A safety expert’s engaging and well-written guide to hazards at home, at work, and elsewhere.
A consumer advocate sounds an alarm about everyday safety risks in this exposé of corporate and other practices that endanger Americans.
Goldhaber draws on decades of designing warning labels, consulting for government agencies, and testifying as an expert witness to reveal ongoing consumer and workplace safety problems. In chapters organized by theme—home, work, travel, recreation, and more—Goldhaber reviews cases of negligence, carelessness, and unforeseen consequences that have resulted in injury and death. Some of the situations he covers are well known, such as the Takata airbag recalls or the fatal Upper Big Branch mine explosion. Others involve hazards that have had less attention, such as the risks of inflatable bounce houses (which, he says, cause 30 injuries a day) and of microwave ovens with no or incorrect wattage labels (which can lead to unsafe food preparation). Goldhaber shows how corporate profitability has often won out over safety and why regulating manufacturers can be challenging. An especially strong chapter deals with “deeply troubling” TV commercials for prescription drugs that adhere to the letter of the law while flouting its intent—for example, by adding an “Ask your doctor” line that allows big pharma legally to avoid “the general rule that manufacturers have a duty to directly and explicitly warn end-users about the potential risks of their products.” He also describes companies that have taken the lead in providing adequate warnings and demonstrated responsible corporate behavior. The book concludes that safety is simultaneously the responsibility of corporations, the government, and ordinary Americans, and it suggests how each group can do its part, whether by producing and marketing responsibly, upholding standards, or staying informed. With well-chosen and informative anecdotes, the writing is eye-catching (“the common ladder is, for all practical purposes, a list of hazards looking for a purpose”), its messages supported by many images of product or other warning labels that Goldhaber helped to design, illustrating effective but not excessive precautionary techniques. Based on solid research and Goldhaber’s experience in the field, and introduced by the activist Erin Brockovich, this book by the author of Organizational Communication (1989) is a solid choice for both casual readers and those with a passion for safety.
A safety expert’s engaging and well-written guide to hazards at home, at work, and elsewhere.Pub Date: March 11, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-946384-84-3
Page Count: 366
Publisher: Publish Your Purpose Press
Review Posted Online: March 14, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular...
A neurosurgeon with a passion for literature tragically finds his perfect subject after his diagnosis of terminal lung cancer.
Writing isn’t brain surgery, but it’s rare when someone adept at the latter is also so accomplished at the former. Searching for meaning and purpose in his life, Kalanithi pursued a doctorate in literature and had felt certain that he wouldn’t enter the field of medicine, in which his father and other members of his family excelled. “But I couldn’t let go of the question,” he writes, after realizing that his goals “didn’t quite fit in an English department.” “Where did biology, morality, literature and philosophy intersect?” So he decided to set aside his doctoral dissertation and belatedly prepare for medical school, which “would allow me a chance to find answers that are not in books, to find a different sort of sublime, to forge relationships with the suffering, and to keep following the question of what makes human life meaningful, even in the face of death and decay.” The author’s empathy undoubtedly made him an exceptional doctor, and the precision of his prose—as well as the moral purpose underscoring it—suggests that he could have written a good book on any subject he chose. Part of what makes this book so essential is the fact that it was written under a death sentence following the diagnosis that upended his life, just as he was preparing to end his residency and attract offers at the top of his profession. Kalanithi learned he might have 10 years to live or perhaps five. Should he return to neurosurgery (he could and did), or should he write (he also did)? Should he and his wife have a baby? They did, eight months before he died, which was less than two years after the original diagnosis. “The fact of death is unsettling,” he understates. “Yet there is no other way to live.”
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular clarity.Pub Date: Jan. 19, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-8129-8840-6
Page Count: 248
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2015
PERSPECTIVES
A passionate and accessible guide to humanizing the workplace.
Helbig and Norman present a game plan for making leadership more responsively human.
In this expanded update to The Psychological Safety Playbook: Lead More Powerfully by Being More Human (2023), the authors provide “practical strategies for responding to resistance, sparking change, embodying the change we want to see, and moving forward deliberately,” specifically in a business setting. They suggest ways to encourage what they call “changemakers” through the use of five key “plays” from their playbook: Communicate Courageously, Master the Art of Listening, Manage Your Reactions (“shift from automatic reaction to conscious response to stay better connected to yourself and others”), Embrace Risk and Failure, and Design Inclusive Rituals. The goal is to ensure that organizational cultures promote psychological safety, guided by leaders who “walk the talk” by emphasizing their own humanity at every turn. (“We must be the first to share our own failures with our teams, which will start to make it possible for others to do the same.”) This call for example-setting is sounded throughout the book as Helbig and Norman urge their target audience (leaders and would-be leaders) to go beyond mere instruction and instead embody the qualities they want to see in their subordinates, such as continuous learning, active curiosity, and self-reflection. Each chapter includes a detailed “Recommended Reading” section and text with extensive numbered and bulleted points formatted to make the core concepts more immediately digestible. The authors effectively employ clear and empathetic prose to assure readers that psychological safety is slow to build and quick to break, observing that such safety requires steady attention and delivers outsize payoffs as a result. They refreshingly ground a great deal of the material in psychology and neuroscience, pointing out, for instance, that research has demonstrated that the parasympathetic nervous system responds to honest appreciation, which improves creative thinking. Some wistful readers might consider some of the authors’ suggestions beyond the reach of their own organizations, as when group facilitators are advised to “gently intervene when someone dominates the conversation,” but hope springs eternal.
A passionate and accessible guide to humanizing the workplace.Pub Date: May 19, 2026
ISBN: 9798993550503
Page Count: 170
Publisher: Crazy Idea Press
Review Posted Online: April 23, 2026
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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