Self-improvement audiobooks rarely name their promise as bluntly as this one does: the subtitle alone commits to teaching listeners how to 'hypnotize, influence and control anyone,' language that reads more like a carnival pitch than a clinical guide. David T Abbots' Hypnosis runs a brisk one hour and twenty-three minutes, structured around three short chapters covering the basics of hypnotic technique, a set of specific hypnotic methods, and best practices for both hypnotizing others and practicing self-hypnosis. It is filed here under science and engineering, which undersells what this actually is: a compact, popular-audience primer on suggestion and trance, not a technical or academic treatment of the psychology involved.
The Review
The book's actual content is straightforward once you get past the somewhat lurid marketing language: a primer on what hypnosis is, a short history, a debunking of common myths, and then the practical mechanics, induction techniques, the phases of a hypnotic session, and guidance on practicing self-hypnosis specifically. Reviewer Posm1st, who says this was their third book on the subject, describes it as focused on self and improvement of self in preparation for engagement with others, a more modest and useful framing than the cover's promise of controlling anyone at will.
At 33 ratings and a 4.0 average, this is a small-audience title without the marketing budget or reputation of a major self-help imprint, and the reviews confirm a book aimed at complete beginners rather than practitioners. One reviewer describes putting both themselves and a friend into trance after listening, calling the content simple enough to apply immediately, while another appreciates that it avoids dense terminology in favor of a straightforward walkthrough anyone could follow without a background in psychology or suggestion therapy.
Modern hypnotherapy as a field traces back to figures like Milton Erickson, whose more clinical, permissive approach to trance work shaped decades of therapeutic practice, though Abbots' book sits much closer to popular self-improvement than to that clinical tradition. Readers curious about the roots of contemporary hypnosis technique will not find that lineage explored in depth here; this is a practical how-to guide rather than a history of the field's major theorists and their competing methods, and it makes no claim to be otherwise.
Total runtime aside, the three-chapter structure itself gives the material a clear sense of forward motion, basics, technique, practice, that a listener can track easily even in a single short sitting.
What Makes Hypnosis Worth Hearing
Narrator Jim D Johnston keeps the delivery plain and unhurried, which suits instructional content built around step-by-step technique more than it would suit narrative nonfiction. No dramatic vocal shift separates the historical overview from the how-to sections, a reasonable choice for a book listeners are likely to replay in short chunks while actually practicing the techniques described, rather than consume once straight through the way they might a memoir.
The short runtime is itself part of the format's honest appeal: at under ninety minutes, Hypnosis functions closer to an extended audio pamphlet than a full audiobook production, and Johnston's pacing does not try to stretch thin material into something it is not. For the specific, narrow promise this book makes, a quick primer on self-hypnosis mechanics, that brevity reads as appropriately scoped rather than as a shortcoming worth apologizing for.
Short instructional audio like this occupies a specific niche adjacent to full-length self-help audiobooks: closer to a single extended podcast episode in scope than to an eight or ten hour treatise, and priced and marketed accordingly. For a listener specifically curious about self-hypnosis basics without committing to a longer, more academic text, that compressed format is arguably the book's biggest practical selling point, letting someone sample the subject in a single sitting before deciding whether to go deeper elsewhere.
The Caveats
At just over eighty minutes, this cannot function as a comprehensive treatment of hypnotherapy as a clinical practice, and it does not try to. Listeners hoping for citations to peer-reviewed research, a history that goes deeper than the brief history the synopsis promises, or guidance suitable for training as a certified hypnotherapist should look toward longer, more academic material instead. This is squarely a popular-audience quick-start guide, closer in spirit to a weekend workshop handout than a textbook a student would study from.
The genre tag applied to this listing, science and engineering with a mathematics subcategory, is worth flagging directly since it has nothing to do with the actual content; a listener browsing by category could easily miss this title entirely, or stumble onto it while searching for something else altogether. The mismatch does not reflect on the book's quality, but it is a real discoverability problem worth knowing about before you go looking for it on the wrong shelf.
A book promising to teach listeners how to influence and control others invites an obvious ethical question the synopsis does not address head-on: consent. Readers should approach the persuasion and influence techniques described here with their own judgment about appropriate use, since the marketing language leans toward personal power rather than therapeutic benefit, and the book itself does not spend much runtime on the ethics of using suggestion techniques on someone else without their knowledge or agreement.
With only 33 ratings total, this listing has not reached anywhere near the audience of a mainstream self-help bestseller, and prospective listeners should weigh that limited sample accordingly; a 4.0 average built on a small base is a reasonably positive signal but not the same statistical confidence a title with thousands of ratings would offer. Reviewer Amazon Customer's brief but enthusiastic praise, calling it simply 'really great,' adds to a generally favorable but thin pool of feedback for anyone trying to gauge broader consensus before committing even a short amount of listening time.
Should You Listen to Hypnosis?
This suits total beginners curious about self-hypnosis specifically, looking for a fast, low-commitment introduction before deciding whether to invest in longer or more clinical material. Reviewer Kindle Customer's account of successfully practicing basic techniques on themselves and a friend after listening suggests the instructional content is at least clear enough to attempt immediately, which is really the only bar a book this short and this cheap needs to clear.
Listeners who enjoy dabbling in a wide range of self-improvement micro-genres, meditation, manifestation, NLP, self-hypnosis, as one part of a broader toolkit rather than a single deep specialty, will find this an easy, low-stakes addition to that collection.
Skip it if you already own one of the more substantial hypnosis or NLP guides, since Posm1st's review suggests the ground covered here overlaps heavily with other beginner titles in the space. Anyone hoping for scientific rigor, ethical discussion of consent and influence, or techniques suitable for professional therapeutic use will find eighty-three minutes nowhere near enough runtime for that ambition, and should look to accredited training material instead of this primer.
- Read by: Jim D Johnston keeps a plain, unhurried delivery suited to step-by-step instructional content rather than narrative drama.
- At its heart: self-hypnosis technique, suggestion and influence, beginner instruction
- Vibe: Brisk and practical, more workshop than treatise
- Short version: A quick, clear beginner primer on hypnosis technique, best for total newcomers rather than anyone seeking clinical depth.
