Books and Me

by Katie Hurley (2019) With news that 9/10 teens are worried about their mental health, and that a third state that they feel helpless, sad and or fearful frequently and this problem far outstripping any help that is offered by others, these sorts of work books would seem to have a big and important function. This one does the job efficiently enough. There isn't anything you won't already have read before in other places, but it puts all the strategies in one neat place succinctly and clearly, and even if you don't have any mood disorder, often seems to offer very sensible strategies for life. Whether a teen would actually engage with it in the first place, let alone actually benefit from it, is another matter altogether. Rating 6/10

by Robert I. Sutton (2017) This i s, just as Daniel Pink says on the cover, a contemporary classic. If everyone were to read it, take it to heart and act on it, our planet would be an infinitely better place.  Sutton explains not only how to identify an "asshole", (sorry, there is no other satisfactory word -believe me, I've dug around in thesauri and the darkest reaches of the minds of friends and relatives, and have not yet come up with a satisfactory replacement), he also provides numerous ideas about how to deal with them, some of which strike me as inspired, (the Benjamin Franklin effect being one of these), but for the icing on the cake, he also requires that the reader look in the mirror in order to make sure they are not the asshole in the room! So it works for everyone, the asshole as well as the victim.  And of course, most of us have our moments.  It takes a masterful saint not to lapse at some point, though we might as well aim high, I guess. A must rea...