Surrender, Dorothy: Reviews

Great Discoveries: Explorations That Changed History

2009-12-02T15:57:53-06:00

It's that time of year! Coffee table book time! I recently received Time's Great Discoveries: Explorations That Changed History for review. It's a large, full-color coffee table book.

Less than $20 right now.

While the photos are the quality you'd expect from a nice coffee table book, the difference here is the accompanying text. It's actually interesting. The chapters cover exploring the past, planet Earth, life on Earth and the solar system. I got sucked into reading it for over an hour when I had every intention of just looking at the pictures. This is a good all-purpose book for even the most casual science buff, as the narrative is engaging and written at a newspaper reading level. My favorite bit was about bog bodies.

It's a little large for a bookshelf -- that's probably my only qualm. It's almost a foot square.

MedSafe

2009-12-02T15:46:27-06:00

Even though the little angel is only five, I'm already worried about substance abuse. When I was a teenager, it never occurred to me to take my parents' prescription drugs. Just watch a little daytime television now, though, and you'll see it's indeed a concern for today's parents.

The folks at MedSafe sent me a unit for review. It looks like this:

It comes with four holes so you can screw it into the wall, if you want, though here it's shown precariously balanced in a medicine cabinet. I wouldn't advise that, because in order to open it, you have to hold onto it and punch in a five-digit code, then push a button that sort of sticks a little pretty hard. I like that there are no keys, because really? If there's a key, then you have to remember where you put it. And if you remember where you put it, an enterprising teenager or her friends probably can also figure out where you put it. I hope to God my daughter wouldn't think to look for my medicine anyway, but really, better not to tempt.

It's battery operated and made of fairly unattractive lightweight ivory plastic, but I what it lacks in style it makes up for in practicality. If you punch in the wrong number, nothing happens. If you punch in the right number, it makes a happy little noise and lets you open it. Time to pop your meds!

The Case for Make Believe: Saving Play in a Commercialized World

2009-11-29T19:07:33-06:00

I was excited to read Susan Linn's newest book, The Case for Make Believe: Saving Play in a Commercialized World, when I was contacted to review it.

I am of the curmudgeon-old-school ways, the type to hand my daughter a huge cardboard box but refuse her a Leapster. I just can't handle toys that tell you how to play with them or books that read themselves to you. That's what parents -- and ultimately, kids themselves -- are for.

So Linn was pretty much preaching to the choir with me. She's worked with Mr. Rogers and makes a convincing case for make believe, backed up by formidable research. It's totally scary how many toys are made to do one specific purpose. Even Legos now come in screwed-up kits that only allow you to fashion them in one way. I can't handle it.

Linn gave me hope for the future, though. She encouraged parents to allow kids to act out their frustrations through play and not get freaked out if the kid pretends to leave the baby doll in the freezer. I admit I used to get completely weebed when my daughter played that the baby had been bad and had to be punished, but Linn posits this play is just kids learning to work through authority structures. I know I eased off a lot after reading this book and started letting my daughter just play what she wanted.

Part of me is just so totally relieved she knows how to play without having it explained to her by a robot.

Cat Ladies

2009-11-24T14:57:25-06:00

When The Editor Across the Aisle showed me the trailer for the documentary Cat Ladies, I knew I had to secure a screener for review.

Meow. She collects their whiskers.

We howled with laughter when we realized the documentary was, indeed, about cat ladies, which I would totally be if left to my own devices and didn't fear my house smelling like cats. And if Beloved didn't exist. He is very tolerant of Petunia Cookie Dough, but more than one? Katie, bar the door. You know, thinking about it more, I wouldn't ever be a cat lady. But I do like cats.

I was expecting sort of a funny movie. Instead, I was disturbed. And sort of sad.

But also fascinated -- and isn't that what a good documentary is designed to engender? Fascination with its subject? Maybe enough discomfort to get you examine your life?

"They take care of me by letting me take care of them."

They all kept saying "I don't understand why people call me 'the crazy cat lady.'"

One of them has 127 cats. She didn't even know how many she had until she counted them.

EEEK.

But you can't look away. The themes here are so uniquely human. It's so not about the cats.

The Double-Daring Book for Girls

2009-11-19T20:11:11-06:00

I love just about anything Andrea J. Buchanan and Miriam Peskowitz do. I loved The Daring Book for Girls, and their follow-up, The Double-Daring Book for Girls, built on the first nicely.

There's not a great detraction from the first book. The Double-Daring Book for Girls is a hodge-podge of instructions, definitions and recipes for everything from sailing phrases to calligraphy to optical illusions to The Nobel Prize. It's an old-school looking hardback with that awesome 5th-grade-textbook font and thick pages that smell like the second floor of your childhood library. I'm excited my daughter is getting older and will be able to crack the spines on these books soon. They make me feel like a girl again.

A Is for Admission: The Insider's Guide to Getting into the Ivy League and Other Top Colleges

2009-11-19T20:00:34-06:00

Michelle Hernandez is a former assistant director of admissions at Dartmouth College. In her book, A is for Admission: The Insider's Guide to Getting into the Ivy League and Other Top Colleges, she describes in intimate detail the algorithm used by the Ivies to rank students based on class rank, class type, extracurriculars, test scores, and oh, yes, G.P.A.

I'll admit I didn't read this book cover-to-cover, because it's a reference book. I think if I were really interested in getting into an Ivy League school, I would've been fascinated. When I agreed to review the book, I was thinking it would be more narrative than it actually is, so as an intermediately degreed 35-year-old, I was bored. I'm not planning to get a PhD, and I'm not planning to encourage my five-year-old to start taking advanced placement journal writing in kindergarten to woo Yale. However, I know if I did want her to go to the Ivies? I might consider starting now.

The book discusses sports, legacies, financial aid, communication between schools and other -- frankly -- insider topics. Hernandez does a good job -- she's startlingly transparent -- but be prepared for a very dense and statistics-filled tome that will probably depress you and your little Ivy-tastic kiddo just a wee bit. They don't call it the Ivy League for nothing.

Insatiable

2009-10-05T09:42:00-05:00

Having experienced eating disorders in high school and college, I immediately agreed to review Insatiable: A Young Mother's Struggle with Anorexia, when it appeared on the e-mail of upcoming titles.

Erica Rivera's memoir is very raw, surprisingly raw, considering she describes leaving her two young daughters alone and sleeping in her house while she went on pre-dawn, 90-minute runs. Brave, but necessary, because without that level of detail, it's hard to appreciate how this mental illness -- for that's what eating disorders really are -- can distort reality for those who suffer from them.

Rivera describes chewing and spitting, binging and starving with self-deprecating prose both disarming and disturbing. Her recollections brought back a lot of my own memories, and I was surprised at how similar our inner voices were.

The ending left me wanting follow-up, but that's how eating disorders work -- you're never really sure if they're gone forever. You just keep eating and hope for the best.

The Cat's Pajamas: 101 of the World's Cutest Cats

2009-09-24T10:25:27-05:00

I've had photographer Rachel Hale's coffee-table book, The Cat's Pajamas, for a really embarrassingly long time. But there's a reason the review has taken so long.

My daughter made off with it. From the moment I got it, she was transfixed by pictures of cute kittehs in all sorts of poses. Some sweet, some just shockingly beautiful. She'd page through them while I worked, cooing and gahing for seriously forty-five minutes straight.

Each photo is accompanied by a description of the breed in the picture, so if you or a friend is looking to invest in a beautiful cat (or just like looking at them), this book is more beautiful than any other breeds book I've ever seen. Or if you're just an LOLCats fan and like looking at cute stuff, this works, too.

I'd better hide the book before it disappears again.

WalkingFish Fishing Journal

2009-09-24T10:18:04-05:00

Blondie loves to fish and has been talking about teaching the little angel to fish for a while now, so when WalkingFish Books contacted me about reviewing their Fishing Journal, I said what the hey?

Let's just get this on the table: I don't fish. So I'm not really sure what's important in a fishing journal. However, this seems pretty thorough -- leaving spaces to document who you fished with, how many you caught, released, kept, weights, tides, moon phases -- crazy stuff.

I also really liked how at the bottom of each page is a little picture and description of different kinds of fish, including their scientific names. I imagine that could be pretty entertaining while you're waiting for the fish to bite.

So Blondie, come on down. We're all ready for you.

Child Care Today

2009-09-24T10:10:46-05:00

I'm just going to come right out and say I'm not going to do Penelope Leach's new book, Child Care Today: Getting It Right for Everyone, justice.

Child care is one of my political pet projects. I believe every parent should have access to quality child care if America wants to compete on a global level with its own workforce. The financial and mental burden placed on parents to locate and finance child care good enough to feel comfortable leaving kids and going to work is insane. It's the most difficult thing I've ever dealt with, and I have the means to afford quality care. I don't work weird hours or swing shifts. I have a vehicle that I can use to drive to my child care provider's location. I'm one of the lucky ones -- and I still think it's horrible and it sucks and I've never been more terrified than when my daughter was in what I considered to be a subpar facility as a baby because there were no other options.

I didn't make it through Leach's incredibly well researched book. It was much more academic than I expected it to be, but that's fine -- it's an amazing resource and one that I intend to go to when writing on this subject in the future. Leach digs through crazy volumes of research in the U.K. and the U.S. and talks about child care on a global level -- giving me insight into how other countries handle child care and how we might improve things in our own country.

So, I apologize to you, Ms. Leach -- you really killed it with this book, and I did not have the mental energy to get through it, but I'm very happy to own it and intend to use it as a resource to make me smarter in the future.