Island Follies: Romantic Homes of the Bahamas by Alastair Gordon

 Gordon, who’s written regularly for magazines about architecture and design, wonderfully showcases the architectural impact Henry Melich made in the Bahamas, where he spent 30 years. 

Melich favored follies, ornate structures that are mostly decorative: Xanadu’s sphinxes, obelisk, and breezeway; Waterloo’s half-round portico; and La Feuillie’s faux Roman ruins are exquisite examples. 

Readers who love design will devour this book’s sumptuous photographs. Loggias, terraces, and plantation shutters appear in tropical colors—coral pink, parchment yellow, leaf green, and hibiscus. 

Some of his more creative follies include the secret writing room he devised for Rosanna Todd and the turrets for Ferguson Castle. Some of his structures served a practical purpose too. Tivoli’s classical pavilions adorned with cloisonné horses hid its pool’s maintenance mechanisms. 

This book also mentions Melich’s clients, most of them heirs and heiresses, who craved a curious hybrid of Roman antiquity and Bahamian flair. Delightful anecdotes about Doris Duke, Pamela Woolworth, and Sibilla O’Donnell abound.

The Language of Emotions: What Your Feelings are Trying to Tell You by Karla McLaren

 

In the first version of The Language of Emotions, released in 2010, McClaren showed how the emotional realm is a dynamic system that are part of every decision we make. The updated version continues to show while also revealing that anxiety is a distinct emotion from fear.

McClaren also includes four key models for understanding emotions that she developed in The Art of Empathy. 

In the first part she explains why repressing emotions, as people are taught to do, can be harmful. She shares the four keys for effectively working with or channeling one’s emotions. 

She defines a family of four elements that inhabit the psyche--air, earth, body, and water—and explains that emotions should flow like water. McClaren continues to assert that all emotions—even anger and jealousy--convey valuable information. 

Emotions only become problematic when they become stuck in a loop. She offers recommendations for an imbalanced psyche. In the second half, she explores emotions more fully giving each emotion gets its own chapter. 

McClaren gives readers additional resources to explore topics in greater depth and advises how to honor each emotion in others. Though friends can offer some help, she advises when to refer a friend to a professional.