Living with Your Body and Other Things You Hate by Emily Sandoz and Troy DuFrene

Living with Your Body and Other Things You Hate(Cover picture courtesy of Target.)

Let’s be honest: most people are unhappy with at least some aspect of their physical appearance. Just think of all the money we spend each year trying to improve our looks! But if worrying about your appearance is getting in the way of living, maybe it’s time to start thinking about body image in a completely new way.

Based in proven-effective acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT), Living with Your Body and Other Things You Hate offers a unique approach to addressing your struggle with body image. In this book, you will not be told that your self-perceptions are wrong, that your thoughts are irrational, or that your feelings are misguided. Instead, you will learn to live with the reality that these often painful thoughts and beliefs about yourself will arise from time to time, and that what is really important is accepting these distressing thoughts without allowing them to dominate your life.

You know what it’s like to constantly be checking the mirror, to avoid certain social situations where your body may be exposed, or to gaze longingly at a fashion model in a magazine and think, “Why can’t I be her?” But what you may not know is that people who struggle with negative body image are at an increased risk for depression, anxiety, eating disorders, and low self-esteem. Body image problems can even lead to major financial issues. By focusing on your appearance and little else, you are hurting yourself in more ways than one.

If you are ready to find a purpose in life that is more important than the pain you feel about your appearance, this book provides a truthful, powerful resource.

*Possible body image related triggers*

[Full disclosure: I received a free ebook through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.]

I’ll be honest with you guys: this was one of the hardest books I’ve ever had to read.  I picked it up on NetGalley with the intention of reading it and keeping my thoughts to myself because like a lot of people, I’ve struggled with my body image for a long time.  However I felt I had to share my thoughts on the book.

While I don’t necessarily think this book is for everyone, it certainly helped me.  It taught me how your attention span can either be scattered or stuck and that being stuck on your appearance can affect your whole life in ways you’ve never really noticed.  It taught me how to accept my appearance and not be repulsed by the areas of my body that I hate.  In truth, it taught me so much more than that but those are the main areas that I felt are important if you want to decide to buy the book or not.

What makes this book effective is that after every little section there’s an activity you can choose to do to help you in your body image journey.  There’s audio tapes you can download to go along with these exercises and if you’re serious about the book I’d highly recommend using them.  Yes, some of these exercises are going to bring up painful memories.  Yet some of them will bring up a time way back when you were a child that wasn’t concerned with your body image.  It’ll teach you how to accept that sometimes you’ll feel badly about your body and that those thoughts are okay as long as you stop letting them run your life.

Really, there’s not much more I can say.  Living with Your Body and Other Things You Hate is one of the more effective self-help books I’ve personally read and I don’t think there’s anything wrong with giving it a try.  It worked for me but it might not work for everyone.

I give this book 5/5 stars.

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Echo Prophecy by Lindsey Fairleigh

Pageflex Persona [document: PRS0000037_00039](Cover picture courtesy of Goodreads.)

Discover what’s hidden–a powerful, mythic race, an ancient Egyptian prophecy, and a love strong enough to shatter the boundaries of time.

Alexandra Larson isn’t human…but she doesn’t know that. As far as Lex is concerned, she’s simply an ambitious and independent archaeology grad student with a knack for deciphering ancient languages, especially the various forms of Egyptian. When she’s recruited to work on her dream excavation, her translating skills uncover the secret entrance to an underground Egyptian temple concealed within Djeser-Djeseru–the famous mortuary temple of Queen Hatchepsut. Lex is beyond thrilled by her discovery…as is the enigmatic and alluring excavation director, Marcus Bahur.

As the relationship between Lex and Marcus heats up, a series of shocking revelations leave the young archaeologist reeling. Once Lex discovers the truth of her ancient Egyptian roots–the truth of her more-than-human nature–the people she trusts most make one final, terrifying revelation: Lex is the central figure of a four-thousand-year-old prophecy. She is the only thing standing between the power to alter the very fabric of time and an evil megalomaniac…who also happens to be her father. As events set in motion over four millennia ago lead Lex and Marcus from Seattle to the heart of Egypt, the fate of mankind depends on one thing: the strength of Lex’s love.

[Full disclosure: I received a free ebook through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.]

As you guys all know, I’m an ancient Egypt fanatic.  There’s just something about ancient Egypt that appeals to me, so it was pretty much a guarantee I’d pick up this book and at least give it a try.  So did Echo Prophecy measure up to my expectations?

Absolutely!  Lindsey Fairleigh knows far more about ancient Egyptian mythology, culture and language than I ever could have hoped for.  She actually knows something about how hieroglyphs are translated and that there isn’t only one form of Egyptian (i.e. Middle Egyptian is an entirely different animal from New Kingdom Egyptian).  I very nearly fainted when she actually used the properly translated names of the Egyptian gods like Heru, Aset and Set instead of the more commonly used Greek translations like Horus, Isis and Seth.  I was just blown away by the way she incorporated the Egyptian mythology into the story and used it to create a believable explanation for the Egyptian gods.

As for the characters, I loved Lex.  She was believable because not only does she react like a normal person would to finding out about a whole secret race, she is also flawed.  Throughout the story she seems pretty unsure of herself until she gradually grows more and more confident.  It’s a natural progression and I love Lindsey Fairleigh for doing it that way rather than having her accept everything all at once.  Marcus was also a great character and I found that his actions were very well explained by his major secret.  I don’t want to give too much away, but let’s just say that obviously Marcus isn’t everything he appears to be.

In the beginning the plot is pretty slow.  That didn’t really bother me because it let me get my bearings for a little bit as Lex’s dreams became more and more frequent.  But Lindsey Fairleigh didn’t dawdle for too long because soon everything was happening at once and Lex’s world changed completely.  Despite the insanely fast pacing at some points, I never felt like the character development was forgotten.  Even in the moments where there was huge suspense, everyone grew as a character either through their actions, words or when more backstory was revealed.

Even if you aren’t the biggest ancient Egyptian fan, I highly recommend Echo Prophecy.  It’s a well-written, fast-paced novel with just enough romantic tension to keep the slow parts interesting.  I can’t wait for the next book to see how Lindsey Fairleigh handles that huge cliffhanger she left at the end.

I give this book 5/5 stars.

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Sia by Josh Grayson

Sia by Josh Grayson(Cover picture courtesy of Always YA at Heart.)

When seventeen-year-old Sia wakes up on a park bench, she has no idea who or where she is. Yet after a week of being homeless, she’s reunited with her family. At school, she’s powerful and popular. At home, she’s wealthy beyond her dreams. But she quickly realizes her perfect life is a lie. Her family is falling apart and her friends are snobby, cruel and plastic. Worse yet, she discovers she was the cruelest one. Mortified by her past, she embarks on a journey of redemption and falls for Kyle, the “geek” she once tormented. Yet all the time she wonders if, when her memories return, she’ll become the bully she was before…and if she’ll lose Kyle.

[Full disclosure: I received a free ebook copy through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.]

After reading books with plenty of tragedy in them recently (Othello, The Hittite, The Iron Traitor) I saw this book on NetGalley and knew I had to request it.  I absolutely knew what I was getting into: a shamelessly inspirational book that helped restore my broken faith in humanity just a little bit.

If you’re feeling down now or just want to see a YA book with a happy ending, Sia is perfect for you.  It’s a cinematic story of a young girl who, when given a second chance at life, becomes a better person and changes the people around her for the better as well.  Sia used to be a spoiled, bratty rich girl and after losing her memory through the rare fugue amnesia she has to confront the person that she was and all the damage she had done.  Instead of letting this revelation destroy her, Sia chooses to move forward and become a better person rather than reverting to her old life.

The thing about Sia is that it’s not just your stereotypical inspirational novel.  It’s actually well written!  Josh Grayson just has this way of describing the scenery and the people that makes you feel like you’re really there.  You can feel the tough reality of life on the streets just as well as you can feel the air of indulgence at the Oscar party in Hollywood.  That, my friends, is what you call cinematic writing.  It’s very easy to picture this book on the big screen.

Obviously Sia is a well-rounded three dimensional character, but the supporting cast is as well.  Kyle felt very real to me as did Sia’s parents.  The sort of villain in the end will never go down as one of my favourites, but her motives were believable enough in the context of the story.  He won’t get any awards for completely unique characters from Sia, but the way Josh Grayson writes them more than makes up for it.

Overall, if you’re looking for a good light read or maybe even a little inspiration, I’d highly recommend Sia.  You can’t go wrong with this book.

I give this book 5/5 stars.

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I am More Than Just a Chronic Pain Statistic

Last year on my birthday I wrote about my experiences with bullying.  This year I’m writing about the elephant in the medical profession’s closet: chronic pain.

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I am a human being with hopes, dreams and goals.  Some of these have been forever altered or have become impossible because of my chronic pain.  You see, I’ve had chronic back pain for three years this fall and have yet to receive even a diagnosis.  My pain starts in my lower back and migrates up to encompass my entire back all the way up to between my shoulders after only a few hours of being awake.  My knees have an almost arthritic ache and occasionally pain shoots down my right leg, making it impossible to walk normally some days.

Luckily I was born in Canada so I have not become bankrupt because of my illness.  I have had X-rays, an MRI and multiple physical exams.  I’ve been to chiropractors, massage therapists, orthopaedic surgeons, physiotherapists, back pain specialists at the provincial clinic and multiple GPs.  I’ve had orthotics, massages, special exercises and chiropractic treatments and nothing has helped.  Some things like the physiotherapy (which I did for nine months) made things worse than ever. Continue reading →

Discussion: Blogging Pet Peeves

Everyone reading this now is probably a regular blog reader and not just of The Mad Reviewer.  Most people that read one blog read at least a couple of blogs on a semi-regular basis, especially when those people are bloggers themselves.  But like books, there are some blogging deal breakers and pet peeves.  Here are just a few of my pet peeves:

1.  A busy layout.  A nice, unique design is perfectly okay but when you’ve got yellow spirals on a pink and purple polka dot background my brain starts to hurt.

2.  Not responding to comments at all.  I know I’m not always the speediest when it comes to replying to your comments, but I really do try and eventually 99% of comments do get a well thought out reply.  But on blogs where the blogger never responds to comments?  It just seems like they’re not that interested in what their readers have to say.

3.  Bad grammar.  Everyone makes typos; that’s pretty much expected when you’re editing yourself.  Yet when I encounter a blogger that doesnt like using capitol letters and doesnt spellchek it really starts to get irrtating.  Ya know?  Its worse when they do things like make run on sentences like this and never seem to know the difference between a colon semi-colon period exclamation point and especially a comma.

4.  Bloggers that don’t have a consistent posting schedule.  I totally get that life can get in the way of blogging sometimes.  That’s okay.  Yet when bloggers post every other day and then suddenly don’t post for a week, that gets annoying.  I like bloggers with a consistent schedule with very few exceptions.

Really, this could be an entire article but I should stop now.  After all, it’s your turn: What are your blogging pet peeves?  Why?