loved it. it makes me think in all different ways....the things around you and the things that happen to you make you think and react in a quite magical way

The book was enjoyable. I think the author made an honest effort to be fair and to believe. She had some preconceptions though that I thought held her back. 1. The experience of an unbeliever/cynic is more valid than someone who does not question and moves ahead with a premise. 2. It is somehow undignified and low class to want material things and, at the same time, makes you insensitive to the blight of others. 3. A person's wishes are something to be judged. Everyone lives their own life and our preception is our reality regardless of what others may think. We really don't have any authority to judge another just because their problem does not seem as important or as grave as others we can bring to mind. I would like to ask her if she thinks the world would be a better place if a majority of people were moving towards what gives them substance and satisfaction thereby reaching a place where they can contribute or by sitting in the dust lashing themselves feeling guilty. We are all unique gifts to this world, no exceptions, and we actualize that by following what gives us joy, not by gnashing our teeth over what we think is 'profane' in another.
I wouldn't discourage buying the book. I definitely go something out of it, but I never felt she was comfortable enough with the material. She always seems to hold herself apart, afraid to admit somethings to herself. She is a good writer, but she may have finished the book before she finished the lesson.

Ninety percent of this book is mind-numbingly boring. If you want to read a great book of this genre, go for "Eat Pray Love" and skip "The Wishing Year." The author is not particularly likable and there is waaaay too much academic rambling.

Five Shooting Stars for The Wishing Year! I am so thankful that I ignored
the first Amazon reviewer and bought it anyway. "See how our thoughts make
our world? I feel like saying--but I resist." (page 255)
One day I hope to get the nerve to try "Putting It Out There" myself. And if
this happens I plan to take this book, place it under my pillow, focus on
Noelle's poetic thoughts and words, and wish for a muse to sing through
me...

I just finished the Wishing Year and my profoundest wish when I got to the end was that it wouldn't be over so soon. I wanted it to go on and on. Spending time with this author is like spending an evening with one of those mesmerizing friends who leans towards you over the table at your favorite bistro and says, "You won't believe what happened to me?" and then launches into a tale of meeting someone fascinating who transformed her life, or unexpectedly being offered a trip to an exotic place that she'd always wanted to visit, or another wondrous occurrence. You're left thinking, "why don't these things happen to me? Reading the Wishing Year is wish fulfillment in itself. You get to live Noelle's life for that year and it was a hell of a lot more fun than my life that year for sure.

The best thing about her approach to wishing was that it made sense of New Agey gobbledygook like the "Secret." I, like her, am an intellectual, skeptical sort who secretly visits psychics and semi-believes in some of this woo-woo stuff but feels guilty about it. Oxenhandler removes the guilt by explaining the ancient roots of wishing and other attempts at magical intervention, and comes up with some scientific theories about why it might work. Hey, even Plato believed it. (sort of).

I'm coming up with my wish list as we speak and will report back whether any of them came true.

This is one of the most beautifully written and thought provoking books I've read in a long time. I am a voracious reader, devouring books at a clip of 3 or 4 a week, both fiction and non-fiction. This book had a lot of meaning for me, a newbie to the law of attraction and a devotee of all things positive and spiritual. Noelle's journey is profound and so beautifully written that it made me smile, dream and travel with her and her friends through their physical, emotional and dreamed journeys, always seeking balance. I will not only read this several more times, but intend to buy this book for about 15 dear friends with whom I want to share Noelle's journey. I've also already made a lengthy list of books she quotes from that I also wish to purchase, though Raquelle's might have to wait for the next tax return check! I wish (left hand over heart, right hand over left) that Noelle would continue this journey, taking us with her once again as her life continues to unfold, her man becomes more cleaved to her, her new home transforms (those old vinyl floors have to go) and her spiritual journey is given more insight. I want more and I've said that about only three other authors in my lifetime. I didn't want her year or my reading of it, to end. Buy this book for yourself and for everyone you care about, now - today. Few books you will ever read will leave you feeling more fulfilled, satisfied and optomistic! It will also expand your understanding of how life really can work, will provide a brief study of authors from before Christ to the spring of '06 and will solidly plant a burning 'I must know more' lust in your heart - yearning for Bromeliads and tide pools, hot tubs and burritoes. When Budda said (even though it is aberrated) 'What we think - we are' is the most fundamenal of truths for all of us, for all time. Thank you Noelle Oxenhandler, a thousand Thank You's!!!

We live vicariously through reading all kinds of books, but memoir truly gives readers the sense that they understand the writer's inner experience of life. Every once in a while a memoir appears that makes you fall in love with the author's mind. That's how I feel about Noelle Oxenhandler's The Wishing Year. At so many points in the book I found myself appreciating not just her humor and her intelligence but her entire way of being in the world. For example, when I read the account of how the author sat with her dying friend, I felt I was witnessing something essential about simply being with a dying person, about meeting those who are dying on their own terms and not ours. The other people in the memoir are presented with complexity, not as a cast of flat characters. The Wishing Year is a memoir that, among other things, shows us a person who knows how to live life with compassion, openness and grace. It's good to soak up the details of such a life.

Noelle Oxenhandler's work -- in the New Yorker or Tricycle or book form -- always knocks me out. Her writing is sometimes referred to as memoir, but I think she's a philosopher who uses elements of her own life, along with her research, to explore the textures and workings of the world. Her books have such a remarkable combination of pleasures: gorgeous, lucid, vivid prose; wonderful descriptions of people and places; philosophical inquiry; a rich, interdisciplinary investigation of her topics; brave but elegant personal revelation; and a feeling for the rich textures and absurdities of life. I loved The Eros of Parenthood (The Eros Of Parenthood: Explorations In Light And Dark), in which she goes into territory that most writers would be afraid to touch and handles it with such grace that she conceals the difficulty of her accomplishments as a writer and a reader.

The Wishing Year is another example of her generosity and originality. The book is funny in a subtle and complicated way, and at the same time, moving. She doesn't shy away from either library or field research (I'm including swimming with the dolphins in Hawaii, or following unlikely wishing practices, as well as delving into history, mythology, philosophy, and even self-help books).

The Wishing Year invites us to examine our own depth-monsters -- anyone who reads it is likely to have to own up to their own desires and their own choices. It's a delicious book to read but not always a comfortable one. Her writing is so beautiful that I think some people may be surprised by how challenging it is. I think it's a book one is likely to love when coming to it with an open sense of inquiry, and maybe it's a book that would enrage those readers who would rather not look into their own areas of darkness and desire.

The book is gripping -- it reads like a novel -- it's more about stirring up the questions for readers than trying to answer them in ways that would invariably be false or reductive. What are the lines between sacred and profane? Where do traditional magic and modern science intersect? What do we allow ourselves to wish for, and how, and why? Are there wishes we should not have? How do we work with the images and desires presented to us by our unconscious minds, even those we find somehow embarrassing or scary? How do we come to terms with our lives, past and present?

Having tried to read Eat, Pray, Love and found it so sadly lightweight, I couldn't finish, I was hesitant about picking up The Wishing Year. But, Oxenhandler's book surpassed all expectations. Readable, intelligent, thought provoking, authentic, without going into useless or irrelevant details. It's a wonderful book for starting a conversation about self-limiting beliefs, core religious values (no matter what your religion is), and coming back after a huge disaster -- that you yourself caused and feel the devastating weight of still. This is the book you want to give ALL your book-loving friends this holiday season.

I really liked this book and it's not the type of book I usually read. There are too many books,tapes,programs,dvd's,etc. you name it-- we are in a storm of "law of attraction" information these days. But there has never been anyone who is not connected in some way to these products that has written about their personal experience while using this information. Very savvy of Ms.Oxenhandler to write a memoir about this topic as well as timely. Magic is a delicious subject and law of attraction is the topic on everyone's list. Ms. Oxenhandler is very knowledgeable about things that I did not expect to be in this book which is what made it an interesting read. Her experiment in making wishes to better her life was fun to read but it is just one layer of this book. The one thing that did disappoint was that she did not give the readers any information about her ailing mother after she spent a great deal of time worrying about and helping to move her from France to CA. All in all it's a good read. You can read this book over a weekend.

I did like this book, but I had major irritations with it. While I'm sure most of us who wish for things also worry about the "what ifs" and for every positive, we think of the negative, but Noelle's constant questioning was like a popcorn kernel wedged between tooth and gum. A few things that really bothered me:
Needing to come up with a down payment for her home, her mother suddenly remembers she has a forgotten bank account and gives the money to Noelle to help with payment. Skip ahead a few chapters and Noelle's mother is in debt, suffering miniature strokes, and she needs a place to live. Noelle wonders how she's going to help her mother find money to pay her bills and worries about finding her a place to live.
Well. I couldn't get the thought out of my head...shouldn't Noelle give the mother her money back? And if her health is bad, why wouldn't Noelle offer to take care of her?
We meet her boyfriend Nicolas, who lives in a boarding house (which bothers Noelle) and then ends up moving to his parents house and perhaps, even, living in his car.
Noelle, who has supposedly been immersed in spirituality, does not offer to have Nicolas live with her.
While reading the book, Noelle searching for her spirituality to return, traveling to spas, overseas, etc (yet she is broke?), it's hard for me to feel any empathy for her when it seems that all around her, people are helping Noelle, but Noelle is not helping herself nor is she helping other people.
I am not a student of spirituality the way Noelle claims to be, but I do know that helping others and looking out for others is usually at the top of the list.
Spirituality is so damn simple, and Carole, who was the most interesting character in the book and who should write her own book, exemplified it with such ease yet Noelle could not seem to grasp that having things is wonderful! But having no attachments is the ultimate spirituality, which Carole displays time and time again by her ability to create and let go.
There were many loose ends...what happened to her mother? Were her bills paid? Did she move to CA? Is she happy?
On the whole, a good read. But if I ever meet Noelle, I'd tell her to quit her whining, be thankful!, instead of looking for ways life is going to help her, perhaps if she stopped and helped others and herself, things would come much easier to her. And though love is wonderful, it is not the end all to be all. I have a feeling Noelle is still not yet happy with the person she is, otherwise she wouldn't worry so much about finging the 'right' man.
I really hope Carole writes a book. She is THE BEES KNEES.

I spent the whole day yesterday reading this wonderful book. It is the kind of book I've been waiting for for quite some time. It's a book for people who have read all the Law of Attraction, intention manifestation, or even magic books. If you've manifested a few things here and there, but still have some concerns about how it all works or how you can be both spiritual and materialistic, this book is a great start.

It's great to finally read a book that goes deeper into the act of wishing (as the author calls it) and provides its readers with an in-depth real life example of what happens when you take that first step. It's amazing what starts to happen when you take that first step: the Universe responds. I have had experiences like the author and I felt her excitement when things started to happen, seemingly out of nowhere.

That being said, I had a few minor issues with this book. The author herself complains a lot about how her spiritual community fell apart. That's fine and all, but I think it's perfectly clear that she was one of the reasons that happened. She had an affair with a married man (the spiritual mentor of her community) while being married herself. She glosses over this in a couple of sentences in the book. I feel that if she really wanted to grow as a spiritual individual, she would acknowledge that she played a huge part in why her spiritual community fell apart. She should face her own darkness and take some responsibility, instead of always complaining: "Oh, my spiritual community fell apart, and now I don't know who I am." I don't know, maybe she has dealt with those issues. Maybe she is reluctant to share it with the world, and that's understandable.

With that being said, that was a very minor detail I had trouble with. I actually enjoyed 99% of this book, hence the five star rating. It was fun to read her reactions to books that I've read myself, like "It Works" and "The Science of Getting Rich" or that ever-popular movie, "The Secret." (I had a similar reaction to hers.)

Overall, this is a very worthwhile book for anyone who is interested in intention manifestation, The Secret, magic, or whatever. I can't recommend it highly enough.

If you feel like all the books you've been reading sound too good to be true or extremely filtered of real human experience (a whole book of "you can do it, think positive!" gets kind of annoying when you have real life problems to deal with), then I definitely recommend picking up this very interesting memoir.

-Ater

Jump in and meet Oxenhandler's unique friends while she excavates the power of wishing. Follow her across oceans and into the past and see how her logic (applied to a broad and deep exploration of the role of wishing over centuries) creates a wonderful counterpoint to her precise point of view and wry humor. Masterful and engaging, this book is much more than a light summer read. Questions arise we all seek to answer, and in the end answers appear that create an opening that may not have been affected through any other means. Bravo to Oxenhandler, I recommend this book to all thinking readers and have sent it to many friends.