The Badass Life: 30 Amazing Days to a Lifetime of Great Habits—Body, Mind, and Spirit

With her usual high energy and optimistic attitude, Abbott (The Badass Body Diet) returns with a book intended to help people improve their lives with a reasonable and systematic approach to developing good habits. Abbott intermixes stories about her own struggles with drugs, alcohol, and cigarettes with anecdotes about people who achieved goals such as weight loss, athletic triumphs, or financial success. Inspirational quotations begin well-designed exercises (which Abbot calls “challenges”) for forming goals and making changes, including one where readers are invited to write their own obituaries in order to ponder what they’d like their legacies to be. Quizzes help readers determine their stress levels, attitudes, and resiliency. Abbott acknowledges common obstacles—relapses, insufficient time, and unsupportive family and friends—while offering solutions to each. The chapter “Turning Setbacks into Comebacks” addresses facing the harshest critic most of us have: ourselves. Never shying away from potential obstacles, Abbott counterbalances her candor with ways of celebrating one’s victories and acknowledging progress. While the tone occasionally borders on the Pollyannaish—“Don’t Get Bitter, Get Better”—Abbott’s sincerity is apparent on every page. Readers seeking ways to jump-start their lives will find Abbot a companionable guide. Agent: Steve Troha, Folio Literary Management. (May)