Stepping Out from the Shadows: A Guide to Understanding & Healing from Addictions by Allan Kehler Published by Your Nickel’s Worth Publishing Review by Shelley A. Leedahl $19.95 ISBN 978-1-927756-12-6 Unhealthy addictions are prevalent in contemporary society, and if you visit any bookstore, you’ll note that books about addictions also fill the shelves. When one who’s experienced the wrath of addiction puts pen to paper, it tends to add weight to the words. Allan Kehler is a Saskatchewan author, addictions counsellor, educator, and presenter, and he’s also struggled with both addictions and mental illness. His book Stepping Out from the Shadows: A Guide to Understanding & Healing from Addictions, is an easy-to-read guide for those struggling with addictions, and for those who love and support them. Kehler names some of the reasons why one might become addicted to a substance or behavior (like compulsive gambling or over-eating). These include a lack of love and nurturing within the home environment, mental illness, peer pressure, or some specific trauma which resulted in suppressed emotions. “The person takes comfort knowing that something exists that will bring them out of their painful reality.” As use escalates, however, a habit that was once a “want”…

Opening Up: How To Develop Your Intuition And Work With Your Angels by Lisa Driver Published by DriverWorks Ink Review by Shelley A. Leedahl $19.95 ISBN 978-1-927570-13-5 Are you as happy as you’d like to be? I’m guessing that most would answer “no” to this glaring question, whether our challenges concern illness, loneliness, grief, financial woes, strained relationships, confidence issues, employment worries, addictions, or something altogether different. Of course many books promise happier, healthier living, but Lisa Driver’s Opening Up: How To Develop Your Intuition And Work With Your Angels takes a unique approach: it combines elements of Christianity (the author was raised in a Christian home and uses “God” to describe the “loving energy” we all share) and what some term “new age” beliefs, ie: developing intuition through meditation; using crystals; participating in Angel Tarot card readings, energy work, and Reiki; and recognizing when our angels are communicating with us. Regina-born Driver was in transition in her own personal life – she’d had “about seven jobs in as many years” – when she attended a “Natural Health and Healing Expo” in her adopted city, Medicine Hat. There the “’regular’ Saskatchewan prairie girl” was introduced to an “angelic medium from…

After the Truck Hit by Jennifer Kuchinka Published by DriverWorks Ink Review by Michelle Shaw $19.95 ISBN 978-1-927570-16-6 When I first picked up Jennifer Kuchinka’s book After the Truck Hit, I was both intrigued and apprehensive. With a title like that, I figured I was in for an emotional journey. After the Truck Hit is both a story and a journal of Jennifer’s life before and after the accident. It’s a story firmly rooted in Saskatchewan. In Estevan, where Jennifer was born and where she lived for a time with her husband; in Macoun, a small town in the southeast corner of Saskatchewan, where she grew up and where she lived with her parents and baby daughter while recovering from her accident, and in Regina, where she studied at the University of Regina, met her husband and subsequently spent almost three months in the fall of 2010 recovering from her accident. Much of the book seems to have been taken from Jennifer’s personal journal after the accident which is both fascinating and a little frustrating in that the reader experiences firsthand her jumbled and repetitive thoughts. To make it easier to follow, Jennifer “fills in the blanks” in italics, putting…