This latest offerring by Joanna Arettam is not your standard New-Age-Self-Help-let-us-sit-upon-the-ground-and-tell-sad-tales-about-what-a-bastard-my-ex-was kind of book. Reading this book is a little like getting mugged - but in a good way!

That probably deserves an explanation, so I'll do my best. This is a small book with a big heart, that is not bound by any law of typesetting known to man. Some of the fonts used include: Berthold Akzidenz Grotesk, Giddyup and Sackers - all in various sizes and colors.

This may seem a strange way to write a book, but it works, and with good reason: When you are at your lowest ebb and looking for help, the last thing you want to do is pick up some droning black and white monologue on the problems of modern society and how sad it all is.

This book readily admits it " does not have all the answers you need, but it will tap the one person who does: You.". A little fuzzy bunny, I'll grant you, but given the subject matter the book deals with (Letting go of Anger, Fear, Hate, Mistrust and Unhappiness) I can forgive Arettam for tripping over the fine line between comfort and platitudes, which she does hardly ever.

The first part of the book is primarily devoted to helping you identify what you are feeling and how you are behaving by asking yourself a series of questions (e.g. "When was the last time I did something nice for someone else?"). The second is focused on "Letting Go" of self destructive feelings and negative emotions in your life through a series of elemental (i.e. Air, Fire, Water & Earth) exercises, and finally by making contracts with the element that replace negative, unhealthy energy with positive energy from each of the elements.

This book is about 80 pages long, but then has another 20 or so pages of blank elemental contracts for you to rip out and use. I'll probably leave mine intact though. Although I've read a few books in the past that made me want to rip out the endings, this, fortunately, isn't one of them...