Completed on: 4/29/15
Review Rating 5 stars 5
Reviewed By Jack Magnus for Readers’ Favorite
Th3 Simple Questions: Slice Open Everyday Life is a collection of Jean W. Yaeger's blog entries from January through June, 2014. Each entry revolves around
three questions: "Who am I?", "Why am I here?" and "What do I want?" These essays are far-ranging, with topics covering the environment, politics, history and health. Sometimes the "who" is an inanimate object such as a pause button or a
historical entity such as Galileo or Machiavelli. Many topics delve into the author's personal life, belief systems and thoughts about the human state.
     Jean W. Yaeger's nonfiction spiritual/philosophical text, Th3 Simple Questions: Slice Open Everyday Life, is something to be read slowly and savored. The author states in his preface that those three questions insert fine knives into everyday existence, and indeed, they do exactly that.

     I found that in reading Yaeger's blogs I began to learn quite a bit about the author and his world-view, and much of what I saw resonated strongly with me. One poignant blog entry related a story of the author and his friend who was dying of cancer who were fellow baseball card collectors and the author's prize Willie Mays card. Another favorite was the blog entry, "I am Grass", which was a marvelous historical and environmental paean to grasses and the earth. "Why is Big Bird Big and Yellow?" gives a spooky look into the realm of advertising and what control we give over to the tube when we turn it on.
     Yaeger's writing is easy and conversational, and I often felt as though he were actually in the room conversing and, sometimes, pontificating, but always in a nonconfrontational,
honest and wryly humorous way. When I finished the last response to the three simple questions, I realized that I had gotten to know a kindred spirit, someone whose blog seems well worth getting to know a lot better.
     Th3 Simple Questions: Slice Open Everyday Life is highly recommended