Chicken Soul for the Soul Review!

I'm a big reader. Every year I participate in the 50 Books in a Year Challenge. I've been doing pretty well at it. There's not a particular genre I like to read more or less, typically I get in moods like young adult dystopian moods, classic novels, etc. So when I was given the opportunity to do a few reviews for Chicken Soup for the Soul I hopped on the chance.



I received The Original, 20th Anniversary Edition, of Chicken Soup for the Soul. It has all of your favorite original stories plus 20 bonus stories.

I actually have never read a Chicken Soup for the Soul book before even though we had one in our house growing up, I'm not even entirely sure if my mom read it. Mom would get books that she heard were "in"(like Men Are From Mars, Women are From Venus) and I don't even know if she even read them. So I was really excited reading one for the first time.

It's broken up in chapters like "On Love," "On Learning," "Live Your Dream," and "Overcoming Obstacles." Each chapter has a variety of short stories about that subject to kind of inspire and motivate you.

I'm not sure if all of the stories are based on true events or if they are stories, I'd like to think they are because they would be way more inspiring. They also had lists and facts and even a few cartoons. One article was basically just a timeline of President Lincoln's life and how it took so long for him to succeed and become president. He ran for State Legislature and Congress more than once before winning spots there. It took him over thirty years from the time he lost his job to the time he became president. In another really short piece called "Don't Be Afraid to Fail" they state that Babe Ruth struck out 1330 times but also hit 714 home runs.

As you can tell, I really enjoyed the "Overcoming Obstacles" and "Live Your Dream" chapters because I am kind of stuck in a rut, afraid of failing, so it's nice to see and read stories about the most successful people and how making it to the top they had a lot of rejection and fails but eventually they made it. It boils down to just putting your mind to it and accomplishing what you want to do. You can live your dreams if you try, and it was really great reading about it.

Overall, while some of the stories were a little cheesy, sometimes you need that when you're feeling down and out. When you're sad don't you watch some silly comedy or lifetime movie and devour all of the chocolate in your house? I do. So this is like that lifetime movie, it has a great message and left you feeling motivated to do what you want to do in life. I really liked it.

Buy It! Head on over to your local bookstore or head on over to Chicken Soup's website where you can submit your story or browse the other books they have.