The Black & White Book: Two Sides to Every Story
R.P. Moore
Pocket Books, hb, 130 pages, $12.95

This book belongs right at home in our discussion of gender and polarities, for it's about polarization and getting beyond it. It's a little less of a content-filled book than a single idea that is reiterated over and over again in different ways. But with repetition the idea is only given more strength.

The idea is a gimmick. Every page of the book is black on one side with white writing and white on the other with black writing. On the black pages are printed examples of negative thoughts and negative experiences and negative assessments of events. On the white pages opposite are printed the positive take on those same thoughts, experiences or assessments of events.

The back cover provides an excellent example. On the top half of the cover, in white on black, are the sentences: "This book is filled with negativity. It might make you angry. Some stories may stop you in your tracks. This book is rude. This book is not funny. It may hit too close to home. How could you think of owning this book?"

On the bottom half, in black on white, are the cognate sentences: "This book sees the good. It will probably make you happy. Some stories will give you strength. This book respects you. This book will crack you up. It may be what you've been waiting to read. How could you think of not owning this book?"

While it sounds like this could get old, it doesn't. The examples are varied and the flips from negative to positive come in sometimes surprising ways.

All the polarities are there just so we can overcome them and rise to a higher perspective. This insight is specified in the last paragraph of the introduction: "Acceptance is the single greatest concept I have ever incorporated into my life. Without it, I could not have authored this book. I at last accept my anger and my darkness, your fear and your hatred. I have found that it's only the resistance that makes these human conditions so painful."

The punch line, by the way, is the author's acknowledgement of his bout with AIDS.

A wonderful book for a gift. Nice reading matter to leave in the bathroom. A marvelous declaration of an insight we all need to get over and over again because as the last sentence of the book says, "It has been my experience that the more darkness I encounter, the greater my capacity for light. Ugliness turns to beauty. The negative with the positive. Up, down. Black and white. And so it goesÉ"