This author is best known for his bestselling book 'Raising Boys' and other parenting guides. An Australian, he is a world-renowned therapist and I'd certainly heard of him, despite never having read any of his books. So I was interested to look at his new book, subtitled 'The Neuroscience Breakthrough that Helps You Transform Anxiety and Live a Fierce and Loving Life'.

It's a very easy and interesting read, and invites us to be more in tune with our selves and more caring for others by learning to trust our instincts, and to look at the animal kingdom for a better way to live our lives! It is not a self-help book, he says, it's a 'help-each-other' book. 

'So much of what is wrong for us - anxiety, violence, conflict and destruction - comes from having inner storms and terrors that arise when people are out of touch with their own heart,' he says. 

There are two parts to our brain. There's nothing much new there. But what we've come to understand as one half logical and one half creative is too simplistic, he says, and inaccurate. 

The silent half of your brain is the right hemisphere and it's the part that birds and animals use, but also Einstein and scientists engage this part of the brain in solving complex problems, apparently. 

He highlights the behaviours of wild cats, elephants and so on, to illustrate his points, and these are often fascinating. And he argues, we'll never get along with nature if we can't get close to our own nature.

There are a couple of occasions where he loses me with his arguments and advice but overall I found it an interesting and uplifting read, particularly his references to poetry, research practices and studies regarding PTSD. Quite a few takeaways from a very readable book.