Douglas Abrams & Jane Goodall — The Book of Hope (Book Review)
Douglas Abrams teams up with Jane Goodall to co-create The Book of Hope: A Survival Guide for Trying Times. It’s a record of their conversations about hope, and focuses primarily on Goodall’s four reasons to be hopeful. Abrams is a skilled interviewer and captures the...Garrett Graff — The Only Plane in the Sky (Book Review)
Garrett M. Graff created a heart-wrenching book with The Only Plane in the Sky: An Oral History of 9/11. Since the author intended this to be an oral history, I listened to the audiobook which has a large cast of narrators. About five minutes in, during one of the...Sasha Geffen — Glitter Up the Dark (Book Review)
Sasha Geffen writes a captivating musical and social history in Glitter Up the Dark: How Pop Music Broke the Binary. Not only do they* capture the magic of music through the decades, they also explain how a plethora of performers broke through the limitations of...Nancy Marie Brown — The Real Valkyrie (Book Review)
Nancy Marie Brown combines history and imagination in her upcoming book, The Real Valkyrie: The Hidden History of Viking Warrior Women. If you follow me, you know that I love books about Vikings and Norse people. And this is the best I’ve ever read. It covers a wide...Arthur Herman — The Viking Heart (Book Review)
Arthur Herman explores Scandinavian culture, history, and its worldwide effects in The Viking Heart: How Scandinavians Conquered the World. As the publisher puts it, he “melds a compelling historical narrative with cutting-edge archaeological and DNA research to trace...From The Minimalists — Love People Use Things (Book Review)
A new book from podcasters The Minimalists is almost here. Called Love People Use Things: Because the Opposite Never Works, it’s about relationships. And about why our relationship with stuff gets in the way of developing meaningful relationships with people. Written...Ben Blatt — Nabokov’s Favorite Word is Mauve (Book Review)
Ben Blatt is a numbers guy investigating words in Nabokov’s Favorite Word Is Mauve: What the Numbers Reveal About the Classics, Bestsellers, and Our Own Writing. Experts hotly debate the intersection of the two, especially whether such a thing is valid. Blatt...Dr. Jen Gunther, MD — The Menopause Manifesto (Book Review)
Dr. Jen Gunther, MD is my new chief explainer of women’s health. Her upcoming book, The Menopause Manifesto: Own Your Health with Facts and Feminism is brilliant. It’s an utterly necessary addition to every 35+ woman’s bookshelf. Run, don’t walk, to your nearest...Amy Stanley — Travel to 1800s Japan in Stranger in the Shogun’s City (Book Review)
Amy Stanley is a professor and social historian who specializes in early modern Japan. In her 2020 book, Stranger in the Shogun’s City: A Japanese Woman and Her World, Stanley explores the story of a rebellious woman in a strict time. Her subject is Tsuneno, the...Elizabeth M. Norman — We Band of Angels (Book Review)
Elizabeth Norman delivers everything I want from narrative nonfiction in her 2000 book We Band of Angels: The Untold Story of American Nurses Trapped on Bataan by the Japanese. It’s engaging and obviously well-researched, including many interviews with the women...Ed West — Saxons vs. Vikings: A Compact but Extensive History (Book Review)
Saxons vs. Vikings is the first mini-history book on my shelf from Ed West. And it’s worthy of the subtitle: Alfred the Great and England in the Dark Ages. But it also contains interminable descriptions of battles and considering its brevity that’s saying a lot....Mudlark by Lara Maiklem — Visit London Throughout the Ages (Book Review)
Lara Maiklem introduced me to a whole new world in Mudlark: In Search of London’s Past Along the River Thames. Not that I haven’t been to London. I have. She takes readers specifically to the foreshore of Britain’s iconic Thames, with all of its quirks and...Hope Jahren — The Story of More: How We Got to Climate Change and Where to Go from Here (Book Review)
Hope Jahren developed the crux of The Story of More: How We Got to Climate Change and Where We Go from Here as an introductory class for college students. And fundamentally, it reads this way. There’s a lot of science, some history, a bit of humor, and a smattering of...Shoshana Zuboff: The Age of Surveillance Capitalism (Book Review)
Shoshana Zuboff is a professor emeritus at Harvard Business School, among other academic qualifications. And that informs everything about her book The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: The Fight for a Human Future at the New Frontier of Power. It’s more academic than...Legal Insights from Ruth Bader Ginsburg in My Own Words (Book Review)
Reading My Own Words by Ruth Bader Ginsburg is like dipping my toe into the world of judges and legal briefs. It’s a marginally vast compilation of lectures, briefs, interviews, and other writings from the Supreme Court Justice. They begin early in life—with a school...Bookshop.Org Affiliate
Purchase My Book
I will definitely recommend Kick Pain in the Kitchen to my patients: Those who are looking to avoid pharmaceutical treatment and those who want to combine western medicine with alternative therapies.
Jane A. Swartz
ARNP, MSN, Rheumatology Nurse Practitioner
Find Me on these Book-Related Sites
Recent Comments