Book List

Simplified Husbandship/Simplified Fathership. In his management consulting practice, Richard would often ask his clients what their goals were for their businesses or their professions and he found that most had clear and ready answers. When asked what their goals and plans were for their families however, most men could come up only with very vague answers. To fill the void, this book lays out the basic steps of succeeding inside the home as well as outside it.

I Challenge You Vol. II. When I Challenge You/I Promise You became one of the top 10 bestselling LDS books of all time, it seemed like a good idea to do a second volume. This follow up book has been called "better than the first one" by many, and it expands the thinking of the first by going into some of the less obvious challenges and less predictable promises of Gospel Living.

The Awakening. Richard’s one and only novel is the story of an amnesiac who, in search who he is, finds his spiritual identity before he discovers his name and develops his future priorities before he relocates his past history.

Your Eternal Choice. There is no more important decision in life than marriage, and the decision is more than the big question of "Who?".....there are also the questions of "When?" and "Where?" begging to be considered. It has been well said that if the biggest decision of life is made correctly, all other decisions will be easier--and if the biggest decision is not well made, no other decision will really matter. This book is a guide and a manual for making the decision right! A great gift for dating individuals and a wonderful overview of how the Lord can be brought into both the decision and its aftermath.

Teaching Children Responsibility. As the elementary age sequel to the preschool oriented Teaching Children Joy, this book is an innovative collection of methods for helping children to become accountable and to accept the consequences of their actions. From being responsible for their things and their behavior to being accountable for their choices and their relationships, this book has become a worldwide classic on helping kids to transition into responsible adults.

The Secret of the SabbathRichard believes that dedicated, devoted, disciplined observance of the Sabbath Day brings remarkable physical, mental, and spiritual blessings. But real Sabbath observance is much more than a list of things “not to do.” It involves a weekly spiritual “re-creation” of worship and planning that serves as an invitation to inspiration and a regular course correction of one’s life. In stunning, clear language, he lays out a set of challenges for how to make Sundays the most important (and the most joyful) day of the week.

Success Is…How do you define success? The world’s definition centers on achievement and competition and comparisons with others. Richard, in this small volume, defines success in completely different terms that orient more to relationships than to accomplishments and more to the spiritual than the temporal. Still better, it lays out practical suggestions for going beyond a better definition of success to a better realization of it.

A Joyful Mother of Children.A veritable treasure trove of great advice for moms! Linda’s intimate and personal insights into the roller coaster adventure of motherhood will tickle your funny bone even as it opens and explains ideas that you will want to try as soon as you have read them. The phrase “Joyful Mother of Children,” taken from the Psalms, is a good description of the perspective of seeing our kids as our treasures, and this is both the attitude and the goal of all of Linda’s writing.

Free to be FreeWe all love and give lip service to a wonderful thing called “Freedom.” But do we know the deeper meanings of what freedom really is? Is it one of the trappings of democratic political systems or something won in war….or is it a gift of God that accompanied our entrance into mortality? In this short but remarkably “pithy” volume, originally written by Richard with inputs from Paul Dunn, readers are led to a new definition and a new perspective on the “agency” or spiritual freedom that makes life on this earth the greatest of all eternal adventures.

5 Children’s stories on JoyWhen the Eyre’s book Teaching Your Children Joy became a bestseller, there was a lot of demand from parents to have children’s stories or read aloud books that would teach the same joys listed in the book directly to children. Not finding enough stories directly taking aim at teaching kids joy, Richard and Linda decided to write stories of their own on each of the 15 different Joys advocated by their parenting book. This volume, the first of two, was the result. Delightfully illustrated by a bevy of wonderful artists, this collection will become the favorite bedtime story book of your preschoolers and even of many younger elementary age children.

The Change That We Call BirthThe Change That We Call Birth.Having written the best seller The Birth that we Call Death, Richard had begun to think in great depth about the major transitions of the eternities, and it seemed compelling to write another volume about the other great transition, the one that takes us from the premortal world into this life. And, as it turns out, The Change that we Call Birth is also a parenting book of sorts, because it reminds us beautifully and powerfully that these children that we call “ours” actually belong to God and are co-eternal and equal in spiritual age to ourselves. This perspective may impact our parenting more than anything else in life.

Mother, Father and the FamilyThe Eyres have always liked fables, allegories, and metaphors, and this little volume is all three. In fable-like language, it tells the story of a family fraught with problems until they hit on some parenting and home-organizing ideas that changed everything and made their parenting and their family begin to really “work.”

12 Children’s stories on JoyIt turned out that 5 Children’s stories on Joy (see #18 above) were not enough, so the Eyres wrote (and found favorite artists to illustrate) this larger volume containing 12 stories related to the “Joys” in Joy School and the Teaching Children Joy parenting book. Kids love both to have these stories read aloud to them and then as elementary age kids to read them themselves. What could be better than stories that allow children to experience different kinds of joy vicariously so that they can then go out and find the same joys in the way they live their lives!

Teaching Children Charity With Teaching Children Joy established as a mainstay for parents of preschoolers and Teaching Children Responsibility as a best seller in homes with elementary age kids, parents began asking the Eyres what they had to offer them if they had adolescents and teenagers. Should there, in other works, be a third “Teaching Children” book in the series. The answer was a resounding “Yes.” Richard and Linda’s theory is that most all of the problems teens have center around their propensity to always be “looking in mirrors” and seeing everything and everyone in terms of how it will impact them. The Eyres thought that if adloscents could start seeing through “windows” instead of into “mirrors” and really get interested in other people, many of their problems would be replaced with friendships and empathy. They felt that the best name for this new and healthier and happier outlook was “Charity” and the third book in the series, filled with practical methods and ideas, was born.

Teaching Children Sensitivity. With Teaching Children Charity written to a mainly LDS or Mormon audience of parents, there was demand for a more secular version, so the Eyre’s wrote Teaching Children Sensitivity containing the same techniques to help kids get their minds off of themselves, but in less religious language.

Lifebalance. Perhaps one of Richard’s true classics, this book tackles the society-wide problem of work/family balance. But rather than rehashing all the old time-management ideas, it takes the perspective that balance is really a mental and spiritual challenge and one of establishing and living by true priorities which put family and relationships above everything else. The book also introduces the concept that “inner balance” is possible only when a person’s structure and spontaneity coexist and feed each other. The solution of “spiritual serendipity” is introduced here and then runs through many of Richard’s subsequent books.

More Children’s stories on JoyThe third volume of stories for preschool and elementary age kids—a collection of read-aloud stories that teach the various “Joys” of the joy school preschool program. Similar to the first volume (see # 18 above) but with stories for the other Joys not covered in the first two volumes.

I Didn't Plan to be a Witch. One of the best known and best loved “motherhood” books in the world, this captivating volume is short on parenting advice but long on parenting experience. Praised by mothers everywhere as the book that “really gets it” and that tells “everymother’s” story and predicament with candor and honesty as well as humor, this may be Linda’s most popular and perennial book. Read it and laugh, read it and weep, and read it to realize that you are not the first mom to feel the panic and frustration as well as the joy.

Serendipity of the Spirit The concept of “Spiritual Serendipity,” first mentioned in Lifebalance (see #24) got attention and brought appreciation from all over the globe to the degree that Richard felt it needed to become the full topic of a new book rather than just a support topic of another book. His research led him to Sri Lanka (originally called Serendip) and to the British Musieum in London where he found an ancient Persian fable called The Three Princes of Serendip which had been the inspiration for the coining of the word Serendipity by Horace Walpole in 18th century England. More importantly, Richard found a concept and a perspective that can allow us to “Frequently find something better than that which we are seeking.”

Stewardship of the Heart Both Richard and Linda Eyre have embraced two favorite “wordconcepts” that have guided and influenced how they have lived their lives. Interestingly, both words have eleven letters and start with “S”. The first word is “Serendipity” which inspired Serendipity of the Spirit (see above) and the second is “Stewardship” which is the subject matter for Stewardship of the Heart. Stewardship, Richard believes, is the humble and out-turning alternative to the proud and inward attitude of Ownership. Stewardship, in the spiritual sense is the belief that God owns all and that each of us are given charge of many unique blessings which we are to care for and magnify. Whereas the perception of Ownership breeds envy, jealousy, condescension and enmity, a paradigm of Stewardship generates gratitude, empathy, and teamwork. More than just describing an attitude or a belief, this book tells us how to reorient our lives based on a mega-principle.

Utah in the Year 2000 Though it is not known to most of his readers, at one stage of his life Richard was highly oriented to and committed to politics. He was, for many years, a principal in the renowned Washington DC political consulting firm of Bailey, Deardourff and Eyre and helped plan and manage campaigns for a host of US Senators, Congressmen and Governors in addition to working on the Presidential Campaign staffs of George Romney and Nelson Rockefeller. He moved to Utah to run the Jake Garn US Senate campaign and was on the verge of running for Congress when he and Linda were called to preside over the LDS Church’s mission in London. He also used his political skills to run successful Utah referendum and bond elections to build Symphony Hall, to restore the Capitol Theater, to expand the Salt Palace, to save the Hogle Zoo, and to expand the Central Utah Project. A few years later, Richard ran for Governor of Utah, winning the Republican Convention but eventually losing the race to Michael Leavitt. Prior to his run for Governor, Richard spend nearly two years developing public policy ideas on how Utah could be governed in a more family-and-education-centric way. He put his ideas into Utah in the Year 2000, a book that continues to influence politicians today.

Teaching Your Children Values. After acquiring Teaching Children Joy and Teaching Children Responsibility, Random House Publishers asked the Eyres to write a third book in their series called Teaching Children Values. Richard and Linda did so, outlining 12 universal values that they felt all parents wanted to teach to their children and creating a book with 12 “months” rather than chapters, and with the suggestion that parents focus their attention on one value each month of the year. Random House took issue with one of the 12 values, the one on “fidelity and chastity” arguing that it sounded old fashioned and would put many parents on a guilt trip. The Eyres refused to take the chapter out, and ended up parting company with Random house over the disagreement. Simon and Schuster saw the book, offered the Eyres a substantial advance, and enjoyed watching the book become a New York Times #1 bestseller with the disputed chapter becoming arguably its most popular and most discussed section. Oprah loved the book and put the whole Eyre family on her show for a full hour, causing the book to zoom up the bestseller charts. Teaching Your Children Values has been translated into a dozen languages and continues to be a classic guide for parents throughout the world.

Three Steps to a Strong Family. What makes families strong and lasting and cohesive and loving? The Eyres believe that there are three primary things that all successful families share—well established family traditions or rituals, clear family laws or rules, and some kind of a family economy that shares responsibilities and rewards their accomplishments. These become the three sections of this volume which suggests literally hundreds of ideas to help parents take the “three steps to a strong family.”

Don’t Just Do Something,Sit There Are we sure we want to accept all of the old clichés that our mothers taught us….like “If a thing’s worth doing, its worth doing well.” Or, “Don’t just sit there, do something.” Maybe there are replacement maxims that actually are better fitted to today’s world, like “If a thing is just barely worth doing, just barely do it.” Or, “Don’t just do something, sit there”—sit there and think about it and decide what you really want and find the best way to get it. This delightful little volume calls into question dozens of old clichés that may not work too well any more and replaces them with “today’s maxims.” Guaranteed to make you think, the book draws heavily from Richard’s rich experience and draws readers into “a whole set of new paradigms.”

The Wrappings and The Gifts During their Mission Presidency in London, and throughout another year spent in England ten years later, Richard and Linda became close friends with a Member of the British Parliament who asked a highly thoughtful and interesting question: “I know about Joseph Smith and the Gold Plates and the Book of Mormon and the fact that you believe your Church was restored by God” he said, “but what I want to know is exactly what it was that was restored. What doctrines or teachings of Christ do you claim were lost and had to be replaced or put back on earth.” Then to make his question more graphic, he added “To me all the visions and gold plates are just the wrappings. I want to know what gifts are inside—what actual doctrines are in the package.” Richard wrote an 84 page letter to answer the man’s question, and later put it into this book.

Spiritual Stewardship. Information not available.

Spiritual Serendipity. The earlier book Serendipity of the Spirit (see no. 27 above) was written primarily for LDS readers, but by word of mouth and book-sharing, its concepts spread far beyond Church members and there began to be a demand for a “less religious but not less spiritual” edition. Spiritual Serendipity was Richard’s response.

Emotional First Aid for Moms For many years, Linda was involved in a “mother’s group” that got together regularly to discuss their parenting, their children and their choice to stay at home with them during their most formative years. Linda came to greatly respect and admire these women, and finally suggested that they write a book together sharing some of their discussions and solutions. Margaret Archibald, Anne Orton, Erlene Blaser and Barbara Timothy Bowen teamed up with Linda to write this wise and enduring book of perspectives and tips for mothers.

How to Talk to your Child about Sex. Over the years, the Eyres have come to feel that earlier and earlier recreational and experimental sex is the biggest emotional, physical and spiritual danger that kids face today. Many parents do a pretty good job about discussing the dangers of drugs and violence and bullying to their children, yet often do not even dare to attempt the “big talk” with their kids about sex. Yet study after study shows that the earlier and more thorough this big talk from parents is, the later their kids will experiment or become sexually active. Richard and Linda decided to tackle the problem (and the discomfort and embarrassment parents feel in addressing it) head on in this candid and straight forward book. At its core is a big talk dialogue that reads like a play….You say this….child will say this….you say this….child will say this, or this….in each of the cases, you will say this or this. Parents throughout the world have depended on this book not only for the big talk (which the Eyres say should come around age 8) but for the follow up family discussions covering everything from pornography to homosexuality and from modesty to how to say “no.”

Life before Life. Always troubled by theology that contemplates a “one-way eternity” with beliefs in a forever forward but no forever backward, Richard has written this defense of the premise that we did not flare into existence at birth but rather came to earth as individual spirits and spirit children of God who were sent here as another chapter in our eternal growth and perfection. Having this perspective, Richard believes, gives whole new meaning to things that we call coincidences and allows us to see the bigger picture about where we came from, why we are here, and where we are going.

The Happy Family Tolstoy begins his book Anna Karenna with an intriguing statement, “All happy families are the same; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own unique way.” During their extensive and worldwide travel and speaking to parents and families, the Eyres have observed certain “best practices” that seem to always be used in some form by relatively happy and successful families. They have collected and editorialized about these in this book which will stimulate you to include or adapt things into your family that really “work.”

Empty Nest Parenting. The first time one of the Eyres’ children turned 18 and left for college, Richard and Linda began realizing that “you are never done with parenting, you just shift into a new phase of it, and parenting problems do not go away, they just get bigger and more expensive.” Responding to their own situation, and interviewing and holding discussions with groups of other “emptying nesters” they began to see certain patterns that worked and others that definitely did not. They concluded that while there was no single “right way” to do things like financial help or regular communication or ongoing advice, parents who had a plan and had thought these issues through were doing much better than parents who were just letting things happen and responding to one need or problem at a time without any thought-out strategy or set of policies to guide them. With the subtitle “adjusting your stewardship as your kids leave home” this book will help you get through the difficult emotions of having kids leave and will give you methods and techniques to continue to be in close touch even as you respect the emerging independence.

The Book of Nurturing. One day the Eyres’ editors and publishers at St. Martins Press in New York made a very interesting suggestion. “Most parenting books are highly prescriptive” they said, “telling parents just what they should do and why; and there is usually an analytical, left-brain tone. How about a more artistic, right-brain parenting book that operates off of stories and metaphors rather than step-by-step do this or don’t do that advice?” Linda and Richard loved the idea and set off to produce “the most beautiful and creative parenting book ever.” What they came up with was nine quite wonderful animal and nature metaphors that let stories and pictures and a “secret code” influence kids behavior where commands and discipline couldn’t do it. From the hump back whales that teach us about communication to the feisty crabs that teach us how dangerous criticism and bickering can be, this book is a joy for parents and children alike.

Dr. Bridell’s Rational Diet While no one is quite 100% sure just who the mysterious Dr. Bridell is, but he does seem to have quite a bit in common with the Eyres, both in terms of his writing style and his deeply and passionately held beliefs. While thousands swear by this book as a diet book that has helped them collectively lose literally tons of weight, it is actually a broader book on appetites and their conscious control and embraces a whole new philosophy of life where things are used with grateful discipline and slowly savored. Eating, and every other Human passion is broken down into two alternatives, “Appetite Eating” where the appetite controls you, or “Joy Eating” where you control your appetite(s). This book is filled with thought-provoking perswpectives like “A mile, delicious hunger is a wonderful companion.” It will entertain you, motivate you, and make you more curious about the intriguing and mystical Dr. Bridell. More than that, it will help you reshape and redefine your physical body and your spiritual awareness.

The Three Deceivers At about this point in their lives, Richard and Linda discovered that they needed a third “favorite word” to go with “Serendipity” and “Stewardship.” They felt the need for a word-concept that would explain or at least represent their growing belief that their most important identity was not either of them as individuals but both of them combined into a married “oneness.” They also wanted the word to express that timing was everything and that God knows infinitely more about the timing and sequence of our lives’ events than we do. Combining “synergy” with “synchronicity” they came up with their third 11 letter “S” favorite word: “Synergicity.” With the three words in hand, Richard was set to write his most complete “life philosophy” book, called, on one of its two front covers, “The Three Deceivers” and on the other cover “The Three Alternatives.” The three deceivers (and Richard says the three greatest distracters and diminishers off our happiness are “Control,” “Ownership,” and “Independence.” Our obsessions with these three spiritually-false concepts shoots us off in directions that cause us to make bad trade-offs and use up our energy seeking things we can never have. Richard argues that we really control and own nothing but our own will, that everything else is God’s, and that we are all interdependent with each other and dependent on God. The Alternative to Control is an attitude of Serendipity. The Alternative to Ownership is the perception of Stewardship. And the Alternative to Independence is Synergicity. After reading about the destructive forces of the three Deceivers from one side of the book, one can flip the volume over and be converted to the other side by shifting orientation to the three 11 letter “S” Alternatives.

The Mother's Book of Secrets Coming Soon.

Five Spiritual Solutions In all their experience with parents globally and in their own experience with their own children, the Eyres have become convinced that the only real and lasting solutions to parenting problems and the challenges children face are spiritual. In a nutshell, the five spiritual solutions are 1. 2. Following God’s parenting example and patterns, 3. 4. 5. Taken together, these five spiritual perspectives on family can change everything from how your household works to how your mind works.

The Entitlement Trap We used to call this problem “spoiled kids” or “selfish little brats” but today there is a better term to describe what is happening to kids who think they deserve to have everything they want, everything their friends have, and all without any work or effort on their part. The word is “Entitlement” and it is becoming a Trap in our society that catches kids in its clutches and squeezes the motivation and incentive right out of them. The entitlement attitude that infests our youth today robs them of gratitude and strips them of any work ethic. If we as parents don’t do something about it, we will send our kids out into the world ill equipped to compete and to succeed and even to live responsibly. On the other hand, if we can recognize that chosen, earned Ownership is the antidote to Entitlement and the prerequisite of Responsibility…..and if we can find ways to help kids perceive real ownership of everything from their things to their money and from their grades to their choices….then we can give our children the kind of pride of ownership that will motivate them to do their best, to make good decisions, and to take responsibility for everything they have.

Turn the Hearts In 2012, Richard and Linda began writing two weekly newspaper columns, one called “Why the Family” for the Deseret News and the other called “Mormon Marriage and Parenting” for Mormon Times. In 2012, 75 favorite columns were picked from the 150 written to date, and put in this one volume for old readers to revisit and enjoy and for new readers to discover. With a nice balance between the perspective and the practical, this book will consistently remind parents and marriage partners both of their priorities and of ideas for how to be and do better at them.

Live in Thanksgiving Daily For forty years, Richard and Linda have sent out a Thanksgiving Card to friends and family at the holiday season rather than a Christmas Card. The traditional and original cards that go out every November contain the latest family picture and a poem written by Richard that tries to express the main focal points of their gratitude for the year past. “Linda”, Richard likes to say, “expresses herself best and writes our family history through her blogs (eyrealm.blogspot.com and valuesparenting.blogspot.com) while I do best with a little poem each year.” Taken together, these 40 poems and some additional poetry to lead into them, give a wonderfully in depth picture of what awareness, appreciation, gratitude, and thanks-giving can be, and give us a harbinger to the rest of the holidays.

Tennis and Life Tennis scholarships paid Richard’s way through college and today, he says, the game keeps him from “going to pot”. As a nationally ranked senior player, he cherishes tennis as the one game he can still beat his kids at and also as “the best metaphor of any sport for the game of life.” (The only game where the score starts over every few minutes, the game where you have to get to “advantage” before you can win, and the game that keeps score with words like “love” and “deuce” and “serve” and “receive.”) Over the years, he has collected various lessons that the game of tennis has taught him that can be applied with equal relevance to life at large. They are presented here with a split page format where each lesson is applied to tennis on the left hand page and to life on the right. Whether you play both the game of tennis and the game of life or only play one of them, this book will stimulate your desire to get better.

Oneness The Eyres believe that marriage can exist on one of five ascending levels: 1. Convenience, 2. Contract, 3. Commitment, 4. Synergy, and 5. Oneness. When a couple reaches levels 4 and 5, genuine magic begins to happen wherein the total is greater than the sum of its parts. The book is filled with provocative phrases like: “Neither a man or a woman is a perfectable entity, as is a Oneness Union” and “A man has more influence over the happiness of his wife than he does over his own, and a woman over that of her husband than her own.” You will see your marriage and its ultimate potential in a whole different light and will glimpse why Ben Franklin said “A single man is like half a pair of scissors” and why God has said that “the man is not without the woman nor the woman without the man in the Lord.”

The Last Family Coming Soon.

Life in Full Coming Soon.