I was very impressed by the famous artists I found there - Dali, Picasso, Max Ernst, Brancusi are just a few names. So I thought that such a woman must have had an interesting life.
   
   But I have to say that the autobigraphy she wrote has no literary value whatsoever. Instead, it is a very honest, uninhibited story of a life dedicated to collecting pieces of art and their authors. Her motto was "buy one paiting per day" and she got much of the fame for her many affairs with artists. However, the efforts she made to promote XXth century art, by organizing exhibitions and art galleries can only be laudable.
   
   A definite non conformist, she decided to quit college and left for Europe, where most of the American literary "nomads" of the time were going. Bohemian life style suited her perfectly. The vivid literary and artistic life in London and Paris, made her fall in love with these places.
   
   I can only say "chapeau" to such a woman who was neither an artist, nor a critic, but loved art and artists, and who spent all her fortune to create what is today the most important museum in Italy for European and American art of the first half of the 20th century.
   
   The story flows nicely and I also got the chance to find out a lot of interesting details about famous artists. The book can only be a pleasant and light reading on an intercontinental flight or on your coming soon vacation.



2. Guggenheim doesn't seem to gilt her "Confessions" in velvet (or gold); she comes across as an honest soul wanting to relate her experiences--an influences--in the art world. Some of the things mentioned are her childhood, her marriages, Max Ernst, Brancusi, Kandinsky, Pollock, and Motherwell (to name but a few). Worth a read... and another read.



3. Undoubtedly, Miss Guggenheim led a colourful and interesting life. She had either great artistic insight and intigrity or a bratish desire to boost of her wealth.
   I didn't reach a conclusion having read this book, but then maybe she was doing a bit of both and wanted to keep us guessing? I found the book enormously entertaining and informative if a little disrespectful of it's subject.
   One cannot help but to consider that this disrespect and the virtual anonymous space she occupies in history, might be very different had she been Peter and not Peggy.
   A great read for modern art lovers, a fairly good one for anyone else.
   Though it cannot be helped nor altered, it is a book very heavy on characters, plot, and at times, weighty information; which can be very offputting and confusing.



4. Here's the story of a woman that knew them all, felt the earth move under her feet with many of them, and bought their art for pretty much nothing. She recognized them when they were starting, and this makes her a Princess. This book is her equivalent to Gore Vidal's "Palimpsest" and Lillian Hellman's "Pentimento". This is one of those books that almost transports you to a long gone era, and makes you wish you could have been there to see it all.



5. Peggy was a trip. She also apparently had no editor, or so it seems, which adds to the air of entitlement and oblique charm that permeates this book. Her accounts are interesting historically, though PG's slant on history is sometimes its own beast. This is a quick read and some of her observations will make you laugh out loud ("I was worried about my virginity--I was twenty-three and I found it burdensome..."), while others are chilling, especially the question of which Jews she deemed worthy of her efforts to help them get to the States. This may be more entertaining than informative, but it's both.

5 comments about The Private Passion of Jackie Kennedy Onassis: Portrait of a Rider.

1. When John F. Kennedy was elected president, I was five years old. That was also the year I started taking horseback riding lessons at Potomac Horse Center in Gaithersburg, Maryland. By the year he was assassinated, I was in my first season at horse shows in Virginia and Maryland. We lived on a farm in Great Falls, Virginia, and I showed my pony every weekend, from March to September, eventually moving on to Hunters as I grew up. Jackie Kennedy, and eventually her daughter and her nieces and nephews (Robert Kennedy's children who lived just up the road in McLean) were just other nice people on the horse show circuit.
   
   I saw Jackie Kennedy Onassis through the eyes of the horse-crazy kid I was in the sixties. She was beautiful, tragic and quite a talented rider -- always perfectly turned out, always on beautiful horses. She was also approachable in that familiar milieu. She had a conversation with my mother one day as I was competing in a Small Pony Hunter Under Saddle class at Upperville. I remember seeing her with a small group of women standing by the rail as the class was being judged. My mother bred Bassett hounds, and she told me later that the women were discussing dog breeding and bloodlines.
   
   This book is a lovely tribute to the quiet passion of horsemanship which was infused in Jackie Kennedy. I share her passion, and I know that my love of horses has helped me through some terrible times in my own life. The book is also a retrospective of a dead era. The photographs are wonderful because they so beautifully depict a time which is sadly long gone. I still compete in horse shows today, but they are nothing like they used to be. Tradition has been replaced by corporate sponsorship, and for the most part the romance of the horse world is found not at the "A"-rated shows, but only in tiny corners of 4-H meetings and Pony Club rallies. The love of horses used to be a great leveler for interaction between riders, spectators and communities. Not so in this celebrity-mad era -- I miss it so.
   
   I loved this book. I admired this woman. The text which accompanies the photographs is evocative and respectful. Perhaps Jackie Kennedy was not the best first lady. She was certainly not a canny politician in the vein of Rosalyn Carter or Nancy Reagan. But she was a lady, to the core, and an icon. And if you want to understand her better, and perhaps understand the last vestiges of early twentieth-century glamour which clung to her, and to the horse world she was a part of, buy this book.



2. Interesting content and great photos, but carelessly written and seemingly not proofread. As a professional writer and editor, I'm flinching at the typos. Only recommended for readers with a serious interest in style and horses, or those obsessed with Jackie O.



3. If you love horses and admire Jackie, this is the book for you.



4. If you love horses and are a Jackie Kennedy fan, you will love this book. She was an amazing and dedicated rider. I have it on my coffee table for all to see.
   I highly recommend this book.



5. The pictures in this book are magnificent and the text is well written and easy to read, gossipy almost at times. However, it is written with love and respect for the subject, a fascinating woman who led her own exemplary life. If you are a fan of horses, or Jackie, or both, you will really enjoy this peek into her lifelong love affair with horses.

5 comments about I'm Dancing As Fast As I Can.

1. The books arrived within a few days. The book was excellent and well worth the purchase price.



2. While this compelling, but somewhat antiquated, true story chronicles Barbara's hell during withdrawal from Valium, the point somehow seems to have been missed by the psychiatric community. Benzo prescriptions and hospital detox admissions (at least in the US) are at an all time high. If Valium wasn't enough hell, the drug companies are peddling even stronger and more addictive version of theses benzos. Including Ativan and Zanax being 2 of the most commonly prescribed drugs in America today. Barbara's story is a power and compelling tale of the dangers of these drugs, but unfortunately it's lesson has had no effect on widespread prescribing and subsequent addition to these drugs.

   All one needs to do to verify what I'm saying is join the benzo group at yahoogroups.com. There you will find hundreds if not thousands of people all over the world trying to cope with living the life of an "accidental addict".

   Unfortunately few will ever recover from this addiction and most will die from it or at least with it.




3. If you're like me, and really *get into* what you're reading, this book will have you questioning your own sanity!

   You will fall into the deep blackness with Ms. Gordon, as well celebrate her successes as she begins to see the light!

   This book is timeless, powerful, and AWESOME. Not a "feel good" story -- but a tormented journey -- one which will give you hope.

   A must-read for women in search of inner-strength!




4. Hidden within the pages of this intense and absorbing first person account, are sincere and serious warnings for everyone living in our therapeutic culture. It warns of the false solutions offered by therapists who rely too heavily on medication. It warns of the dangers of relying on experts to provide healing rather than on self-responsibility. It warns of the dangers of emotional repression instead of expression. But the greatest warning may be that we all need to build and maintain networks of supportive and sensitive family and friends. In the end Gordon credits this resource as contributing the most to her healing.

   Honored for 15 weeks on the New York Times bestseller's list, this book is the story of Barbara Gordon's anxiety-induced slide into Valium addiction, her ill-advised and dangerous "cold-turkey" withdrawal, the psychosis and hospitalizations that followed the withdrawal, and her slow, painful, and persistent pathway back to functioning. Readers may find the first half of the book to be a bit repetitive as Gordon chronicles her destructive relationship with Eric, but the pathos and honesty expressed in her fight back to sanity while at Greenwood Hospital is gripping and compelling.

   I am aware that there have been changes in state licensing standards for therapists since this book was written. I am aware that there have been many significant advances in the study of brain biology since this book was written. I hope that the therapeutic "industry" may be credited with significant advance since Gordon endured this mistreatment. Nonetheless, I recommend this book. It speaks with a distinctive voice warning that we all - treated and untreated, patient and therapist - must take personal responsibility for our mental health within a supportive social context of family and friends.

   No one should ever have to repeat the experience Barbara Gordon had.




5. This is the Age of the Quick Fix, the Age of Prozac and other mind potions. Barbara Gordon's story of her addiction to Valium and striving towards recovery is a classic in the literature of addiction. From a successful career as an award-winning documentary film maker, becoming famous and rich, to having a personal relationship with "Eric," who supposably was trying to take her off Valium cold turkey with disastrous results, Barbara Gordon paints an honest and painful a portrait of addiction as you will ever read. Once the most prescribed drugs for anxiety and "Nerves" in the world, it is now potentially one of the most addictive and dangerous to get off of after taking it for a long time. This book changed my life, for I was addicted to Valium, not ever imagining how it would change my life, mostly for the worse. Barbara Gordon's struggle was heroic and her getting off the drug, finding her bearings, and heading on the road to recovery make inspiring reading and a cautionary tale, that pills do not cure everything, that the human spirit can survive deep terrors. Many books on drug addiction have come and gone, written by professionals as well as laymen, but I know of none more powerful, none that face the fear with such total honesty as Barbara Gordon's book. It should never be out of print and anyone contemplating taking the drug path to lower anxiety should read this book and have second thoughts. Barbara Gordon, like many true survivors, takes her readers to hell and back, and show us that there is hope, even after a journey into into the deepest darkness of the psyche. Highly recommended. One of the best books ever written about drug addiction of any kind.