Raising Boys by Steve Biddulph

Rating: 4 out of 5

Paperback: 224 pages
Publisher: Harper Thorsons; New edition edition (8 July 2003)
Language English
ISBN-10: 0007153694
ISBN-13: 978-0007153695

This is a book about how to raise boys. Steve Biddulph is a Psychologist who has worked with children for over 27 years.

This book looks more into the psychology of boys at various stages of their lives. He divides a man's life into roughly three stages; 0-6 years, 7-14 years, and 14- adult. Then discusses each stage, what is happening, what to expect behaviour wise, and what strategies you can implement to ensure your son navigates these stages as safely as possible.

The book focuses on what influences a boy in each stage. For instance the 0-6 year stage, the mother is the strongest influence in the boys life, but by 14 and over this has shifted to someone outside of the family. Biddulph gives some tips for single mothers how to ensure these influences are met for their child, and how to select a good candidate.

Most of the book is pretty common sense. But it is helpful to see the stages and the ideas for how to navigate them laid out. The style of writing is easy and chatty, it feels like you are sitting down having a coffee with the author and you are having a nice chat with a friend about the subject. There are no big words that have you reaching for the dictionary, nor does he talk in a condescending manner.

Biddulph refers to many studies and trials that support his advice. He also uses a lot of testimonials and examples from clients he has had through the years. These are interesting and in the case of some of the trials (one in particular about a school in the UK that seperated year 8 boys and girls maths and english classes) makes you wonder why the education system has not changed.

My only gripe is he makes statements like "a boy should not be put in daycare till he is 3 years old". This is all well and good (the argument is they do not thrive as well as girls and require more one on one care) but the fact is in today's society this is just not practical. Most parents need double income to survive and need to put their children into care. I would have liked the author to perhaps give more advice on how to help your child through this period, rather then say "don't do it". Just telling the reader to not do it is not helpful, especially when there is no other choice. All it does is make the reader feel guilty.

This book is not in depth enough to deal with real meaty behaviour issues. It also does not give detailed advice on parenting or discipline. That is not the point of this book. This book is to give you an insight as to what is happening over all in a boys life, and what could be causing any bad behaviour.

A good book for any parent who has boys and wants to gain a better insight into what drives them.

The Slippery Art of Book Reviewing by Mayra Calvani & Anne K. Edwards

Rating: 4.5 out of 5

Paperback: 186 pages
Publisher: Twilight Times Books (15 Jun 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1933353228
ISBN-13: 978-1933353227

The Slippery Art of Book Reviewing is a how to guide for reviewing books. This book helps build your skills for writing a good book review. This includes how to read critically, how to rate books, prevent amateurish mistakes, and how to start your own review site.

The main point to this book is the do's and dont's of reviewing books. There are some wonderful examples of good and bad reviews. Useful tips are provided on how to avoid falling into the bad review category. Bad habits you should be preventing include basic things like grammar and spelling. To more complicated issues like avoiding sugar coated or caustic reviews.

The advice in this book is clear and simple to read. Advice is grouped into relevant chapters/sections such as five keys to being a good reviewer, reviewing; practical tips to remember, and reviews and publishers. This makes finding the information you need easy.

From what I could see I fall somewhere in the middle with my reviews, which is comforting, apparently I hadn't been doing a bad job after all. Though there is probably a lot I could do better as well.

There is valuable advice for book reviewers who are looking to be more serious about reviewing, even being a professional. It also delves into the issues such as ethics and legalities of reviewing, book blogger vs reviewer, how to start your own review website, and how to rate books.

Personally I felt some of the examples they gave made the review feel stilted and boring. I would probably be suspicious of the "good" review examples given, I would feel like the reviewer was being paid in some way for it. I apparently like a bit of amateur hour in the reviews I read, to me that makes them more believable, more honest. I like it if a review puts a little emotion in their reviews. For me a book is an emotional thing and just like people sometimes you just don't like, or you love a book for no particular reason. If you can find a happy balance for book blogging purposes I think it would work really well.

There is a good section on how to read critically. If I was more serious about reviewing this would be invaluable. However I do not like to stop reading to make notes, as for me that interrupts the flow of the narrative. Also these days I just do not have the time to do that. But I recognise the ability to read a book critically is an important part of reviewing.

After reading the book, it did make me rethink some of the reviews I am currently writing. What I could include in the review to make it more valuable to the reader of my review. Hopefully the small changes I will be implementing will be of value to those reading my reviews.

All in all I think this is an excellent book for book reviewers starting out, and even reviewers who have been doing it awhile. I found some of the tips very useful and will be working to implement them into my reviews. For anyone who is serious about their book reviews, or wants to write reviews professionally this book is invaluable. As for the rest of us it is a great resource to help hone our skills just a little more.

Your Baby and Child by Penelope Leach

Rating: 5 out of 5

This book by Penelope Leach is intended to be a baby bible. A one stop book that covers virtually everything that is baby related from birth to five years old. This book covers everything from sleeping to development, feeding to playing, health to crying, and may more subjects.

Your Baby and Child has been a international best seller for twenty years. The book has been kept up to date and across the latest research, theories, and advice for raising children and babies. Penelope Leach is a research psychologist who specializes in child development. She is also president of the National Childminding Association, research advisor to National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, founding committee member of UK branch World Association for Infant Mental Health, and a mother and grandmother. Needles to say Penelope Leach has lots of experience in the art of raising children.

Ms Leach breaks the book into age groups which makes it easy to read and find the section you need when you come across individual problems (such as teething). At each stage she covers everything you will need to know and expect to find at the stage your child is going through. There is a comprehensive table of contents at the start of the book which assists you in finding the information you require.

The advice is practical and none judgemental. Penelope Leach presents both sides of an issue and has advice on what to do no matter what you decide, for instance she handles the issue of breastfeeding or bottle feeding with compassion and facts. She does not tell you what you should do or make you feel guilty. The information is presented clearly and in plain English. It is also based on the latest research and statistics.

This is an excellent beginners guide. If you have very little experience with babies and children this is the book for you. The book goes through nearly everything you need to know about caring for a child. I would recommend this book for all new parents and even experienced parents.

Gymboree The Parent's Guide To Play

Rating: 5 out of 5

Stuck for ideas on how to entertain your child? Want games that are educational and develop your child's skills? This is the book for you. It has 170 games and activities that cover the ages of birth to two. All the games have been proven to help with your child's development as well as keep them entertained.

Gymboree has been providing fun, educational and age appropriate programs to children for 30 years . They have early child centres in 30 countries. It was started in 1976 by a Californian mother who was trying to find activities she could provide her child with.

The book is broken down into age groups so it easy to find fun and relevant games for your child. Most of the games and activities are simple involving every day items around the house such as the good old pots and pans as musical instruments. This is handy if like me you don't have a lot of space for endless amounts of toys.

Each activity also has valuable information on what it helps to develop like fine motor skills, language and balance to name a few. There are also useful facts scattered through out the book based on research, like the importance of reading stories to babies to develop their language skills.

There is a bright coloured picture that shows you the activity and gives you an idea of how it should be done. Colour coded pages make it easy to find the age you need to find activities for. The book is easy to navigate and understand.

This is an excellent resource for any parent. I highly recommend it.

Sleeping Like A Baby by Pinky McKay

Rating: 4.5 out of 5

Pinky McKay is an Australian parenting expert. She is an International Board Certified Lactation Consultant and Certified Infant Massage Instructor. Pinky is also a mother to five children.

In her book Sleeping Like a Baby, she provides down to earth, realistic advice which is based on scientific evidence. She advocates a more natural and intuitive way of raising children such as co-sleeping, and breast feeding. Her advice goes against current trends of raising babies, which seems to advocate going against your instincts, and forcing the baby to do what you want (like the crying it out method). Her advice to me makes sense and seems right. However at no time do you feel lectured or pressured.

Lots of subjects regarding babies are covered in this book such as communication, sleep, feeding, and sleep environments. It talks about issues from newborn to toddler. The focus is on sleep and the factors that can effect sleeping habits.

Pinky discusses baby body language and the different stages of sleep and wakefulness. Each stage is fully discussed and some basic indicators of each stage are provided. She also gives advice on what you should do with your baby in these stages. For instance Quiet Alert stage is the best time to play with your baby. Some basic signs your baby is quiet alert are wide, bright eyes, looking at you directly, and 'cooing' noises. This section to me was very helpful in fully understanding a babies body language which is one of the few ways they can communicate.

Another point covered is sleep issues. She breaks down by age what can cause a baby to wake in the night, such as new development milestones or teething. This section was interesting to read as she explains what are the main causes of sleeplessness in that age bracket. She also suggests strategies to combat it. Though she points out that a baby is constantly growing and changing and so too is it's sleep patterns, and this is perfectly natural.

Pinky has clearly done a lot of research and has many studies to back up her advice. The end of her book also has lots of useful Internet sites and contact numbers for organisations that deal with various subjects like breastfeeding, SIDS, Depression, and Safety.

The biggest thing Pinky teaches in her book is that it's ok to let baby set the routine. It also teaches you that all those things we find natural to do with a baby (such as rocking to sleep) feel natural for a reason, they are natural. Also, finally, that we as parents can not completely control their babies sleeping habits. That while he might sleep perfectly now, in a week, fortnight, or months time it could all change again, and it is perfectly normal for this to happen. Her approach certainly helps you drop the guilt and stress about doing things "wrong".

I will definitely be purchasing her book Toddler Tactics.

Save Our Sleep by Tizzie Hall

Rating: 2 out of 5

Save Our Sleep is for anyone who is having sleeping issues with their baby. It is written by Tizzie Hall who is an internationally renowned baby whisperer and has spent 18 years working with parents resolving issues with their babies.

I had heard about this book through various people and was a little dubious about it. From what I had seen and heard Tizzie Hall's advice sounded very harsh and rigid. I bought the book thinking I should at least see what Tizzie Hall has to say as some people raved over it. But I did not really believe it would be of much help and definitely not for us. So I was rather surprised to find the book was no where near as bad as I thought.

Tizzie Hall's greatest tip for a settled baby is routine. She has various examples for different stages of a babies life in her book. Tizzie states that the routines are flexible and should be tailored to suit your life (for example if you have other children to work around etc).

Tizzie's other big point is learning the difference between a complaining cry and an emotional cry. She doesn't believe in the "crying out" method and firmly advises against it. Her belief is there are two main cries a baby does, and you can safely ignore one (the complaining cry) and absolutely not ignore the other (emotional cry). Which to me sounds like a variation of controlled crying, which we do not agree with.

Save our sleep also touches on other common sleep problems. These includes things like starting solids, teething, and health issues. It also discusses SIDS and safe sleeping arrangements. But there is no real depth to these issues or strategies to deal with them.

I can see how this book would appeal to distressed sleep deprived parents with the promise of a baby sleeping through from 7pm - 7am. I know far to many people it didn't work for then those who it did work for. Also I had a problem with the lack of scientific evidence in this book, all of Tizzie's advice is based purely on her beliefs and observations not on actual studies or facts. One piece of advice even flies in the face of advice given by the World Health Organisation (Tizzie believes babies should start solids at 4 months not the recommended 6 months).

Overall I would not recommend this book to other parents. I think it sets expectations to high that you can force a baby to sleep from 7pm-7am. The books focus is on routines, not really sleep problems. In the end I feel this book could cause more stress to parents if their baby failed to conform to the routine and was not "normal". The thing this book was good for was making us realise this method really was not for us, and we can set a routine that suits us.

From Baghdad With Love by Jay Kopelman

Rating 4 out of 5

From Baghdad with Love is the tale of Lava, a stray puppy found in Camp Fallujah and a Marine. While sweeping a building for insurgents the US Marine group the Lava Dogs find a bundle of energetic fur that melts their hearts on the spot. And so begins Lava’s story of being raised in secret in Fallujah and his eventual bid for freedom as Jay Kopelman fights desperately to keep Lava a secret and get him out of the country.

Kopelman's story about Lava. Snippets of the story are told from other people’s point of view more to illistrate the events and people working in other countries to help Lava. The story flows easily and is not difficult to grasp the terms being used. One thing I appreciated was that Jay Kopelman did not make the book about the rights or wrongs of war. You did not feel lectured or harassed. While he does express some of his personal views on some situations they are fleeting.

I felt Kopelman glossed over some of the nastier aspects of his stories which is understandable. The tales he did tell were not bedtime fairy tale type stories. However the war stories were not the main point of the book but merely highlighted events that were occurring during Kopelmans and Lava’s time in Iraq. It was interesting reading about what was happening during this period and about the people affected by them.

All these things though high light Lava’s story, which of course is the main theme of the book. I loved reading the effect he has on the Marines and the people around him in Iraq. One in story in particular was that of “Sam” and Iraqi who worked at a compound for news reporters in the red zone of Baghdad. When he first met Lava he wanted nothing to do with the dog, apparently Iraqi people do not like dogs and see them as being disgusting. But by the time Lava left the compound Sam was his biggest supporter and risked his on life for Lava.

While I will not say this was a light hearted book there were some light hearted moments and even funny ones. Some of the funniest moments for me were during Lava’s puppy days with the Marines in Camp Fallujah. I can only just imagine the scene of these big tough Marines and this cute bundle of fur bringing joy into each others lives at a time where there was little joy to be found.

"In reality, when he isn't asleep, he's anything but innocent. I personally saw the little monster destroy several maps, two pairs of boots, one cell phone, photographs of someone's kids, five pillows, and some grunts only pair of socks."

The content of this book is a little older then that of Dewey the Library Cat. I would not recommend this for anyone under fifteen years of age simply because some of the war stories told are quite disturbing even if they are glossed over. A must for animal lovers.

On a Hoof and a Prayer by Polly Evans

Rating 5 out of 5 stars

At age thirty four Polly Evans decides she wants to learn how to ride. So naturally you fly half way round the world to Argentina. This is the story of Polly’s adventures as she spends two months traversing the wilds of Argentina seeing the sights from Patagonia and Iguazu falls. While learning its fascinating history, and of course leaning to ride a horse or two along the way.

Evans has a relaxed way of writing that was easy to follow. She has a great sense of humor and a wonderful understanding of the history of the country which she blends together to tell her story. I have learned more about Argentina reading this book then I have ever learned in school. There were some really good laugh out loud moments and some amazing characters that Evans met during her travels.

“ ‘Ah don’t worry.’ Yvonne smiled ‘They’re good horses here. But you’ve got to ride them properly. We’ve had guests before who’ve ridden their horses into trees - but it was their own stupid fault. They were just sitting there, doing nothing. You’ve got to really ride the horse.’ ”

Another thing I really enjoyed was at no point did you feel her judging the people of the nation she visited. Also she did activities that are attainable by the average person. Those are my two pet peeves with some travel writers; they can be so condescending about the people and do activities that cost bucket loads of money.

I had a lot of fun reading this book and I will definitely be picking up her other travel books (she has written about cycling around Spain, motor biking round New Zealand and traversing China by any means possible). If you like travel books or are planning a trip to Argentina then I recommend you reading this book.

Finding Nino a Sea Change In Italy by Marc Llewellyn

Rating 4 out of 5 stars

Marc, his wife Rohan, new born baby Louis, and their dog Tetly decide to make a sea change. They don’t just move from the city but move countries. They leave behind the rat race of Sydney Australia to live in a small village on the Island of Lipari of the Italian coast.

When they arrive it is the middle of winter. The two bedroom villa while small and stuffy with no windows but a terrace with a view that takes the breath away. However the weather turns bad, Louis refuses to settle and spends the night crying, Marc is frequently sick, he and Rohan seem to constantly fight and that is before the social blunders they inadvertently create which leave them out cold socially. Slowly they begin to realise that the idyllic life they had imagined was a lot harder than they thought.

A great book, with some hilarious moments as they bumble through local customs. I particularly loved the chocolate and garlic cake episode. It was great to see the progress of their life on the island which went from being up beat and jubilant, to miserable, rock bottom, and come out the other side. Originally I was drawn to this book mostly because Italy is somewhere I really want to travel too. It was nice reading about a slice of Italy you rarely hear about. I did think the ending was a little bit of a letdown. I am not sure why, I can not put my finger on it, but I definitely felt a sense of “Oh is that all?”.

I would recommend this book to anyone who likes a nice light read and enjoys different cultures.

Dewey: The Small-Town Library Cat Who Touched The World by Vicki Myron

Rating 4 out of 5 stars

This is a very sweet book that any animal lover is going to adore straight away. Dewey's story begins on a cold winter's morning when he is found half frozen in the Spencer Public Library book return slot. He instantly wins the library director Vicki Myron and her staff over with his beautiful calm personality. He then spends the next 19 years being the Spencer Public Library cat and unintentional mascot and went on to international fame (though I must confess I had never heard of him). It is nice to see a "cat" memoir on the scene to compete with the explosion of dog ones around.

The story focused a little to much on Vicki Myron in some places and Dewey was not mentioned at all. Dewey's tale is told separately to Vicki's and the library. Dont get me wrong her story and the towns is interesting however I would have liked more Dewey stories or how exactly he was intertwined with her. For instance she told the story of her mastectomy and how Dewey helped her through that rough period, and I thought that was just a beautiful moment.

If you like animals and especially cats you will enjoy the book. I recommend you read it with a box of tissues though as you will be crying by the end (well I was).