Reviews by Nonviolent Communication (NVC) trainers
“I have become an instant fan of this story, as it speaks to my own memories of how I experienced life as a child and teen. And also, in my opinion, it is filled to the brim with NVC without ever mentioning it! This, to me, is exquisite! Like 'Ninja-NVC' through story telling. I just love it."
Kathleen de Laet, CNVC trainer, Belgium
“My NVC-practitioner friend asked why I recommended ‘Zak’ for his nephews and nieces. I replied: My 6 year old daughter and I both absolutely loved ‘Zak’. She kept asking me to read her the next chapter, and I could sense a slightly coy, shy air about her that expressed something like, “I see myself in Zak, he’s a bit like me, in my quiet private world”. It was so wonderful and unusual that there was nothing in ‘Zak' that jarred with me - no parts where I wished I could rewrite it a bit to align better with my values. It balances suspense and adventure while offering a reframe around right/wrong thinking. It incorporates magic in a way that is close to what I believe to be ‘true’ magic, and the narrative often goes into stream of consciousness writing that I find accurately represents the way I think many children (myself for sure, and my daughter too, it turns out), quietly think. I appreciate so much there being a book out there that I can read to my kids with a full sense of coherence with my values.”
Gina Seilern, NVC trainer, UK
"I was delighted with Zak. He makes magic very real and ordinary. He gives it being and makes it come alive. He brings hope to find that magic in my own life."
Fr. Chris Rajendrum, CNVC trainer, Sri Lanka
Article about writing 'Zak'
Also available at bookshops worldwide
Zak
"A wholly healing book."
Readers comments
Reviews in journals
Reviews by Nonviolent Communication (NVC) trainers
Full of adventure, humour, magic and discovery, ‘Zak’ conveys the importance of respecting nature, honouring differences, making good friends, and being your unique self.
Most loved by 7-12 year olds, and adults who meditate.
"I am not exactly a usual boy. And I started being unusual even before I was born. Maybe you are unusual too. I used to think i was the only one but I'm beginning to wonder if there are a lot more of us than I ever imagined."
Born flying Zak's first proper conversation is with a duck. Misunderstood on his first day of school he flies out of the window and never goes back. He lives his zany, wondering life with his cat and his family . . . until one summer, age 11, they go to River Island. There he meets Laloune and Sh'krump who lead him into a series of funny, scary and astonishing adventures, through which Zak discovers that reality is full of magic and even people make good friends.
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Listen to the first three chapters read by Bridget
Chapter 1:
Chapter 2:
Chapter 3:
Readers comments
Zak is the only story book that my son Ben, age 9, has wanted to read more than once. He read it six times!
Anne Turner
Zak is a story of considerable interest and value to children and adults alike. It is a kind and human story delivered through the fascinating self-reflection and empathy of Zak, the 11 year old central character. It is highly entertaining, but also beautifully demonstrates the wisdom and ways of respect, acceptance, warmth and humility. I will read it again and again.
Hilton Davies, Professor of Child Health Psychology, Kings College, London
Zak is an introduction to a whole new way of life, of cultivating awareness and perceptions and tapping in to the powerful, creative inner self. It’s listening to silence with pleasure, and feeling empathy non-verbally. It encourages children to feel things for themselves and to be aware of their own inner potentials, regardless of the assumptions and put-downs of others. It is a wholly healing book.
Margaret Harrison, author of ‘Angels on Roller Skates’
Give children the precious gifts of freedom of mind and encouragement for their individuality, by exposing them to Bridget Belgrave’s inspiring Zak.
Michael J. Gelb, author of "How to Think like Leonardo da Vinci"
Zak was really magical and amazing! Zak was a bit like me except I don't have magical powers. I wish I did. It was really interesting how he could talk to the animals and what they talked about.
Ziya, age 8
I like Zak. I could identify with him and accept him. He’s not too young for me, because of the humour.
Max, age 11
I think Zak was the best book I have ever read even better than Harry Potter. I thought some bits were very funny like his first day at school.
Marion, age 9
Zak conveys simply yet profoundly the inter-dependance of the plant, animal, human and spiritual worlds.
Allegra Wint
As a Buddhist, I related to Zak very well. The 'zing' episode seemed very much like meditation and put me in mind of the woods around a few meditation centres I have been to. It was also a delight to read a book that didn't have a violent climax. My 8 year old son was fascinated by it, wondering what would happen next and often wouldn't let me finish of an evening, demanding another chapter.
Daren De Witt
When I was a boy I was like Zak in many ways but I learnt to ‘play the game’. It has only been in recent years that I got tired of the game and started trusting myself again.
Henry, who describes himself as ‘a business man in seach of his soul’.
This book will be welcomed by ecologists. It opens the reader’s eyes to the importance of wildlife and of nature’s subtle processes that can so easily be damaged - at a cost we can hardly dare to think about.
Michael Simmonds
I have just finished reading Zak. It is wonderful. He is wonderful. It is easy and fun to read and I felt as if I were inside Zak’s mind a lot of the time. The message in this book really needs to be heard by millions of people. It makes me want to be Zak too!
Jane Duncan, author of ‘Choose Your Thoughts, Change Your Life’
I'd like to thank you for your book 'Zak', as I and my almost 6-year-old daughter read it excitedly this summer. I was really impressed how my Tess liked it as it was the first book she was eager for me to read her in English (I tried English classics a few times, but it didn't work even though she is fluent in English, although our native language is Russian). And now when I walk in the forest I recall its zing and do my best to respect it. So thank you for this magic!
Olga Belogrivtseva
An Amazon Review
5.0 out of 5 stars WOW .... WOW .... WOW, 8 April 2007
Samantha Martell (Oxford, UK)
Wow ....... what an amazing book !! I read it a year ago when I had just turned 12, it came it to our house as my younger brother is Zak too!! I thought that I would find it difficult to read and believe as I was growing up and didn't really imagine anymore .... how wrong could I have been ?? It was great ....... Bridget made this book really believable and managed to capture my imagination (something that's hard to do)!!! Thank you everyone who put this book into print and of course to Bridget Belgrave who let her imagination fly and let mine do the same !!!!
Jazmin age 13 (Sam's daughter)
Reviews in journals
Review in The School Librarian
vol. 52 no 3, Autumn 2004
Zak is an unusual 11-year-old. He could see out of his mother’s womb, and learned to read upside down while waiting to be born. On his first day at school he did not like the way he was being treated so he flew out the window and never returned – and he can talk to animals and birds.
On a family holiday to River Island, a small island in a river between Canada and the USA, Zak soon makes friends with the island animals which is a squirrel and an owl. They show him the mysterious ‘Zing’, which is akin to a meditative state enhancing his respect for nature and its power.
This is an original, quirky and amusing novel, that will encourage youngsters to become more aware of nature’s subtle processes. The story moves along at an energetic pace, and Bridget Belgrave neatly intersperses the magical elements with the more commonplace. I am sure that ecologists will also welcome this book, and it is one to be recommended.
Review in Education Otherwise
October 2004
The first half of the novel sets the scene and introduces the reader to Zak. He is an unusual boy, he can fly and has conversations with animals. On his first day of school, after several bad experiences, he flies out of the window and never returns to school. The second half tells of Zak's adventures when he goes on holiday with his family. The first half of the book is slow but by half way the novel becomes very exciting and we both found the book hard to put down towards the end. This is a fantastic book for those who feel that
they are different from most people.
Anthea (7) with Clare Crane
Review in Tregolwyn Book Reviews
2004
Zak is no ordinary boy. He can perform conjuring tricks, he can talk to animals, he can fly, and -- strangest of all -- he enjoys knitting. However, even Zak is unprepared for the events that befall him on a family holiday to the Thousand Islands group in Canada’s St Lawrence river.
Ideally, children's books should be reviewed by children. Only a child can truly judge whether the author has the right "voice" to communicate effectively with them. In this case, I'm prepared to stick my neck out and say that Bridget Belgrave has got it right. This is easy reading for any age group, without being in any way condescending. Zak's speech and narrative style reflect the age he is meant to be (eleven), but the novel could be read by (or to) anyone from the age of about five upwards. I must also warn the adult reader that, once you pick up this story, you are not going to put it down readily, and the 157 pages are liable to disappear in a flash, just like the egg in one of Zak's magic tricks.
The opening chapters, in which Zak recounts the early part of his life, are reminiscent of Kate Atkinson's Behind the Scenes at the Museum. Although this is a fantasy, it is almost as straightforward for an adult to believe in as it would be for a child. The narrator is so matter-of-fact about his special gifts and the way he first discovered them that it seems the most natural thing in the world for an eleven-year-old boy to be able to fly -- though of course, he can only do this when the neighbours are not around, otherwise he would risk embarrassing his parents.
Since the animals, including a particularly horrible-looking reptilian monster, are Zak's friends, and hence the heroes and heroines of the story, the villain has to be a human, in this case another boy, Sam. In the course of his Canadian adventure, Zak discovers that he is not as unique as he has hitherto assumed, and he needs help from another gifted human in order to work to undo Sam's unintentional cruelty. In the course of sharing his talents, Zak discovers he has acquired still more. Is this trading on every child's fantasy, offering them the kind of power they may long for but can never have? And if it is, don't the Harry Potter books do the self-same thing?
All in all, this is a great story for children, with potential to be as successful as some of those we have come to regard as classics. Bridget Belgrave is a talented author with a real feel for juvenile psychology. I suspect she also has an eye for a sequel.
Deborah Fisher
Review in Connect – a magazine for Positive Living
April/May 2006
I have come across this book written by a leading internationally acclaimed Nonviolent Communication trainer Bridget Belgrave. I read it in one go completely absorbed. I felt warm and comforted by the connection to nature, magic and the essential positivity of human nature depicted. I especially appreciated the lack of violence, labelling and name calling by the characters and at the same time the character and story development were completely believable and absorbing. A story which inspires me to live more in tune with nature and its magical ‘Zing’ energy fields. I believe this to be a classic which would promote creativity, peacefulness and well being in our children. It is a fantastic school novel or gift for 7 years-adults.
Shoshana Moskowitz of Karuna Detox Retreats
Review in STATnews
2002, Vol 6, Issue 6.
The newsletter of the Society of Teachers of the Alexander Technique
I read Zak, together with my two children age 7 and 11, and all three of us found ourselves entranced. Zak is the story of an 11-year-old boy with a humorous, matter-of-fact take on life. He wears his magical powers lightly, all too aware that being different can separate him from many of the experiences of his peers. In the course of a summer holiday spent a Canadian island shared with just one other family, city-born Zak finds great joy in being allowed to roam freely and alone. He soon realises that the island contains a magic much more powerful than his own, and that through quietness and sensitivity he can gradually come to understand his surroundings, and find his own place on the island and with the other occupants.
The story is simply written, yet touches very deeply. In listening to Zak’s voice, children as hearing something different from the usual world of computers, TV and Radio 1 – trust yourself and your instincts, stay open-hearted and learning to listen to everything around you. For Zak, the more he learns to let go, the more he finds himself able to do. At one point, taking off into flight, his description of the learning process sounds not unlike the very best kind of Alexander lessons!
A few weeks after reading this book, Zak is proving hard to forget. I hope he stays with my children too, and reminds them that there are many different ways of experiencing the world. This is a book I would have liked to read as a child and I am glad to have the opportunity to do so now.
Sue Pepper