Latest Reviews

'Deer Hunting with Jesus' is an evocative title and highlights two of a half dozen values held by the poor U.S. white underclass, whose voting patterns confound most liberals.

Review

'Younger Next Year for Woman' is more than a pronoun change and a pink cover from the original 'Younger Next Year'. That 'more' involves discussion of health issues more particularly related to women with a chapter on menopause.

The authors Chris Crowley, a retired lawyer, and Henry Lodge, an M.D., are the same with no addition of a female writer, but that doesn't deny that there is a slightly different orientation, although much of the text, as should be expected, is identical.

Review

Author Frans de Waal answers the question in the title early and in the affirmative. This is the latest offering of the animal behaviouralist, whose book 'The Bonobo and the Atheist' is profiled on this site.

But in this book, the scope of his insights and observations is broader. And maybe more importantly, his political challenge is more pointed. Those who still insist on measuring animals capabilities against those of humans in a human context have to deal with a twist.

You can make your 'own cheese', the 'ultimate selfie', with a swab from your armpit, navel and between your toes for an appropriate microbe sampling to apply to the milk.

And if you can get past this idea, the author, Tim Spector, a British professor of genetic epidemiology presents a subtle, comprehensive, imaginative, yet scientific look at a subject that many obsess over, their diet.

With a embossed colour cover and glossy pages, this volume has the look and feel of a textbook. The impression is further reinforced with a compartmentalized layout, large colour photos and the use of technical descriptions and terminology.

Chuvalo:A Fighter's Life:The Story of Boxing's Last Gladiator by George Chuvalo with Murray Greig, 2013 is an entertaining read.

Boxing, “the sweet science” has always had a select fan base and its popularity has been waning maybe partly because it is too violent, and in some camps recently, because it isn't violent enough.

This book is a window on a life few people know, and many don't care to know, through the eyes of one of the most violent and durable practitioners of the sport.

I don't recall ever having read a non-fiction book that was such a page turner. Part of that certainly is my personal interest in the subject, but David Epstein, a senior writer for the magazine Sports Illustrated, has not unexpectedly, a great storytelling knack. He employs it regularly at the outset of every chapter as well as within them to introduce heavier material more painlessly.

Essentially this book is a kind of 'fountain of youth' manual for those with the discipline to follow it.

Not only is the formula designed to lengthen one's life, but maybe more importantly, improve the quality by expanding one's options of activities.

It is to change the trajectory of aging from one of progressively steeper decline to one of a gradually descending plateau.

Plutocrats: The Rise of the New Global Super-rich and Fall of Everyone Else by Chrystia Freeland, 2012

With no background on this book, I had been expecting a Naomi Klein-type of visceral rant against wealth and the wealthy. And the latter part of the title “and fall of everyone else” does nothing to dispel this boding.

This book is more developmental psychology than philosophy, but it certainly offers thinking points. At the age of 10, author Alison Gopnik was reading Plato and questioning his thought. So it may be no surprise that as an adult, while giving answers, she is asking questions from various perspectives. Through this book I have come to quite like the author and the way she combines thought, ideas, science and personal observations.