Stress-management consultant LaRoche (Relax! You May Only Have a Few Minutes Left)
asks us to slow down, turn off the cell phones and laugh at modern society's absurdities. She points out that sedentary Americans obsessively work out at the gym, but never take the stairs or go for a walk; we watch sitcom families on TV, but don't spend time with our own families; we buy brand names instead of generic products simply because they impart status—all part of her lament at our collective loss of perspective. Unfortunately, as these examples suggest, most of LaRoche's points will come as no surprise to even the most stressed-out and status-conscious readers. Her breezy statements about the war between the sexes are also problematic ("The brains of men and women are patterned differently, and it happened over tens of thousands of years when we lived in tribes in the wilderness"). Finally, while some readers will appreciate LaRoche's good-natured pep talk, they may find her unbridled enthusiasm for exclamation points grating, as well as her constant use of throw-away expressions like "Listen," "I mean," etc., which are better suited to the motivational speaker lecture circuit than the printed page. (May)
