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Publisher Comments:
Which is the safest seat on an airplane? Where is the best place to have a heart attack? Why does religious observance add years to your life? How can birthdays be hazardous to your health? THE SURVIVORS CLUB Each second of the day, someone in America faces a crisis, whether it's a car accident, violent crime, serious illness, or financial trouble. Given the inevitability of adversity, we all wonder: Who beats the odds and who surrenders? Why do some people bound back and others give up? How can I become the kind of person who survives and thrives? The fascinating, hopeful answers to these questions are found in THE SURVIVORS CLUB. In the tradition of Freakonomics and The Tipping Point, this book reveals the hidden side of survival by combining astonishing true stories, gripping scientific research, and the author's adventures inside the U.S. military's elite survival schools and the government's airplane crash evacuation course. With THE SURVIVORS CLUB, you can alsodiscover your own Survivor IQ through a powerful Internet-based test called the Survivor Profiler. Developed exclusively for this book, the test analyzes your personality and generates a customized report on your top survivor strengths. There is no escaping life's inevitable struggles. But THE SURVIVORS CLUB can give you an edge when adversity strikes.
Review:
"Sherwood (The Man Who Ate the 747), a writer for the L.A. Times, travels worldwide to gain insight from people who have survived a slew of near fatal phenomena ranging from a mountain lion attack to a Holocaust concentration camp, and interviewing an array of experts to understand the psychology, genetics and jumble of other little things that determines whether we live or die. Readers curious about their own 'survivor profile' can take an Internet test, which is explained in the book's later pages. Sherwood's assertion that survival is 'a way of perceiving the world around you' is enlightening, as are some of the facts he uncovers: you have 90 seconds to leave a plane crash before the cabin temperature becomes unbearable; luck has more to do with personal perspective than chance. But Sherwood's balance of self-help, scientific theories and first-rate reporting is diminished by occasionally overwrought prose as well as the countless survivors' stories, which can run together in a touchy-feely stream of faith and optimism." Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)
Review:
Please do not review the aircraft's safety features in the seat-back pamphlet in front of you, and instead continue to read your Dan Brown. Do not heed the flight attendants' Kabuki of precautions, and instead pop a Xanax. And do not expect to survive should something go wrong. Even if you've flown a million times, you are neither prepared nor alert enough. In the unlikely event... Washington Post Book Review (read the entire Washington Post review) of an unanticipated loss of cabin pressure or a water landing, you will be the first to panic and make bad decisions. And then ... Crash. Boom. You're dead. "The Survivors Club" reminds its reader to approach each day with a healthy dose of paranoia. Death is just around the corner, courtesy of the cement truck, the coked-out maniac with a knife, or the gaggle of geese that gets sucked into your plane's engines over the Bronx. The book has an ingenious built-in marketing hook: Read this if you want to live! Join the Survivors Club, why don't you? We're hanging by a thread, as Ben Sherwood repeats throughout his pseudo-self-help book, but there are ways we can tighten our grip on that thread. Such as by honing a healthy will to live. Or being mindful. Or crossing our fingers. Or praying. Blah blah blah. These conclusions hardly warrant a 383-page treatment, even from a novelist/journalist who subjected himself to military survival training for the book. Tucked between these obvious feel-good tenets, however, are more compelling tips. 1. Always nab a seat within five rows of an exit, preferably behind the wing, and keep in mind that you'll have 90 seconds to evacuate before a crashed plane becomes inescapable. 2. When you break through ice on a frozen lake, you have 60 seconds to thwart hyperventilation, 10 minutes of muscles sufficiently limber to paddle you to safety and 60 minutes before you lose consciousness. 3. Avoid getting stabbed, shot, or smashed into a brick wall. In terms of survivability, if you have to choose among the three, go for the knife first, then the gun, then the brick wall. Just FYI. "The Survivors Club" is not for those who feel faint at the mention of blood. Beyond Sherwood's tips — the only practical ones have already been mentioned in this review — is an impressive parade of survivor anecdotes. The book is essentially about bearing witness to survival. It is suitably graphic. There's the woman who got a knitting needle through the heart, the man who escaped a capsizing freighter in stormy seas, the woman flayed within a millimeter of her life by a mountain lion and, most miraculously, the man trapped in the fiery impact zone of the North Tower of the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001. They all made it out alive despite microscopic odds. How? Sherwood interviews dozens of survivors — often relating their stories with nauseating drama — but one wonders if a survival thesis can be drawn from both the man who drunkenly tumbled over the side of his cruise ship and the woman who withstood the torture chamber of the Holocaust. Yes, they survived, but such disparate, disorganized examples make "The Survivors Club" more of a pulse-pounding scrapbook than an enlightening how-to manual or definitive dissertation. Sherwood pads the rest of the book with platitudes and statistics. He chews over some provocative topics (the existence of an alleged "survivor gene," the quantifiable power of prayer) but does not spit out a provocative, cohesive conclusion other than: be prepared because bad things are going to happen. It's good advice — the survivors of the US Airways flight that landed in the Hudson River last week escaped the sinking cabin by acting quickly, deliberately and calmly — but hardly revelatory. As a consolation prize, the end of the book instructs you to get a Survivor IQ by visiting www.thesurvivorsclub.com. There you take a personality test. Your answers are sent to a "cluster of computers" at a "highly secure data center in Boca Raton" (a gated fortress of survivors if ever there was one). Then Boca Raton categorizes you into a specific type of survivor, and Sherwood spends the final 30 pages of the book defining Survivor Types and their corresponding traits. My IQ? I am a "realist" with psychological strengths of "ingenuity," "adaptability" and "flow." As a realist, I can't see how reading "The Survivors Club" will give me an edge when adversity strikes. Most things are out of our control, and there's no way we can really change how we deal with a crisis. We just have to hope for the best. Hone a healthy will to live. Be mindful. Cross our fingers. Pray. Reviewed by Dan Zak, a writer for The Washington Post's Style section, Washington Post Book World (Copyright 2006 Washington Post Book World Service/Washington Post Writers Group) (hide most of this review)
Synopsis:
From a New York Times bestselling author and award-winning journalist comes a fascinating exploration of survival that can help prepare you for life's inevitable struggles, from cancer and crime to car accidents and airplane crashes.
Scientists use the phrase human factors in survival. Translation: Why do some people live and others die? Why do some bounce back and others surrender? THE SURVIVORS CLUB answers these questions with inspirational true stories, cutting-edge research, and the author's behind-the-scenes adventures in the US Navy and Air Force survival schools and the FAA's airplane evacuation course.
In the tradition of Freakonomics and The Tipping Point, THE SURVIVORS CLUB investigates the hidden side of life--and death--including:
why some people really have all the luck
if the will to live makes any difference
how much can the human body endure
Readers will be able to take an exclusive Internet-based test called the Survivor Profiler to find out their Survivor Type and Survivor IQ.
Each one of us eventually joins the club of millions who face life's inescapable tribulations and tragedies. THE SURVIVORS CLUB is the companion we need to prepare us for and guide us through the worst.
Synopsis:
There are plenty of books about coping with adversity. But isn't until now, with WHO SURVIVES, that we discover the human factors that determine survival. It's a combination instruction book and security blanket that blends compelling true stories with cutting-edge science to deliver some of the most important lessons we'll ever need to learn.
The book will:
--list the most important traits necessary for survival (e.g., adaptability, tenacity, faith)
--identify the 5 types of survivors
--debunk myths (like only the strong survive), explore the frontiers of survival science (How much strain and punishment can a human body endure?), and introduce readers to counterintuitive thinking (Ever heard of posttraumatic growth?)
--provide a Survivors Tool Kit, including an online test that measures one's Survivor's Quotient
Each one of us eventually joins the club of millions who face life's inescapable tribulations and tragedies. WHO SURVIVES is the companion we need to prepare us for and guide us through the worst.
C Horne, March 11, 2009 (view all comments by C Horne)
Here's a club everyone wants to be a member of. It's probably human nature to wonder if you have what it takes to survive in a crisis. This thought-provoking book not only profiles dozens and dozens of people who have done just that, it also gives you a way to grade yourself on your likely survivorship, and tips on how to raise your score. You even learn which seats on an airplane are the safest (be near an exit, and forget about that window seat).
The three rules of the Survivors Club, according to author Ben Sherwood, are that everyone is a survivor, one person's crisis can't be compared to another's, and people are stronger than they know. Attitude has a lot to do with it. If you see yourself as a survivor, you'll likely be one.
You learn many of the reasons why people do not survive. One is called the Incredulity Response -- people simply don't believe what they are seeing. Two gripping stories bring this idea to life. In the first, a car-ferry sinking in the Baltic Sea, many victims didn't move or try to get out of the sinking ship, but were rather "frozen to the spot" looking like "marble statues, pale and immoveable." 852 passengers died. In the second story, a fire in London's Underground train station killed 31 people, with many commuters marching "right into the disaster, almost oblivious to the crush of people -- some actually in flames -- who were trying to escape."
"Brainlock" is another reason some people in crisis die. They respond to the shock of the situation by forgetting to think. "Under stress... people often display memory problems. They seem to forget what they're supposed to do." This isn't good if you're skydiving. As Sherwood puts it, "panic is the archenemy of survival."
The final section of the book is devoted to helping you understand your own survivor potential, with quizzes to take and a website to visit.
Reading this book will make you think about how you live your life, and ways to ensure you can keep on living. It's fascinating.
Was this comment helpful? | Yes | No (1 of 2 readers found this comment helpful)
B&b ex libris, March 3, 2009 (view all comments by B&b ex libris)
We all face difficult situations, but some people are resilient and some are not. Who is able to come out of tragedy or overcome a circumstance and survive? Survivors. Ben Sherwood describes survivors as those making the best of their remaining days no matter if it is 50 years after the situation or 3 days. They are overcomers, people who move on, walk forward with head held high. Sherwood interviews people who have overcome all different types of struggles, and obstacles and whom he considers to be survivors. At the end of the book the reader has the opportunity to see if he/she is a survivor and what are the strengths that she/he relies on to make it through tough times.
I LOVED this book. There is so much about The Survivors Club that appealed to me. It resolves mystery, gives explanations of ways the mind works, and brings psychology to the forefront of the study. I have always (well since High school) been interested why people survive when others don't. Some people go through hard times over and over and they aren't any worse for the ware, then other people seem to hit a slight speed bump and their whole world goes out the window. What is the difference between the two? How can someone survive the holocaust and then another person cannot cope with the death of a pet? The Survivors Club argues that it depends on resiliency, and if you are a survivor and good at coping or if you aren't. The most effective survivors reach deep within themselves and find the strength to live through it, whatever the 'it' may be.
Was this comment helpful? | Yes | No (1 of 2 readers found this comment helpful)
Survivors Club: Secrets and Science That Could Save Your Life (09 Edition)
Used Hardcover
Ben Sherwood
0 stars -
0 reviews
$14.00
In Stock
Product details
383 pages
Grand Central Publishing -
English9780446580243
Reviews:
"Publishers Weekly Review"
by Publishers Weekly,
"Sherwood (The Man Who Ate the 747), a writer for the L.A. Times, travels worldwide to gain insight from people who have survived a slew of near fatal phenomena ranging from a mountain lion attack to a Holocaust concentration camp, and interviewing an array of experts to understand the psychology, genetics and jumble of other little things that determines whether we live or die. Readers curious about their own 'survivor profile' can take an Internet test, which is explained in the book's later pages. Sherwood's assertion that survival is 'a way of perceiving the world around you' is enlightening, as are some of the facts he uncovers: you have 90 seconds to leave a plane crash before the cabin temperature becomes unbearable; luck has more to do with personal perspective than chance. But Sherwood's balance of self-help, scientific theories and first-rate reporting is diminished by occasionally overwrought prose as well as the countless survivors' stories, which can run together in a touchy-feely stream of faith and optimism." Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)
"Synopsis"
by Ingram,
From a New York Times bestselling author and award-winning journalist comes a fascinating exploration of survival that can help prepare you for life's inevitable struggles, from cancer and crime to car accidents and airplane crashes.
Scientists use the phrase human factors in survival. Translation: Why do some people live and others die? Why do some bounce back and others surrender? THE SURVIVORS CLUB answers these questions with inspirational true stories, cutting-edge research, and the author's behind-the-scenes adventures in the US Navy and Air Force survival schools and the FAA's airplane evacuation course.
In the tradition of Freakonomics and The Tipping Point, THE SURVIVORS CLUB investigates the hidden side of life--and death--including:
why some people really have all the luck
if the will to live makes any difference
how much can the human body endure
Readers will be able to take an exclusive Internet-based test called the Survivor Profiler to find out their Survivor Type and Survivor IQ.
Each one of us eventually joins the club of millions who face life's inescapable tribulations and tragedies. THE SURVIVORS CLUB is the companion we need to prepare us for and guide us through the worst.
"Synopsis"
by Ingram,
There are plenty of books about coping with adversity. But isn't until now, with WHO SURVIVES, that we discover the human factors that determine survival. It's a combination instruction book and security blanket that blends compelling true stories with cutting-edge science to deliver some of the most important lessons we'll ever need to learn.
The book will:
--list the most important traits necessary for survival (e.g., adaptability, tenacity, faith)
--identify the 5 types of survivors
--debunk myths (like only the strong survive), explore the frontiers of survival science (How much strain and punishment can a human body endure?), and introduce readers to counterintuitive thinking (Ever heard of posttraumatic growth?)
--provide a Survivors Tool Kit, including an online test that measures one's Survivor's Quotient
Each one of us eventually joins the club of millions who face life's inescapable tribulations and tragedies. WHO SURVIVES is the companion we need to prepare us for and guide us through the worst.
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