Can a mother be both loving and selfish? Caring and thoughtless? Deceitful and devoted? These are the questions that fuel psychologist Dr. Judy Rabinor’s quest to understand her ambivalence toward her mother.
While leading a seminar exploring the importance of the mother-daughter relationship, Dr. Judy Rabinor, an eating disorder expert, is blindsided by a memory of a childhood trauma. Realizing how this buried trauma has resonated through her life, she sets off to heal herself. The Girl in the Red Boots weaves together tales from Rabinor’s psychotherapy practice and her life, helping readers understand how painful childhood experiences can linger and leave emotional scars. In the process, Rabinor traces her own journey becoming a wounded healer and ultimately making peace with her mother, and herself.
Not a traditional self-help book outlining “steps” to reconcile or forgive one’s mother, The Girl in the Red Boots is a poignant memoir filled with hard-won life lessons, including the fact that it’s never too late to let go of hurts and disappointments and develop compassion for yourself—and even for your mother.
Meet Judith Ruskay Rabinor, PhD
Judith Ruskay Rabinor, PhD, is a clinician, author, writing coach, speaker, and workshop leader. In addition to her New York City private psychotherapy practice, she offers remote consultations for writers, clinicians and families. She has published dozens of articles for both the public and professionals and has authored two books, A Starving Madness: Tales of Hunger, Hope and Healing (Gurze Books, 2002) and Befriending Your Ex After Divorce: Making Life Better for You, Your Ex and Yes, Your Ex! (New Harbinger Publications, 2012). A sought-after speaker and workshop leader, Judy speaks at national and international mental health conferences and runs workshops at spas (including Canyon Ranch), colleges and universities (including Harvard University Continuing Education), and retreat centers such as the Esalon Institute, California. She resides in New York City. –This text refers to the paperback edition.
9-year-old Nichole and her parents are evicted from their home because of her parents’ heroin addiction. With nowhere left to turn, they are now homeless. In order to survive they must dig through dumpsters, beg, and steal. While living on the streets, Nicole struggles to understand why people treat them differently.
Meet Nichole Carpenter
NICHOLE CARPENTER is a wife and mother living in Orange County, CA. She is passionate about sharing her testimony of overcoming homelessness with others.
Preventing Her Shutdown is an inside look of what an ongoing caregiver spouse goes through in my desperate effort to keep my wife with Alzheimer’s “connected”. Very personal unloaded emotions are expressed and actions taken, never confided to anyone while slowly losing my wife. She doesn’t speak at all. She expresses only some sounds and shows a lot of anxiety. This becomes a real challenge trying to figure out what she wants and how she feels. How do we communicate? How do I talk to her? How does she tell me what she wants or needs? We both had to learn how to interact and communicate with each other. My desperation as a spouse caregiver is that we are constantly “connecting” as this alleviates my greatest fear of a “shutdown”. Detailed is how everyday, every moment I can, I try to create an opportunity to “connect”
Meet Sammie
I am a typical John Doe husband “amateur caregiver” for my wife with Alzheimer´s on my own inventing and creating ways to keep my wife interactive and connected. This book started out as a daily diary noting my wife’s behavior and my reactions which not only helped me ventilate my sorrow but also how to react to her changes and her needs as her caregiver.
I wanted to share these efforts with other “amateur caregivers” like me living this same journey alone with their loved ones.
In The House on Dogbone St., Julia Duthie takes us on a walk through the tumultuous life she was destined to endure.The feeling of treading on eggshells for the little girl who had no choice but to navigate one of the most dreadful paths that life could offer, displaying her resilience and go-getter attitude no matter what obstacle was thrown her way, is fascinating. We cannot blame her for being naive in some circumstances as the two people meant to protect her were in a world of their own. One, in a depressive trance, while the other was never fully present.
However, from start to end, her story is a lesson for every one of us. Ignorance takes no blame in this journey as Julia made the best of what she had and what she thought to be right. It is the advantage taken by elders and those who camouflaged their real personas that are the actual culprits of a life filled with scars at every turn. How she turned those dents into beautiful blooms is the intrigue of it all. Walk her path through this great rendition to encounter neighbours and teachers who stood in the shadows and shed a slight reflexion of hope toward her direction, never knowing how much it would finally mean to her and what she would eventually become.
Although it is a triumph to be celebrated, the unwelcome demons she collected along the way sometimes threaten to manifest themselves and take her back to a state of defeat. But will she follow suit? Find out in her extraordinary memoir.
Meet Julia Duthie
Julia lives in Surrey with her two children, her partner Kathryn and her Beagle, Brodie. Over the years, she has both built and led numerous businesses, has been an artist and nurtured other artists in the competitive world of the music industry. She has also had the privilege of living and working in the US and India. Given she started her career at a local leisure centre; a job she took in order to use its laundry facilities to wash her own clothes, her origin story is something of an enigma.
Dancing was her life. Until a paralyzing virus threatened to shatter her dreams.
Forever on Pointe: A True Story is the fascinating account of one woman’s ever-evolving journey from the intense world of professional ballet to the bloody streets of the Hungarian Revolution to the glittering nightclubs of Montreal. In this intimate and revealing memoir, Agota Gabor shares how grit and determination allowed her to attain her wildest dreams.
As a young girl, Agota intends to become a professional ballerina in Budapest, but her dream is shattered when she contracts polio. Through gruesome therapy and iron willpower, she learns to dance again, making a living as a dancer in Canada after her home country erupts in the Hungarian Revolution of 1956.
Agota forges ahead to achieve a prosperous and dynamic life, working as a chorus girl in Montreal casinos and nightclubs. But she wants more than just the glitz and glam. After going back to school, Agota becomes a television journalist and works with her foreign-correspondent husband as they live the expat life, traveling across the world from Hong Kong to Jakarta to London. Agota’s roller-coaster life continues as a mother and a businesswoman, as she runs a successful communications firm and makes a killing in real estate.
Meet Agota Gabor
Agota Gabor grew up in Budapest, Hungary and attended the Ballet School of The Hungarian State Opera House. After fleeing Budapest with her mother during the Hungarian Revolution, Agota settled in Canada where she became a dancer in Montreal. During the 1960s and 70s, Agota worked in television production, eventually going back to school to receive a degree in journalism from Ryerson University. After travelling the world as a freelance reporter and becoming a mother, she founded The Gabor Group, a media company specializing in public awareness campaigns, digital communication, and video production. In 2020 she wrote a handbook on communications and media interviews. Forever on Pointe is her debut memoir. Agota lives in Toronto.
The very concept of New York City conjures up a wealth of emotions in many people. For writer Joanie Strulowitz, it has always been a place of magic: an enticing playground, a cascade of art, a wonderland of fascinating characters, a youth serum to keep her feeling forever young.
Believing herself to be a New Yorker who just happened to be born in Iowa, Strulowitz felt the tantalizing call of Manhattan from the time she was four, and eventually made her home there. In this love song to the City, she pays adoring tribute to the essence of Manhattan from its intense pace and the pounding excitement in the air to the funky charm and even the glittering pavement that provides a stage on which it all unfolds.
The City is her laboratory, her art studio, and the extraordinary inspiration for this collection of captivating vignettes. In each short but sublime piece, Strulowitz evokes the luminous ambiance that has lured artists and adventure seekers to the island metropolis for generations: enthralling chance encounters, the slightly terrifying exhilaration of first subway rides, the soothing clink of silverware in a favorite sidewalk cafe, the urge to break into song when discovering a perfect little boutique.
Anyone who has lived in New York City, played tourist there, or just dreamed of paying a visit will find something to love in this transcendent appreciation of the jewel-encrusted celebration of life and art that is Manhattan.
Meet Joanie Strulowitz
ALTHOUGH JOANIE STRULOWITZ is seasoned in numerous aspects of the arts and business, writing has always been her baby. While raising her two daughters in Iowa, she joined the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators. Years later, after finding her first apartment in Los Angeles, she discovered that–magnetically–the SCBWI offices were two blocks from her front door. Originally from Iowa and later Chicago, Strulowitz moved to New York because, as she explains in My Love Affair with Manhattan (Vignettes of a Life in the City), “My soul has always lived there, and my body needs to catch up.” With a memory that is largely emotive, she recalls almost every square inch of how she felt growing up. As an observer who always thought something was wrong with her because she didn’t fit in, she discovered that writing books, and being involved with all of the arts, help to make sense of life. Now she seeks to be the voice she searched for, so the lessons she learned can help others to find the gifts in their differences–and to believe in themselves and their dreams. Today you can find her (and her black turtleneck) in Los Angeles, writing a chapter on her grocery bag while walking home, or completing her YA fantasy novel during Pilates sessions.
A heartbreaking doctor’s visit. A fate she never saw coming. She’d dig deep for the strength she so desperately needed…
Seattle, 2015. Jenny Lisk was happy with a perfectly normal, busy life. But after the usual bustling week, Friday night turned from downtime into mild alarm when her forty-three-year-old spouse shared that he’d been feeling dizzy. And after ten days of his condition steadily worsening, she still wasn’t prepared for the stunning news: He was terminally ill.
Reeling from his diagnosis of an inoperable brain tumor, Jenny suddenly became not only a wife, mother, and career woman, but also a cancer-patient caregiver and parent of grieving children. And her many fears and uncertainties swirled around one relentless question:
Did she have what it takes to help her young family survive?
Through a vulnerable, honest account of preparing for the death of a loved one, Jenny shares tips and information about childhood grief, how to be there for mourning friends, and ways online communities provide essential support. And for those who feel lost and alone, or are grappling with any kind of loss, her deeply personal journey provides a universal beacon of hope.
Future Widow: Losing My Husband, Saving My Family, and Finding My Voice is a brave and raw narrative that doesn’t pull any punches on the realities of caregiving and bereavement. If you like captivating stories, authentic inspiration, and understanding the grieving process, then you’ll find encouragement in Jenny Lisk’s touching memoir.
Buy Future Widow to rebuild a life today!
Meet Jenny Lisk
Jenny Lisk is an award-winning author and widowed mom who is dedicated to helping widowed parents increase their family’s well-being.
In her book, Future Widow, Jenny draws on her personal and professional experience to provide a real-life guide for surviving and thriving while raising grieving children.
As host of The Widowed Parent Podcast, Jenny has done more than 100 interviews with experts, seasoned widowed parents, and people who lost a parent at a young age. Her podcast brings much-needed resources to parents, helping them feel less lost and alone.
In this painfully moving memoir, take a firsthand look at anorexia through the eyes of a young girl. Even in kindergarten, Rachel Richards knows something isn’t right. By leading us through her distorted thoughts, she shines a light on the experience and mystery of mental illness.
As she grows up, unable to comprehend or communicate her inner trauma, Rachel lashes out, hurting herself, running away from home, and fighting her family. Restricting food gives her the control she craves. But after being hospitalized and force-fed, Rachel only retreats further into herself.
With a driving perfectionism, she graduates college with honors. But at sixty-nine pounds, Rachel is a shell of nervous and obsessive behaviors that have controlled her life. Years of self-harm and self-loathing have fueled the inner battles between good and evil, health and sickness, and life and death.
Acting on stage offers her moments of freedom from the skewed perceptions she’s constructed over the years. But her dream of a career in theater is not enough to save her. What is the secret that will finally unleash her will to recover?
If you or someone you know suffers from an eating disorder or is a concerned parent, is anxious about weight and dieting, has an addiction, or wants to learn more about the mystery of how an eating disorder develops and the multifaceted and complex road to recovery, this book is a must-read!
Meet Rachel Richards
After years of struggling with an eating disorder, author Rachel Richards turned her life around and now helps others in pain.
Returning to school after earning her BFA in theater from Hofstra University, she graduated from the Swedish Institute College of Health Sciences and started her own private practice in Manhattan as a licensed and board-certified massage therapist. She hosts a popular YouTube channel, has spoken at the National Alliance on Mental Illness, has written several articles for Recovery Warriors, an online magazine dedicated to helping eating disorder sufferers get the treatment they need, and she has written numerous articles on health and self-care, which can be found at Rachel-Richards.com.
Simon Williams is plagued by a recurring nightmare where he goes on a long hike. But no matter how far he walks, he can never get away from his past.
As a young man he was scarred for life. If you passed him on the street, he might not stand out. There is nothing exceptionally notable about his appearance. However, he carries a secret torment that will one day change everything, not just for him.
As he turns 50, Simon looks back on the times of escape in his life that have taken him to Japan, India, Thailand, Greece, South Africa, and South America. This man has traveled to all the places most people want to go, but suffered from the one emotion that people do not.
An inspired memoir about an unusual life from a unique story teller. That is both hilariously funny and yet deeply thought provoking of what suppressing pain and anger can do to an ordinary man.
Eventually, our past catches up to all of us.
Meet Simon Williams
Simon Williams is an author who believes in the adage, write what you know. So, his two memoir series, TORN and WANDERLOST, encapsulate the three themes he knows best in this world, fear, regret, and inspiration.
Life has not been fair to Simon, on many levels, but his honest and forthright openness on the issues that have dogged him as he found a determination to continue fighting for the one thing in his life that is most important to him and that still eludes him to this day.
Born in a small, dry town in Australia, after residing in over 45 different locations, Simon now calls Miami, Florida home.
His books are always tinged with sufficient humorous relief to keep uplifting readers as they must follow Simon through what have been some extremely harrowing exploits over his 50 years.
What if you could make a wish…and your every hope, dream and desire came true?
Think about how you’d feel if this magic lamp wasn’t a fantasy. What if you really had one but just didn’t know it?
The truth is, you do have a magic lamp: your mind.
It can manifest anything you wish. You just need to learn how to free the genie, and Best Life-ing will show you how.
If you’re trapped in a dead end job, toxic relationships and a hopeless life, Best Life-ing can transform you into a fearless, empowered badass that is in control of your destiny.
Opening the pages of Best Life-ing is like rubbing your magic lamp—a whole world of possibilities, dreams and desires are suddenly at your fingertips.
But is this just a load of BS?
Well, the author was once stuck in a far worse place than most people.
Best Life-ing documents Julia Brodska’s story of how she grew up in poverty and later was a high school dropout, overweight, drowning in debt and going nowhere in life. In one year, she underwent a radical transformation: she paid off $30,000 in debt, lost 30 pounds and started her own business. Today, she owns two successful companies, teaches workshops and classes, and speaks to auditoriums of corporate employees, all while traveling the world.
Best Life-ing will teach you how to undergo your own dramatic transformation.
Using Best Life-ing’s 7 Areas of Life Framework, you’ll learn how to pummel your insecurities, conquer your fears and become unstoppable as you achieve dream after dream in your best life.
Unleash your genie.
Buy this book now and start living your best life today.
