Stewart Books

Hodgins is a skillful writer, and he's in top form here. The dialog is excellent, as are the character potrayals, and the descriptive passages are both compelling in their own right, anchoring the reader into scenes with a vivid sense of physical immediacy, and in terms of the way landscape echoes and refracts the protagonist's sensibility and changing pyschological states. This is not an easy book. The relationship of the protagonist to his father is shot through with pain, a pain that is all the more excruciating for the reader because it is so resonant. But in the end this is a rewarding and redemptive read. It is an intimate story painted in bold colors, with a bigger heart than alot of the psychologically minimalist fiction coming out these days. Highly recommended!

Unlike the common run of North American writers, Jack Hodgins' vistas are unconfined by borders, real or imaginary. His book on writing fiction, A Passion for Narrative, is among the finest of the genre. It is unique in its consideration of Pacific Rim writing. His latest novel, Distance, exhibits his extended outlook brilliantly. "Distance" can impart many meanings and Hodgins weaves geographical and personal themes here with his usual skill. "Distance" may be narrowed, and the issues of personal reconciliation and defining "home" are important ones in this book.

We follow Sonny Aalto from Ottawa to Vancouver Island, then across the Pacific. There's even a side journey to the woods of Finland, his family's origins. The journey confronts us with Sonny's family. "Confront" is fraught with meaning, since Sonny's interactions with his family are tense and acerbic. Pleasant words don't often appear and "dislike" is the mildest epithet available. Yet the hostility is tempered with another side to all the characters. Family life, no matter how conflict-filled, still carries an undercurrent of mutual respect and tenderness. Sonny, who has strenuously resisted communicating with his father while seeking closer ties with his own children, is induced to return home.

Why is Sonny so frequently on the move? He's spent a lifetime edging eastward, following various careers, seeking his children. He travels incessantly - ruined cathedrals, shrines to pagan gods, remote villages. The driving force is his father, Timo - "Swampy" Aalto. Abandoned by his wife Viira, Timo, quite unprepared for the role, becomes a single parent. In a remote corner of Vancouver Island, missing part of a leg, and virtually unemployable, he resents the role and his life. Sonny is either left to his own devices or forced to clean up after Timo's drunken debauches with whichever women will tolerate him. Leaving home wasn't a hard decision for Sonny. Once departed, he just never stopped. Ottawa is his latest refuge - "he wanted to belong" . Will it be his last?

Skating the Rideau Canal on one of Ottawa's notorious February days, Sonny is confronted by a stranger claiming to be his brother. "Believe me, mate. I would not risk frozen gonads for a prank!" Jerrod has travelled half way around the planet to deliver an invitation: come to Australia and visit his mother. And shoot boar - they kill sheep. Sonny demurs. He hasn't used a rifle in thirty years. Far more significantly, he's uncertain how to deal with his long-vanished mother. Lured to Victoria by his ailing father, the island continent beckons. Timo, who has his own reasons to confront Viira, endorses the journey. Crippled, seriously ill, he embraces the idea of the adventure. Timo as a travelling companion is compounding risk.

Family relationships, especially those dominated by confrontation, make compelling reading. Sonny has inherited his father's tendency to steer away from family ties - his son is "up the Valley" running a craft store while his daughter Charlotte returned to Vancouver pursuing a photographic career. Charlotte scorns Sonny, while son Warren seems to communicate only to request money. Under Jack Hodgins' perceptive eye and skilled narrative style, these characters become vividly staged in this engrossing tale. The family gathering in the Australian bush becomes a cockpit of conflicting experiences and interests. For all his mother-deprived upbringing, Sonny is a successful businessman. He must hold his own against half-siblings, and on their home turf. Hodgins doesn't invoke a false hero in Sonny, but there's strength and motives to persevere against stiff odds. Timo also shows unexpected drive, his patriarchal role may be challenged, but rarely relinquished.

Hodgins' characters are finely drawn - he has a keen sense of details about people and their habitats. His ability to convey idiosyncrasies of local speech borders on the uncanny. You can hear the bushman's voice of Jerrold Hawkins. Timo's irascibility echoes the stress of years struggling in Vancouver Island's own bush environment. Sonny's firewood supplier's laconic observations reflecting life in the upper Ottawa Valley. This isn't stereotyping, it's identification.

Hodgins draws more than characters. In tracing Sonny's wanderings, each locale is characteristically depicted. Ottawa's chip wagons, Vancouver Island's isolated "up-island" towns, and the novelty of the island continent. His Australian visits enable a special talent for conveying the contrasting environments. When he takes Sonny to the vastness of Australia's desert, he pictures it both with the eye of a casual visitor and established resident. You share Sonny's role as the intruder into both family and place with sympathy. The vast stretches and novel circumstances of that distant and unusual land. Jack Hodgins introduces us to people and places we may never encounter. Follow his lead into journeys of mind and space. It's a rewarding jaunt. [stephen a. haines - Ottawa, Canada]

Hypnosis can bring you success at weight loss, especially if other approaches have failed. Some of my patients report that their weight loss was virtually effortless -- not at all like being on a diet. Reaching and maintaining an ideal weight requires your attention to three simple principles:

You'll learn to eat healthy and take pleasure and delight in what you can eat, rather than be frustrated by what you can't eat;
You'll learn to lead an active lifestyle, enjoying your decision to be active on a regular, daily basis;
You'll learn to meet your emotional needs without using food to comfort yourself.

"Teaching these three basic principles and amplifying them with self-hypnosis via Dr. Larry's self-change techniques has made him a fantastic weight loss guru. This CD will get you started easily, quickly and permanently on the road to good health. As he entertains you, Dr. Larry will give you the latest information in medical advice and strategies for weight loss. As you understand what you need to do and should do, the suggestive powers of self-hypnosis help to put you in charge."

I will be forever grateful to Dr. Larry for this CD it changed my life!

After years of trying every diet plan imaginable, I purchased Dr. Larry's Lose Weight CD. Hypnotism was totally unfamiliar to me (except the stage type). I couldn't believe it would work, but was determined to try.

Listening to the tape on a daily basis, I learned to eat smaller portions of healthy food, joined a fitness centre where a fitness instructor devised a program for me to support the weight loss program suggested by Dr, Larry.

"Meeting emotional needs without using food as a salve" was perhaps the most difficult. Being overweight, size 16-18 clothes and feeling very unattractive, led to a cycle of overeating. But as the pounds started to come off and continued to do so with the aid of Dr. Larry's CD, a new confident person emerged, who could handle this lifestyle change.

Dr. Larry's CD changed my life - after almost 40 pounds of weight loss, I wear a size 10, lead a healthy, active lifestyle and have a very positive outlook on life. I was thrilled to go shopping for my first pair of jeans (without an elastic waistband) and have my grandchildren call me their "cool Nanny"!

our son loves krypto this sturdy book is one of our favorites. He is only 2.5 years so the turning is a little difficult but he is learning to be more gentle. A great little story.

I bought this book for my 14 mo. old daughter because I personally thought it was hilarious. Oh and also because there are lots of flaps and dials - not sure what they're called. I think my daughter is a little too young for it now but I'm pretty sure she'll like it when she's a little older.

"Stewart Home imprisoned the pure pupil of a drug fetus." - Kenji Siratori, author Blood Electric

This guy writes seriously screwed up books...and he writes them brilliantly.

It's like Irvin Welsh (who is an obvious influence.) if Irvin had studied English Lit'...or like James Joyce if Joyce hadn't been the only Irishman in history who could not tell a story.

You gotta read this stuff...but then go read some Jane Austin just to get a bit of balance back.

Believe it or not, in the early 1980s, medical hypnosis experts claimed only 25 percent of smokers could be cured through hypnosis. (Of course, cigarette companies said smoking was good for you, too!) Dr. Larry proved them wrong -- in his own family practice, two-thirds of his patients quit smoking after a single hypnosis session.

With Dr. Larry's Quit Smoking program, you will:
* Break the psychological addiction to smoking;
* Develop an alternative comfort behavior that replaces smoking;

* Be ready to let go of the smoking habit.

Dr. Larry Deutsch, a practicing family physician and hypnotherapist, has over 30 years of hands-on experience. He's already helped thousands of people lose weight, quit smoking or achieve other health goals via medical hypnotherapy. With his motivating and entertaining style he combines sound medical advice, psychology and self-hypnosis techniques to empower you to find the subconscious strength and will power necessary to succeed. "Remember: Smoking is also a biological addiction! You can achieve a higher chance of success by combining some medical counseling to deal with physical symptoms of withdrawal. Fortunately, hypnosis and self-hypnosis boost your response to counseling, making your cravings much easier to combat."

Dr. Larry's Quit Smoking Program was largely responsible for my ending a 30 year addiction to cigatettes.

I acquired the CD when I was thinking of quiting and after I listened to it once I decided to quit and have not had a puff since.

The first few days were difficult but by listening to the CD two or three times a day for the first week I was able to resist the urge to smoke.

I can recommend the Quit Smoking Program because I am sure that it made the difference it made the difference between this successful attempt at quitting and previous failed attempts.

An account of the great accomplishments and the magnificent failures of the visionaries who sought to create what they could not find in America.

This book is about people whose names aren't found in schoolbooks and there have been no marble statues made in their honor, but nevertheless they helped make America what it is today. All of them...visionaries, indomitable pioneers, ranting lunatics, or patient doers, helped to build America.

In these pages are the stories of people like Sylvester Graham (Graham Crackers), who campaigned against "adulterated" bread but only succeeded in having a cracker named for him; of Orson Fowler, who made a fortune exploiting phrenology; of George Eveans, who conceived the Homestead Act; of Henry George, who propounded the idea of a single tax, on land; and among the many others, of Dorothea Dix, who struggled to improve the asylums of the mentally ill. Learn about the heroes and heroines of the temperance and the suffragette movements; of the persons who worked for the deaf and dumb, the insane, and the blind...or who brought about prison reforms, or led the fight for the workingman. Learn about more of America's off-beat characters in this book!

I really enjoyed Holbrook's technique of depicting history through as an inter-related web of ideas and historical personalities. As an exmple, his explanation of the underlying motiviations for Prohibition were very insightful. It was also exciting to see the evolution of the modern penitentiary system, mental hospitals, Oneida silverware and the graham cracker. These are all things that are a part of modern life and reading this history helped me to understand why they are they way they are.

This simple, beautifully illustrated guide will help you to get the most from your dreams. There are techniques to prepare yourself for a better night's dreaming, such as meditation, and relaxation. It gives advice on recalling and recording your dreams, because by keeping notes about your dreams and reviewing them, you may see patterns emerging that reveal much about your subconscious thoughts. A comprehensive list of common dream symbols gives you the tools to interpret your dreams. Explanations of the types of dreams we have, such as nightmares and recurrent dreams, allow us to unlock the secrets of our subconscious.

I've had this book for a few years now. Everytime I get confused, I look up my dream and it tells me that my dream is a refelction of this or that from my waking life, and 99.99% of the time it's absolutly right. I always feel so relived to know what a dream ment, so I don't have to keep wondering what it means. Now, my friends always come to me asking about what their dream ment. It's great.

Don Stewart's creativity is unmatched. One could sit and stare at his art work for hours, continuously finding new twists in every piece. In addition to the visual challenge is the intellectual puzzle of what every piece and part represents and how it contributes to the whole. His art is creative, challenging, and beautiful. I look forward to seeing more of his art in the future.

Besides enjoying his book, I have several pieces of his art displayed in my clinic. I encourage you to check out his website: www.dsart.com

My young patients love it!!

-- Marti Sharkey, MD, FAAP

I first saw Don Stewart's art at a local frame shop and was amazed at the creativity and imagination. When I found out he had a book containing his wonderful art I ordered a copy and WOW. What neat images and so creative. Never a boring moment. A book I keep picking up. Like the I Spy books for kids or Look A Likes, this book is for every age and it all flows from Don Stewart's pen.

I got this book at a reading by the author, whose enthusiasm for his subjecct was infectious. I was also enchanted by James Grashow's whimsical woodcut illustration on the cover--a mauve hippopotomus doing a feathery fan dance. The illustrations beckon us into Edelstein's etymological digs into the shared parentage of strange doublets--hippopotomus and feather being just two. Both words stem from the Indo-European #pet- (as well as the suffixed form "pet-ra,")meaning "to rush, fly." With a light touch, Edelstein flies through feather's line derived from the Greek "pteron" (feather or wing) through the Jurassic Age archeopteryx, pen (as in,quill), penne (pasta shaped like a quill); then rushes us on to pinnacle, panache, petulant, impetus, perpetual, compete, repeat, appetite, and get this, symptom. But, he asks, "how does the massive, slow-moving hippopotamus, which has absolutely no sense of panache and certainly can't fly, join the family of rushing and flying words? The answer is not in the 'hippo' but in the rushing water where it thrives. Greek 'potamos' means 'river,' originally 'rushing water.' Greek 'hippos' means 'horse.' Literally, a hippopotamus is a 'horse in rushing water.' Hippos rarely wander far from water, where they feed on water plants and share vegetation, feel buoyant, and stay cool."

All this information in a single page of text!

But the book is not just a trip through the meandering geography of our language. Edelstein has unpacked th treasures words have gleaned from their travels, and he entertains us with their tales. Think of gods, muses, royalty, clergy, soldiers, maids, barbarians, Romans, Greeks, French, Germans,Americans all sharing a common table, swapping stories, jokes and wordplay and you get some idea of this book. It's rich Epicurean fare packaged as small tastes--tapas, perhaps. And, it is a comfortable book, cozy in the hands with a soft cover; light enough to carry in a backpack or purse (which I do); with clear operating instructions (doublets are in alpha order). Erudite but friendly, Edelstein's Dubious Doublets might be construed as Pooh's take on the Oxford English Dictionary. For me, it's become a pal.5

Allison Tracy, Western Massachusetts

Anyone interested in words will find this book to be delightful and enlightening. Stewart Edelstein has taken many unlikely pairs of words and traces them back to reveal their common, often surprising roots. For example, he pairs "gazebo" and "placebo." A gazebo is a structure, he explains, which affords an enjoyable view. A placebo is a substance with no real effect. What do these words have in common? Expectation, we learn. Then we learn about the history and the early recorded uses of the words. The book is filled with discussions of such "dubious doublets"-- which provides the book's title-- from "aardvark" and "procelain" to "canary" and "cynic" to "salacious" and "salmon" to "dentist" and "dandelion," and many, many more. Dubious Doublets is a delightful read, filled with erudition and humor. And it is accessible to people who, like me, have never really studied word origins. It is beautifully and humorously illustrated. It would make a fine gift for writers, people interested in language, or people who enjoy words games. It can be read in small doses or in large portions, depending on one's mood. I heartily recommend it.

Rebecca Reid and Dr. Michael Campbell met while they were cataloguing Dun Iain's artifacts in the book Ashes to Ashes. After months of long-distance dating, Rebecca was thrilled to be working with Michael on a dig in Scotland at the Rudesburn Priory in Eidon Hills. It was rumored that the abbey's last prioress, Marjory Douglas, still haunted its halls and that Robert the Bruce's heart was buried there and never found. Leading a group of archeology students, Rebecca was eager to uncover the priory's treasures, mythical or no. She was also eager to determine what exactly her relationship with Michael was. However, their relationship was immediately strained when Sheila Fitzgerald, Michael's ex, showed up at the dig to film the entire event. When Sheila was found murdered a few days later, apparently with Michael's own knife, Rebecca finds herself doubting her relationship with Michael. Oh, she knows that he didn't do it, of course, but she has no idea who did. Was it Adele Garity, an older woman who went back to school who is obsessed with New Age philosophies; Dennis Tucker, an overweight student with his own hidden agenda; Jeremy Kleinfelter, Sheila's current lover, the leader of the dig whose reputation is on the line after he as accused of salting his previous dig? Or was it someone else entirely? As Rebecca works to solve the mystery before Michael is arrested, she also has to try and council Hilary Chase, a rape victim and help her get involved in her first relationship since with Mark Owen, a fellow student. As more and more revelations come to light, Rebecca discovers that she doesn't really know anyone on the dig, including herself...

Dust to Dust is a wonderful sequel to Ashes to Ashes. It is not necessary to read Ashes to Ashes, though, as Carl does a fine job about giving the reader a little bit of background if they are not familiar with the story. Still, Ashes to Ashes is a great book so I recommend you read it. I loved this one even more than Ashes to Ashes, though, as it had more of a romance story in it. Rebecca and Michael are in that interesting stage of a relationship where they are serious enough to have to determine if what they have is worth taking to the next level or if they should just give up on the whole thing. It was also wonderful to have a dig in Scotland as the backdrop. I particularly enjoyed learning about Scottish history and the archaeological aspects were fascinating. The book is a wonderful read and I highly recommend it to anyone who enjoys romantic mysteries!

In her second book about historians Michael and Rebecca, Lillian Stewart Carl takes us to a dig at a priory in Scotland. Sacked by Henry VIII during his attemps to divorce himself from Catharine of Aragon and the Catholic church, the priory is haunted, not only by Henry's victims but by the pasts of the archaeological team. You'll also want to read the first in the series, Ashes to Ashes and then the the third, but hopefully not final installment, Garden of Thorns.