Christina Eckert has been a student of human behavior, self-analysis, and self-improvement for over twenty years. She began her study at Wheelock College in Boston, one of the most renowned colleges for child life education and teaching, where she earned two degrees. Being a keen observer of the human experience, and having spent half a lifetime being taken advantage of by what she calls Wackos, Christina Eckert, a self-described “Mother Teresa,” decided she had had enough and was ready to give all the Wackos in her life the old “heave-ho” once and for all.

Christina’s first observations of Wackos began as a young child and continued until she found herself involved in a business venture with a self-absorbed, egocentric, “friend,” who fancied herself a businesswoman, but in fact had no formal business training, had failed in seemingly every endeavor she had ever undertaken, both personal and professional, and had the most unbelievable habit of blaming everyone in her life for her own failings. Despite the obvious Wacko warning signs, Eckert gave her new partner the “benefit of the doubt,” and, as she puts it, “welcomed the new business proposition like an ice-cold Boodles martini with Santa Barbara olives.” A short time later, the enterprise failed, and Eckert found herself “pulling the knife out of her back and wiping the blood off her face” from being “hit on the head with a two-by-four.” The experience so deeply affected Eckert, she decided to write a book about her lifetime of experiences with Wackos so that others would not have to endure the same emotional pain and frustration when they run across Wackos in their lives.

Her new book, Winning Against the Wackos in Your Life: How to spot them and stop them in their tracks, is written for the good guys out there: those of us who wear our hearts on our sleeves and are constantly pulling the knives out of our backs. While the subject of dealing with Wackos is serious, Christina laces her real-life Wacko experiences with a sensational sense of humor and a well-deserved dose of rye cynicism to keep you laughing—uncontrollably at times—while learning to identify and rate Wacko characteristics. As she translates Wacko behavior into four categories — the relatively benign Level 1 to the very dangerous Level 4 — she describes in plain terms how Wackos integrate themselves into our lives for their own benefit, only to pull a double cross when the timing suits them. Then, and most importantly, Eckert tells us how to protect ourselves from the Wackos in our lives. The book is available now at Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble, Borders, and Target.