A History of Courtship by Tania ODonnell

A History of Courtship by Tania ODonnell ISBN-13: 9781781593486 ebook: 176 pages Publisher: Pen and Sword History Released: Jan. 27, 2017

Source: ebook review copy from the publisher through NetGalley.

Book Description, Modified from Goodreads:
Tania O’Donnell takes the reader on a journey from medieval Courtly Love, through to the sexual license of the Restoration, and Victorian propriety. Learn about courting, writing romantic love letters and poems, appropriate gifts, proposing, and more. In the 14th century young men tried to impress the ladies with their footwear, donning shoes with pointed toes so long that they had to be secured with whalebone—presumably because size mattered! The author also recounts tales of classic romantic mistakes and scandals.


My Review:
A History of Courtship is a survey of courtship practices--mainly from the 1300s to the 1800s in England. The author described how couples met, beauty and clothing fads, acceptable gifts, improper behavior, the role of chaperons, love poems and letters, and areas of conflict after marriage. She also looked at the differences in practices between the rich and the poor. She described some scandals and other unusual stories to illustrate various behaviors. The material came from sources like diaries, guides on things like etiquette or letter writing, and preserved love poems and letters.

Keep in mind that this book isn't meant to be an exhaustive source on courtship, and the subtitle is a bit misleading. It's not about seduction techniques, and she didn't really cover 800 years. Most of the information was from the 1500s to late 1800s. Overall, I'd recommend this interesting and entertaining book.


If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.

The PlantPure Kitchen by Kim Campbell

The PlantPure Kitchen by Kim Campbell ISBN-13: 9781944648343 Paperback: 256 pages Publisher: BenBella Books Released: Jan. 24, 2017

Source: ebook review copy from the publisher through NetGalley.

Book Description, Modified from NetGalley:
The film PlantPure Nation has helped foster a growing community of whole food, plant-based eaters. Key to its success has been the PlantPure Director of Culinary Education Kim Campbell’s inspiring and delicious recipes like those she shared in her 2015 cookbook, The PlantPure Nation Cookbook. Now Campbell is back with even more inventive recipes bursting with flavor.

Campbell shares tons of new recipes that will turn any plant-based eater into a chef with ease. With compassion for the challenges of following a plant-pure diet, Campbell lends advice about the best natural sweeteners, the most useful kitchen tools for plant-based cooking, vegan-friendly substitutions for making recipes egg-free, dairy-free, meat-free, and even gluten-free, and whole a lot more.

From dips and spreads, like Crockpot Apple Butter, to classic dinners, like Welsh Rarebit, The PlantPure Kitchen’s recipes will inspire you to lead a more plant-pure life.


My Review:
The PlantPure Kitchen is a whole food, plant-based (vegan) cookbook containing 130 recipes. This would be a good cookbook for someone new to cooking vegan meals from scratch. The author provided cooking tips, suggested only a relatively small number of tools, and most of the recipes were pretty simple to do. While she used gluten-containing grains and tree nuts in some recipes, she suggested easy modifications for people with those concerns.

The author started by describing some commonly used foods in vegan cooking and how to use them. She also described plant-based substitutes so you can convert regular recipes. She gave shopping tips and tips on food storage and food prep. There were also a few, short educational articles at the start of each section.

Each recipe had a picture of the finished product, and they looked very tasty (which I can't always say about vegan foods). The recipes included some vegan versions of holiday or popular foods. There were 10 breakfast recipes, 7 bread and muffin recipes, 10 burger, sandwich, and wrap recipes, 15 dressing and sauce recipes, 14 salad recipes, 11 appetizer, dip, and spread recipes, 10 soup and stew recipes, 27 entrees, 11 sides, and 14 deserts. Overall, I'd recommend this cookbook to those interested in adding more whole-food, plant-based meals to their diet.

Update: I've tried several of these recipes now. They've all turned out to taste very good, and they weren't difficult to make. In fact, the "I won't give up meat" eater in our family tried each of the dishes because they looked so good and didn't look that different from his food. He agreed he'd eat those dishes when we had them.


If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.

Teaming with Fungi by Jeff Lowenfels

Teaming with Fungi by Jeff Lowenfels ISBN-13: 9781604697292 Hardback: 172 pages Publisher: Timber Press Released: Jan. 11, 2017

Source: ebook review copy from the publisher through NetGalley.

Book Description, Modified from Goodreads:
Teaming with Fungi is an important guide to mycorrhizae and the role they play in agriculture, horticulture, and hydroponics. Almost every plant in a garden forms a relationship with fungi, and many plants would not exist without their fungal partners. By better understanding the relationship, gardeners can take advantage of the benefits of fungi, which include an increased uptake in nutrients, resistance to drought, earlier fruiting, and more. Learn how the fungi interact with plants, how to grow their own, and how best to employ them in the home garden.


My Review:
Teaming with Fungi is about using beneficial fungi in crop agriculture, gardening, nurseries, forests, lawns, and hydroponics. The author described the benefits to using mycorrhizae when growing many types of plants and what practices can support or disrupt their growth.

He named specific fungi known to work well with certain plants and described how to best apply them to your plants. He even described how to collect and grow your own if you don't want to buy them, though it looked like a lot of work to me. He also included a technical section on the biology of beneficial fungi and a detailed explanation about how they interact with plants.

Last year, I tried to use mycorrhizae in my organic gardening but felt like I hadn't applied them correctly to some perennial plants. Reading this book did enlighten me as to what to do to get the most out of beneficial fungi, and I'll feel more confident using them in the future.


If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.


Excerpt: Read an excerpt using Google Preview.

Eat Wheat by John Douillard

Eat Wheat by John Douillard ISBN-13: 9781683500117 Hardback: 325 pages Publisher: Morgan James Publishing Released: Jan. 10, 2017

Source: ebook review copy from the publisher through NetGalley.

Book Description, Modified from NetGalley:
Has gluten been found guilty without a fair trial? Eat Wheat presents the science on the other side of the gluten-free aisle. For example, ancient wheat has been shown to have twice the gluten content of modern wheat yet decreased inflammation two-fold and lowered cholesterol and blood sugar. So how could the more glutinous grain actually be healthier?

Dr. Douillard has seen more than 100,000 patients in his natural health practice, helping to improve their digestive systems and begin to eat wheat again. He explains how a breakdown in digestion has damaged the intestinal wall and leaked undigested foods and environmental toxins into the body’s lymphatic system, causing “grain brain” symptoms and food allergies. Although eliminating wheat and dairy from your diet may help your symptoms, it’s a temporary solution.

The book addresses the root cause: the inability to digest well and break down harmful pollutants and toxins that can lead to more serious health concerns. Backed by more than 600 scientific studies, Eat Wheat is a revolutionary guidebook to regaining your digestive strength and safely bringing wheat and dairy back into your diet.

It will also reveal the benefits of wheat and dairy; help you navigate around food toxins in modern wheat and dairy; detail how to flush congested lymphatics linked to food intolerance symptoms; teach you to follow natural digestive circadian cycles; help bring your blood sugar back into balance, and teach you proven exercise and detox techniques to reboot strong digestion and achieve optimal health and vitality.


My Review:
I've heard about gluten being linked to increased intestinal permeability in many people. Yet whole grains (including gluten-containing grains) are a part of the healthy Mediterranean diet. So who's right?

Eat Wheat looked briefly at the scientific studies that indicate benefit or harm from gluten or dairy. And it's clearly not as simple as "gluten is bad." The author explained the "leaky gut" link that gluten-free advocates are talking about but then pointed to a deeper, root cause of food sensitivities and digestive troubles--in the lymphatic system.

He explained how the lymphatic system works, why it might not be working well, and what you can do to heal your lymphatic system and leaky gut. He included some Ayurvedic principles, like eating more seasonally, but cited scientific studies to back up many of his recommendations. He sometimes recommend Indian foods and herbs, but you can find many of these in a good health food store. I felt like a person could more easily (and more cheaply) follow his healing program than some of the "heal your leaky gut" programs I've read about.

I felt that the author had many convincing arguments, and I intend to read through the book again. My brother's girlfriend has repeatedly done "elimination diets" and removed foods (including removing gluten) to the point that she can hardly eat anything. This book should help her heal so that she can tolerate many of those foods again. I'd also recommend this book to anyone who wants to better understand leaky gut or the current gluten-free trend.


If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.


Excerpt: Read an excerpt using Google Preview.

The Oxygen Cure by William S. Maxfield

The Oxygen Cure by Dr. William S. Maxfield ISBN-13: 9781630060510 Paperback: 304 pages Publisher: Humanix Books Released: Jan. 3, 2017

Source: ebook review copy from the publisher through NetGalley.

Book Description, Modified from NetGalley & Amazon:
Hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT) is a medical treatment which enhances the body's natural healing process by inhalation of 100% oxygen in a total body chamber, where atmospheric pressure is increased and controlled. In the United States, the FDA currently recognizes hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT) for 14 conditions, including decompression sickness, embolism, crush injury, bone infection, burns, wound healing, severe anemia, and several others.

Now, in The Oxygen Cure, hyperbaric expert William S. Max eld, M.D., will convince you that HBOT is a vastly underused modality that deserves to take its place among frontline medical treatments. As a holistic treatment, HBOT targets the underlying disease or condition, not just the symptoms. The Oxygen Cure reveals how hundreds of studies on HBOT conducted around the world prove it works at the cellular level to help or heal many more conditions.

Full of hope-inspiring case histories and expert findings, The Oxygen Cure shows how HBOT not only benefits the sick and injured (including our wounded veterans), but may also reduce our country’s staggeringly high medical costs. HBOT often provides a safe alternative to drug therapy and dangerous invasive procedures.

Dr. Maxwell provides his recommendations for how HBOT can help treat conditions as varied as burn care, emphysema, arthritis, fibromyalgia, wound healing, stroke, congestive heart failure, autism, cancer, diabetes, and more. He offers strategies about exactly how HBOT should be administered and recommendations on where to seek the best treatments.


My Review:
The Oxygen Cure describes how hyperbaric oxygen therapy works, what it's used to treat in the USA, and additional conditions that it can be used for based on studies from around the world. The author looked at each type of injury or disease (like traumatic brain injury or burns) and described how HBOT has been successfully used. He included case studies describing the person's condition, their treatment, and the improvement seen when using HBOT.

While doctors could use this to become educated about how HBOT can be used, the main audience seemed to be the average person who is looking for help with some of these conditions. He described some clinics where they're informed about and willing to treat FDA approved and non-FDA approved problems, about what it'd cost, and even some ideas on how to potentially get your insurance to help pay for the treatments.

The author is trying to increase awareness so that more people can benefit from HBOT and hopefully prompt the FDA to recognize that HBOT can be safely and effectively used to treat many more conditions. It's very sad that our wounded veterans aren't getting more access to HBOT. Overall, I'd recommend this book to those interested in learning about HBOT and what it can do.


If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.


Excerpt: Read an excerpt using Google Preview.