You probably know before you pick up a book on meditation whether you're on board with it. This book isn't free of the kinds of things that might steer you away from such a book, and I'm not sure any book on the subject can be - if the book's any good, ideas from eastern spiritualism go with the territory. So if that all sounds like crap to you then you probably want to go read something else anyway.

Having said that, this book comes in three sections. Each section is composed of fifteen to twenty short chapters on a particular idea, usually accompanied by quotes of some kind - Thoreau, Whitman, Donne, eastern philosophers, etc. The first, "The Bloom of the Present Moment," describes the objectives of meditation; the second, "The Heart of Practice," describes particular techniques of meditative practice, and the third, "In the Spirit of Mindfulness," talks about mindfulness in day to day life.

The first and third sections I found enlightening, engrossing, and rewarding. The prose, being what it is, is lucid and vivid. It not only gives you a good idea of what is going on with meditation and mindfulness, but will get you thinking a bit in that fashion, too, if you're reading closely. I had several times when I finished a chapter and immediately backtracked, not to reparse what I misunderstood, but to comprehend the whole of the chapter.

The second section may well be valuable - I don't know, I can't say that I meditate any to know. Advice to meditate on the image of a lake, or meditate by walking around - it's like reading the cheat codes section in Nintendo Power. You'd think that's where the good stuff is, but it always reminds you that you'd rather be playing the game.

At first blush, a great book, a wonderful book, if you're interested in the topic.

Finally: my edition had rough cut pages. Modern rough cut pages suck. That is all.