Curious, Healing

Books about healing, business, and fun

“Lottery” by Patricia Wood

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Recommended to me by: Dave Hingsburger’s blog

The book begins, “My name is Perry L. Crandall and I am not retarded. Gram always told me the L stood for Lucky.” Perry is indeed lucky to be raised by his observant, patient Gram, since the rest of his family is avaricious and self-centered in the extreme.

He is also lucky to be employed at Holsted’s Marine Supply (where he does a great job), and to have a best friend Keith who lives on a sailboat in the harbor.

Perry makes the most of the opportunities that luck brings his way, with hard work, integrity, and the careful attention to detail taught by his Gram. He calls himself an auditor, a listener, as he observes the conversations and behaviors of the people around him. His commentary on their quirks is one of the pleasures of the book.

The dramatic plot, as Perry copes with winning $12 million in the lottery and other life events, is a vehicle for a clear moral about not labeling people. Over and over, Perry says he is not retarded, and that it is wrong to label others as well. His successes demonstrate the point.

In a book bringing such awareness to language, it was jarring to see the repeated use of “gyp” to mean “cheated” without comment or apology. The author may need to gain awareness of the discrimination suffered by the Gypsy/Rom peoples.

Overall, a thought-provoking read.

Available at bookshop.org.

“Will I Ever Be Good Enough? Healing the Daughters of Narcissistic Mothers” by Karyl McBride

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A mix of personal memoir, client stories, and self-help advice, this book compassionately details the effects of having a narcissistic mother and shows a pathway for healing.

Narcissism – extreme self-absorbtion and inability to empathize with others – occurs on a spectrum from a few narcissistic traits to full-blown Narcissistic Personality Disorder. Women with these traits compete with, control, or ignore their children rather than providing unconditional mirroring and acceptance.

Their children grow up questioning their very right to existence, either piling up achievements to become “good enough”, or hiding from their pain in drugs, alcohol, and acting out.

“A daughter who doesn’t receive validation from her earliest relationship with her mother learns that she has no significance in the world and her efforts have no effect. She tries her hardest to make a genuine connection with Mom, but fails, and thinks that the problem of rarely being able to please her mother lies within herself. This teaches the daugther that she is unworthy of love.”

McBride gives three steps for recovery:

  1. Understanding and diagnosing the problem
  2. Processing the grief and other feelings from childhood
  3. Discovering true preferences, values, and ways of being.

I recommend this calm, thorough, and encouraging book to anyone who finds herself struggling to prove that she is good enough to be seen, honored, and valued.

Available at bookshop.org.

“Mister God this is Anna” by Fynn

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I bought this book about 20 years ago for the delightful drawing on the cover. At the time, I read it as a rescue story, set in the 1930’s in London’s East End. 5 year old Anna has run away from an intolerable home life, and is found and adopted by gruff, kind, 19 year old Fynn and his dependable mum.

Fynn makes an effort to educate his new best friend, and finds himself educated at the same time by her headlong explorations of physics and her effervescent ideas about Mister God.

I picked the book up recently and re-read it, and this time it reads more like an allegory, where Fynn and young Anna are vehicles for the Author’s Message about God.

The Wikipedia page about the book reveals that Fynn is a pseudonym for Syndey Hopkins, and gives more information about his life. He did grow up in the East End of London in the 1930’s.

In the book, as Fynn and Anna discuss philosophy and religion, they also explore the East End with all their senses, and share it with the reader. Those details, along with William Papas’ impressionistic line drawings, are my favorite parts of the book.

Available at bookshop.org.

“Purple Cow: Transform Your Business by Being Remarkable” by Seth Godin

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Recommended to me by: Tshombe Brown

Seth Godin specializes in pithy marketing advice for this new era of marketing with permission rather than blanket advertising. In fact, he created the phrase “permission-based marketing,” and Purple Cow‘s mission is to convince marketers that the era of blanket advertising is over.

Seth Godin’s points:

In the old days (a few years ago), TV advertising drove demand, which created profits, which paid for more TV advertising. Now, that channel has been saturated – there are too many marketers competing for consumers’ limited attention.

Even if customers have clear needs and are open to receiving information, they turn to their friends or other trusted sources rather than to media advertising.

The solution is to create a product that is remarkable, like a purple cow, so that people will remark on it to their friends, and it will spread as an “ideavirus”.

While companies previously targeted the large number of mainstream customers with their message, it is now important to target those innovators and early adopters who will spread the word about remarkable products. Godin calls these people “sneezers” of the ideaviruses.

The book includes many brief case studies and suggestions for how to find or create a purple cow.

  • Find the edges of your product or service, and see where you can go further than others
  • Marketing should be part of product creation, not an afterthought
  • People need a clear, short phrase to help them spread the word.
  • Be willing to fail. The “safe route” isn’t safe anymore anyway.

While the book is heavily slanted toward product businesses, I’ll be thinking about how to apply the ideas to my own service business. I’ve noticed that many people have a strong reaction to the word trauma in my tagline “helping sensitive people heal from trauma” and my web address TraumaHealed.com, and I think that’s a step in the right direction.

Read more remarkable marketing ideas at Seth Godin’s blog.

Available at bookshop.org.

“Fox” by Margaret Wild and Ron Brooks

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Recommended to me by: Susan Reagel

With its full-page drawings, brief text, and animal characters in the Australian wilderness, “Fox” is in a children’s book format, but it is an adult book in disguise. How many children’s books begin with despair over loss and disability, move through partnership and betrayal, and end with the determination to do what it takes to surmount mistakes?

At first I was impatient with the hand-lettered text, some of it pasted in sideways on the page. I was soon drawn in to the active, expressive, textured drawings and the raw, honest, emotionally vivid story of one-eyed Dog, burnt-winged Magpie, and lonely, jealous Fox.

Find this book. Read it, look at it, take in its many-layered message of survival, compassion, and hope.

Available at biblio.com.

“Comfort Secrets for Busy Women” by Jennifer Louden

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Recommended to me by: Emma McCreary

When I saw its pink cover and tie-in title with Jennifer Louden’s earlier book “The Women’s Comfort Book”, I expected to be bored by shallow platitudes.

Instead, I engaged deeply with Louden’s ongoing process, vignettes from other women’s stories, gentle questions rather than strident answers, and a focus on creating an authentic life with profound, courageous self-acceptance.

Most of all, the book reminded me to notice how far I’ve come in consciously creating my life, and validated the crooked path I’ve taken in listening to myself and sitting with not-knowing.

Plus, the book mentions my Reiki teacher Priscilla Stuckey and prompted me to reconnect with her on Twitter.

Available at biblio.com.