I have two interesting non-fiction books and two heartwarming novels for the month of May. Any one of them would be a perfect Mother’s Day gift, should you be on the hunt for one. Happy reading!
Now that the warm weather is almost here, nearly every magazine on the stands has a cover article detailing how you can have a bikini ready body by the time swimsuit season arrives if only you follow their excusive diet and exercise plan. Instead of investing your time and money in another fad weight-loss program, read Gina Kolata’s new book, Rethinking Thin: The New Science of Weight Loss—and the Myths and Realities of Dieting. The author follows the progress of four dieters who participate in a two-year long weight loss study sponsored by several universities. Half of the dieters are following a medically recommended low calorie plan while the other half is on the perennially popular Atkins diet. Which diet helps participants lose more weight and which diet is healthier in the long run? Interspersed with her periodic check-ins on the dieters’ progress are investigations into the history of dieting, overviews of popular weight loss programs past and present, and lucid explanations of obesity research, studies and results. At the end of two years, Kolata does a final check-in with her group of dieters to see how they fared. Their results? They all had lost weight, but gained much of it back. They were all more aware of making healthier food choices and all were more active. As far as their health indicators went, they were all in better shape than they were when they started the study. And Kolata’s conclusions about dieting? “The effort, the lifelong effort, can be rewarding—people say they feel much better for it. But true thinness is likely to elude them.” If you’ve tried the grapefruit diet, the Atkins diet, Weight Watchers, Jenny Craig, or any other program, you should read this book. Kolata proposes looking at the issue of obesity and health in a whole new way. With obesity as the major health risk in the United States, we can only hope that her book gets half the attention of recent diet books on the market. Read it and eat! (Sensibly, of course….)
In the spirit of being a more active participant in life, I suggest reading The Big Turnoff: Confessions of a TV-Addicted Mother Trying to Raise a TV-Free Kid by Ellen Currey-Wilson. She was brought up watching television to the exclusion of everything else, but when she discovers she is pregnant, she vows to raise her child without television and to drastically cut back on her own viewing. After her son, Casey,
is born, she struggles to survive the mind-numbing boredom of spending all of her time with someone with whom she can’t have a conversation without the comfort of her usual television fix. As she struggles with her own addiction and her feelings of guilt for depriving her child of something the rest of America thinks is perfectly normal, she manages to raise a child who is intelligent, creative, self-sufficient, independent and not particularly interested in watching television, even when the opportunity presents itself. Despite being somewhat neurotic, Currey-Wilson has an engaging narrative style. She is making slow progress on her path toward enlightenment; the way she entwines stories of her own spiritual growth with tales of her son’s physical and intellectual progress is reminiscent of Anne Lamott’s Operating Instructions.
Because of the title, I almost skipped these next two books, but I am glad I overcame my prejudice! The Monk Downstairs and its sequel, The Monk Upstairs, both by Tim Farrington, are wonderful novels with a former monk as one of the main characters, but without the preachy overtone I feared. The first novel is a wonderful love story with a heart of gold. When Rebecca, a divorced mother of one, rents out her first floor apartment, romance is the furthest thing from her mind. It is all she can do to support herself and her six-year old daughter (Mary Martha) with sporadic assistance from her unreliable, irresponsible ex-husband. Mike, her new tenant, had been a monk for 20 years until he left the monastery and landed downstairs from Rebecca. He is a man whose faith in God is being tested; Rebecca is a woman who puts her faith in herself and her own hard work, whose cynicism about religion masks a deep need for belief. Slowly, they get to know each other, as Mike’s friendship with Mary Martha expands to include her mother. As Rebecca and Mike’s relationship becomes romantic, Farrington does a masterful job of illustrating its progress despite the pitfalls and roadblocks of everyday life. When Phoebe, Rebecca’s mother, suffers a stroke, Mike’s strength and faith keep Rebecca going, and their bond becomes even deeper. Since there is a sequel, you know Rebecca, Mary Martha and Mike end up as a family in The Monk Upstairs. While the first book is a book of love and romance, the second book is all about marriage, family, and the commitment it takes to make it all work. Both books are wonderful, full of more quirky characters than I can’t possibly include in a short review, but I can’t recommend them highly enough. Any book that can make you laugh, cry and really care about the characters is worth reading.
Susan Taylor has been in the book business, in one aspect or another, since 1982. She recently returned to the Capital District after 14 years in the Boston area (which included stints at the Harvard Bookstore and the Wellesley Booksmith), and is happily re-employed at the Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza. Stop by the store if you are looking for a good book—she’s read a lot more than she can talk about here!