Collecting the authors’ Chicken Soup & Other Folk Remedies
and More Chicken Soup & Other Folk Remedies
, this volume, something of a Prairie Home Companion
–style health manual, includes new and revised material addressing such topics as ADD and ADHD, children’s health, osteoporosis and diabetes. The sisters Wilen offer brief entries with homespun solutions, many herbal based, for an alphabetical listing of concerns from asthma, colds and fainting to headaches, smoking and weight control. In many cases, however, the Wilens give little explanation for a remedy’s effect (for example, taking oregano for depression “has a way of lifting one’s spirits” and eating sauerkraut may prevent sciatica). Beyond specific cures, there are some all-around wonder workers: the “good-bye dear” morning kiss, bee pollen, the ancient grain salba and singing among them. Although well-meaning, this compendium of folk medicine has a few unsettling moments (for instance, the Wilens’ comment on depression that “staying in a funk” is a choice, and the injunction to “order your body to heal itself”). Such comments will leave even those committed to natural healing grateful for the science that has brought medicine into the 21st century. (Dec.)
