2 comments about Ernie Davis : The Elmira Express, the Story of a Heisman Trophy Winner.

1. The Elmira Express (on which the movie, The Express, is based) may not be the most literary piece of work ever written, but it the real story of Ernie Davis' legacy. The movie may make for good "family viewing", but this book explains the TRUE story of just how brave, unselfish and caring this young man was, right up until his death. The book explains the indepth accounts of not only Ernie Davis' plight, but also of those who coached him, loved him, and experienced his untimely death. If you have a teen-ager, please try to get him (or her) to read this book. It may just change your child's view of the world. Well... OK...Just maybe.



2. This isn't the greatest book, but a very good and emotional read about a guy that a lot of people should strive to be. Hopefully the movie coming out next year will capture the true heart of Ernie Davis.

2 comments about Hidden Spring: A Buddhist Woman Confronts Cancer.

1. With only a slight knowledge of Buddhist principles,but with much experience working with people with cancer, I began this book with curiosity and trust. Trust because I came upon it at a Buddhist retreat a friend was checking out before attending a class in a few months. It was at the library and I couldn't leave without it for some reason. Now I know the reason. There is such grace in the journey Sandy began as she struggled to continue her practice under most difficult, even dire circumstances. I laughed, cried and finally understood at a deeper level than ever before how to truly "practice" Buddhism on a daily basis no matter what is happening in your life. I get it now, when no reading I'd done before ever truly connected except on a mental level for me. I'm grateful for Sandy for sharing this experience and I am humbled by her story.



2. I heard a review of this book on National Public Radio & had to see for myself if it was as great as it sounded. This is an inspiringly honest book. It would be a great read for anyone dealing with cancer, depression, or daily life.

5 comments about It Was Food vs. Me ... and I Won.

1. I borrowed this book from the local library in hopes of finding something new. This book is different, but the message is not - "it is not about the food but the feelings".
   
   Nancy takes many, many pages to get this simple message across. The writing is disjointed and there is little or no connection between one chapter and the next. It is much like reading someone's journal or diary entries. Chapters are numerous and short (like a journal). One chapter is entirely devoted to writing about losing chapter 29 on the computer. I kid you not. This is tiresome and distracting from the supposed purpose of the book. It is as though we are all expected to be hanging on her every word and life experience. Sorry - just not that interesting and certainly not helpful.
   
   As others have stated, the nutritional advice is questionable. Nancy says she wants you to be healthy, but indicates she keeps Ho-ho snack cakes in her freezer and chips/Doritos in her cupboards for when she needs unhealthy foods. She even goes as far as to say that eating salads will not help you to lose weight.
   
   I could hardly force myself to finish the book. I kept thinking I would get to the part where I, too, would feel this was a great book. It never happened.



2. I loved it. I liked the friendship she tries to develop with you as the book progresses.
   Very helpful



3. This is the only book I have ever read where I felt like the author knew exactly how I was feeling. I have never been able to describe my relationship with food until now. Now that I have a better understanding, I can be in control. This is an excellent book.



4. To prevent repetition, please read Carla Baku's review because I believe that the review highlighted some very important aspects of the book that the reader should acknowledge. If you are looking for a book that you can relate to because you have similar experiences with food and emotions as Nancy had, you've found it. I am still amazed at her ability to share and then publish some of her experiences. I have gone through very similar experiences and I can barely write about any of it on paper, let alone share with anyone else. If you are a person who is looking for a solution or an answer to what might be your problem with food... this is the wrong book. It is a comforting book though if you are someone with similar issues like Nancy because it makes you realize that you are definatly not alone. Nancy talks how she goes to see a therapist or a counselor and at first it was really difficult, difficult to admit her problems and difficult for her to face someone and to ask for help. Nancy realizes that her family and her marriage interplay with her issues with food. What I realized at this point was the power of asking for help. Not the kind of help from the late night infomercials selling equiptment that already filled my basement, not the kind of help from the latest diet books or solutions, but the kind of professional help like Nancy sought out and helped her to overcome her issues with food. Like I did and before I knew it, my issues weren't around food at all, food was just the distraction and for me is no longer a problem anymore. I think an important part of the book is the challenge and the power of asking for help. After 2 years with an eating disorder, I asked for help and found a therapist. Its the best thing I've very done for myself.



5. Nancy Goodman struggled for many years with weight issues. Though she was never that overweight, her obsessions with food were making her life miserable. And she kept her weight down by overexercising, undereating etc.
   
   In this book Goodman shares her thoughts on what works for her. She "talks" to the reader and shares ideas on what to do so the reader can also hopefully conquer their food problems.
   
   Goodman's book is an interesting read. Though I feel she still has issues with food and likely always will, it appears that she has won the major battles and can work through her feelings.
   
   Some of her ideas are totally different. Don't eat salads as a weight loss food (unless you want one) because they won't fill you up and by the time you add on all the dressing you may as well have eaten a satisfying sandwich. Consider eating calcium chews as a dessert. One or two will give you that chocolate or caramel munch and serve as an end to the meal. Use your calories on things you want. If you really want that hunk o'cake eat that instead of dinner. Think about what you are willing to give up so you can eat other things. (In Nancy's case she doesn't eat olive oil or butter).
   
   Nancy is really open in the book with her thoughts and feelings. I did feel sorry for her hubby though whom she blasts throughout the book. Also she has the benefit of having spent a number of years working with a food therapist.
   
   Overall, it's an interesting read about one woman's struggle to make peace with food and her approach is different than the typical diet advise.

5 comments about One Man's Leg.

1. Excellent motivator for people feeling disabled. Don't let a couple of 4 letter word obscure the inspiration of Paul Martin's story.
   Ray Ruggles Haigler, Nebraska



2. One of the most inspiring books I've ever read, Paul Martin takes us on a personal journey through his happiness and his heartaches.Through all of the successes and misfortunes, we are given an honest, and at times, very humorous look at one man's search for true joy and personal success. What does it take to be truly joyous and accomplished in life? It takes the will to try, and the willingness to take different roads until you find the one that belongs to you. It takes all that Paul Martin has to share in this wonderful book.



3. One Man's Leg shows the strength of the human spirit, and the determination of one man in particular. But rather than bludgeon us with a tale of dark adversity and eventual triumph, this book delights in its accessibility and humanity. Paul leads us through his life and evolution with humility and honesty, and writes in a natural prose that inspires genuine identification with him as a person first, and an amputee secondarily.

   I heartily recommend this book to anyone at any stage of life, for both a delightful read and a reminder that humans are capable of great things if we only rise to the occasion.




4. I usually don't get into books like this but I read a review on this one and had to check it out...and I was not disappointed. This is a great book for non-athletes and athletes alike. It really shows how someone can change their lives and become great in whatever they decide to focus their energies on regardless of the barriers in the way.

   At times the book seems somewhat self-indulgent...but if it was my book I'd do the same...overall it's a great book and recommend it!




5. This book is a must-read for anyone that has gone through a tragic event, rough time, or is feeling sorry for themselves. It puts life into perspective and shows that there is always someone worse off than you, no matter how tough things get. It shows that you can laugh at yourself no matter what, and provides insight to the strength of the human spirit.
   Paul sets the example that you can accomplish anything that you set your mind to.
   Inspirational!!!

4 comments about Burned But Not Broken: For What Was I Spared?.

1. This is a book, that once you start reading it you won't be able to stop until you are finished. My husband and I each read it in a day. A very touching and inspiring book. A must read!! You will want to share it with all your friends and family like we have done.



2. This book is a must read for everyone -- but especially for are searching for hope within their own lives. This book tells Michael Nolte's story of courage, and hope, and faith. Why was he spared from death, when it can only be described as miraculous that he was saved at all? I have never read another book that provides in such detail what one must endure while relying on others for extraordinary care found in a burn unit of a major hospital. The author of this book should not be alive today! He was saved by two passing motorists -- his angels. His life has been changed forever; as has the life of his wife and children, family, and friends. This is not a light book that one can read in an afternoon; it is a book to be experienced and cherished. It is a book that speaks to your heart because the man writing these words lived this pain that we rarely hear about. WE are fortunate that someone who has survived the horrors of such a accident is not only alive, but is able to use all of his talents to share his story with others. Everyone who has had a loved one in a burn unit must read this book so you can understand even a bit about the pain they have suffered. All nurses and doctors in hospital nursing must read this book to help them get inside the heads of their patients. Michael is a great story teller. He writes with charm, with passion, with clarity, with directness, and yes, even with humor! There are laugh-out loud moments, and moments that bring you to tears. I highly recommend this book to all. You will be grateful to have learned of one man's journey to recovery -- with the help of his family and friends.



3. This is a book for everyone, but especially for students and people working in the health field. I am a nurse and I learned so much about the agony and pain of being in a burn unit for 2 months. I learned how important the wife/nurse was in getting Michael back to being himself. It is a miracle that Michael is alive. It took many many angels (the men who rescued him from the burning car, his wife/nurse, the health care professionals at the hospital, his daughters, his family and friends) over some years to get there. It teaches us how in a heartbeat our lives can change. Life is priceless and we should take care of our lives like a precious jewel. Thanks Michael for the lessons taught in this outstanding read. Rose P RN in MO



4. In this, his first literary work, Michael J. Nolte exposes the intimate realities of his life as it went from "Norman Rockwell" to a blazing inferno "in 1.8 seconds." A powerful and highly inspirational story of bitter pain and raw courage. A must read for anyone who has encountered suffering in their life.

5 comments about Della Raye: A Girl Who Grew Up in Hell and Emerged Whole.

1. This is an eye-opening, gripping account of mental institutions during the Depression and after. It is well told and keeps the reader hanging. I could not put it down. Once I connected with Della Raye, I had to know what would happen next.



2. Della Raye is only one of hundreds of children from age 2 through age 21 who were shipped off by one or both parents to Partlow who simply did not want to care for them any more. Fortunately she, and others whom I personally know, came through it, although they will never forget the nightmares of being locked in a 4 x 4 room for a month for stealing a piece of cornbread, or worse yet, beging stripped naked and taking turns for showers until all patients in that building were finished. No personal clothing, no books, no radios, or newspapers, when a relative of mine was released after ten years, she did not even know how to dial a phone or how to apply for a job. This book is a true story of one person's hell, replicated thousands of times over at least 50 years, and must be read to be believed. Believe me, it is all true.



3. I drive by Partlow every night on my way home from work. As a resident of Tuscaloosa, you sometimes forget that Partlow and Bryce are there. As you head towards the bridge to cross the river, the top of the main building at Bryce is easily seen from afar, and I'm sure visitors to the area probably think it to be an antebellum home. Instead, the sprawling grounds of Partlow and Bryce speak of the sad state of "care" in this state, in the past and in the present. I truly loved this book, and I always hoped after I read it for the first time that I would run in to Della Raye somewhere in town and get to meet her. I know she's gone now, but what a testament she left. I hope many more people will read this story. She never became famous, but she showed courage and perseverence and forgiveness and love to the world, a world that locked her away and demeaned her existence.



4. On Saturday, September 20th, 2003 @ 3:00AM Della Raye Hughes became one of the most celebrated angels in the Heavens. I love you and will miss you terribly Della Raye. Right now you are probably flitting from angel to angel doing comb outs, setting perms and trimming locks. I wish you well on your journey.I am honored to have known you. Please look down on me from time to time. Lord knows I need all the guardian angel help I can get, oh, and it wouldn't hurt if you put a good word or two in for me (insurance...you know). Thank you for all the inspiration, encouraging words,laughs,long distance hugs and for the trust you placed in me. You will always be in my thoughts with much love and respect.



5. This book is about Della Raye Rogers who at age 4, along with her mother and some other relatives, was committed to the Partlow State School for Mental Deficients in Alabama. It was 1929 and Della Raye's Uncle Richard was too poor to shoulder the burden of caring for himself and his "feeble-minded" relations so he had them institutionalized. At the state school the patients were classified as "morons", "imbeciles" or "idiots". The staff was mostly untrained and uneducated so the "school" was more of an underfunded warehouse for those who were unable to care for themselves. After suffering 20 years of horrifying physical, psychological and emotional abuse, Della Raye was finally released. She found that she not only had the spirit & intelligence to live her life fully, but also the grace to forgive those who had treated her so badly. A heart-warming, inspiring story of the power of love and faith.

3 comments about Saving Jack: A Man's Struggle With Breast Cancer.

1. Saving Jack is THE book to read if you or a loved one has cancer. Although it covers the author's personal experience with one type of cancer, breast cancer in a male of all things, the lessons learned are invaluable. It is a personal, first person account by a brilliant, funny and often poignant man who takes you on the roller coaster of the cancer patient's inner world. This is an excellent read for those who treat cancer patients and their families. This book is engaging from beginning to end, and I too, read it straight through! It is the best book of this area for demystifying some very scary issues on a personal level. If life hands you lemons, this is the gourmet recipe for lemonade. This book had an unexpected effect on this reviewer on the most visceral level. It was comforting. Never saw that coming.



2. This is a heartfelt book. The author takes the reader along on his journey in dealing with a disease that many people do not think men can get. From finding the tumor to a missed diagnosis through a mastectomy and chemo therpay. Jack Willis is able to draw you in with his funny and warm writing to feeling that you actually know him and his family. He does a great job of including his family and thier struggle in dealing with a loved one going through cancer. It is a must read for anyone who has had cancer and anyone who has loved someone with cancer.



3. Jack Willis was my instructor and adviser for five years in Oklahoma and I was there through his ordeal with cancer. This book is the perfect mix of journalistic reporting, along with the charm of a memoir. Mr. Willis is sweet, sad, yet funny throughout the chronicles of his battle with cancer. Throughout his turmoil, he managed to produce several top notch journalists, and reading this book reminded me why he was the amazing teacher and friend that he is. I started the book one night and finished the entire thing- you simply can't put it down. Every page is heartfelt and the writing and editing is as strong as I've seen in any book.

5 comments about A Grief Unveiled: One Father's Journey Through the Loss of a Child.

1. I am a Catholic priest, and I stumbled across this book on Amazon while searching for bereavement resources for a family that had just lost a child. In it, a devout Catholic father graphically walks you through his family's experience of suddenly losing his seven year old son. It is heart wrenching, deeply moving, and beautifully inspirational. It's a relatively short book, and easy enough to read, but the average reader may be shocked by the extraordinary faith of the author and his family. It is loaded with solid orthodox Catholic teachings, without minimizing or taking away any of the real pain that they suffered. It is definitely one of the greatest pastoral resources I have ever encountered. Highly recommended for clergy, bereaved individuals and families, and support groups.



2. We just lost our 13 year old daughter suddenly almost eight weeks ago today. Still awaiting to hear from the medical examiner what caused her untimely death. She collapsed after a snow shoe trek at Environmental Camp in the White Mountains of NH.
   
   I have bought a number of books during these painful weeks, and this book was the only book that I felt I could have written - at least the first few chapters. It was like what we experienced was written down and black and white. He describes everything perfectly.
   
   I loved the book because it gave me great comfort that we WILL feel joy one day ... we don't know, nor can we even begin to think we will ever feel joy again.
   
   One of my favorite lines in the book was ...
   
   Our friends brought us God's presence and love. They did not solve our problems, as if grief we a problem to be solved. They did not dispense pious phrases. Our friends allowed us to be in as much pain as we were in and did not trivialize it by trying to move us beyond it ....
   
   Our friends, family, community, were a blessing from God during the darkest days of our lives and they continue to be. This book is such a comfort to anyone who has lost anyone ... or even more importantly for people who want to know how to help people like us who belong to this `club' ... it is a win/win for anyone reading it. I read it in two days!!!



3. The specific circumstances of our son's death and his age were different than Mr. Floyd's child. The feelings and the pain were not. These events test you and your relationship with God as Mr. Floyd writes and he is on the mark.
   I have bought this book for others, who have lost a child or loved one.



4. This book brought healing to me that I could not imagine would ever come. I pray blessings over Mr. Lloyd and his family for being so honest and open about his son's death. I lost my 11 month old son to a very rare infection in July 1999. This was a very sudden death, as we found him dead in his crib. I highlighted and still read over this book and each time, I am healed even more. THANK YOU, THANK YOU Mr. Lloyd for teaching me that it's o.k. to be brutally honest before God- you showed me that that is when the healing truly comes. Everyone should read this book.



5. This book is the attempt of one father to come to terms with the anguish, the heart-break, the devastation, and the questions that arise when tragedy strikes. Others books have attempted the same. The great English apologist C.S. Lewis wrote a book entitled The Problem of Pain, exploring these difficult questions. It is interesting to compare it with a book he wrote later, after his wife died of cancer. His A Grief Observed does not so much refute what he wrote earlier, but in many ways goes far beyond it.

   A theoretical and theological reflection of suffering is one thing. A first-hand personal account is another. A Grief Unveiled is of the second type. Not that theological and biblical reflection is absent. But this is the very personal and very moving account of how one father copes with the worst pain imaginable, moments after the event, hours after, days after, months after, and years after. What does the journey of grief look like from the inside? This volume is an unforgettable account of one long and painful trip through grief.

   For anyone who has experienced any comparable tragedy, the book will echo similar thoughts and emotions, and will bring forth many tears. The book does not over-sentimentalize, but neither does it over-spiritualize. It is brutally honest and totally real.

   Anyone who suffers will resonate with these moving chapters. Yet it is not just a book about sorrow, grief and pain. It is also a book about hope, joy and victory. It is the story of a radiant faith; a faith that takes a terrible hammering, but a faith the survives and grows and triumphs. But it is triumphant faith because it has as its object a triumphant God. Indeed, God is the real subject of this book in many ways. It is only because of the great love, grace and mercy of God that the Floyds can make it through the valley of the shadow of death.

   The opening chapters are the most painful. Descriptions of the accident. Cradling a dying boy. The nervous wait at the hospital. The bad news from the doctor. Watching a lifeless boy in a casket, bandages over the eyes, because the organs were donated. The burial. The days immediately thereafter.

   The grief seems unbearable. But with time comes some relief. The hole in the soul is always there. It will never disappear. But the intense pain and grief slowly, and surely, begin to subside. And through it all, one believer's relationship with his God is sorely tested, but in the end, vindicated. And with it comes the spiritual understanding that comes with the suffering, the realization that the God we serve is a suffering God.

   God the Father knows all about suffering. He too lost a son in tragic circumstances. And Mary, the mother of Jesus, also knows the heartbreak of losing a beloved son. But as Floyd makes quite clear, Good Friday is followed by Easter Sunday. John-Paul is not dead, but alive, waiting for the glorious reunion that will one day take place. The promise of the resurrection is the believer's hope. And the resurrection of Jesus is the guarantee that we too will one day be raised.

   But it works both ways, There can be no Easter without Calvary. Suffering is the path chosen by Christ, and it is the path his followers must also accept. The hard questions may never fully be answered. But the ultimate answer to the problem of suffering and evil is not a proposition but a person. Jesus, who is acquainted with grief and familiar with sorrow, is the only one who can offer comfort and hope to those who suffer.

   If God can take the most horrible and painful event in human history, the cross, and turn it into the most glorious and blessed of events, then there is hope for us as well. Suffering can be redeemed. It can make us more like the one who knows all about suffering.

   This book is a testament to the way the death of one man two thousand years ago becomes the basis of hope for everyone today. This powerful story will help those who are suffering to make it through. And it will help all of us to get our priorities a little more straight, and help us refocus our attention on what is truly important and of value in life.

5 comments about Limbo: A Memoir.

1. and I put down after only a few pages before. This time I started it I read the whole thing. The last part of the book had the deepest meeting for me. I am glad I gave it another chance. I have read her fictional story called "Sister" some time ago so I was familiar with the author. I also read the book "Read this and tell me what it means" another book by the author that book is a short story collection. I am glad I gave this book another chance. :)



2. There are those who easily turn to their religion to find comfort in the midst of nearly any difficulty. Then there are those who REFUSE to do so and who are able to find their way through the pain anyway.
   Ansay falls into the latter group (and I want to be clear here,...I'm not saying one viewpoint is better than the other, only pointing out the facts).
   She is quite honest about her unwillingness (or inability) to make that choice for herself. She is faced with a mysterious illness and no guarantee of recovery. She may be in a wheelchair all her life. She is young.
   THe result? A book about how she comes to grips with all of this WITHOUT insisting on finding "meaning" or a sense that she was destined for this or that there is some deeper significance or spiritual pattern in her illness.
   If you know someone in a similar circumstance, someone for whom religion is not an easy comfort and who wonders how others have coped, this would be a perfect choice. It is also worth reading by just about anyone who wonders "What if?" or "How would I handle this?". Honest, detailed and unflinching.



3. In "Limbo," a memoir by A. Manette Ansay, the author remembers growing up in the sixties and seventies, for the most part, with fondness. Although Ann's traditional Catholic upbringing gave her nightmares on more than one occasion, the strict rules and routines that governed her life made her feel secure. When her parents took her to Wisconsin, she got to know her large extended family, which included sixty-seven cousins. As a youngster, Ann enjoyed physical activity of any sort. She loved to run, jump, and wrestle, and she even did sit-ups and push-ups when she was in elementary school.
   
   One of the great loves of Ann's life was music. She took piano lessons for years and practiced for hours each day. She became so proficient that she was eventually admitted to the prestigious Peabody Conservatory of Music in Baltimore. Tragically, her promising musical career was cut short when physical symptoms that she had been battling for years suddenly grew worse. She suffered from intense pain in her arms and legs, and the doctors she consulted could not agree on a diagnosis. She tried cortisone shots, anti-inflammatory drugs, splints, braces, surgery, hypnosis, and many other treatments. Nothing cured her, although there were times when she could walk under her own power for short distances. However, because of the pain in her arms, Ann knew that she had to give up her dream of becoming a concert pianist. After much soul searching, she eventually turned to writing.
   
   "Limbo" is an episodic memoir that goes back and forth in time. The shifts are sometimes too sudden and they give the book a choppy feel. In addition, it is a bit confusing when Ansay uses the present tense to describe events long past. However, her descriptive writing is vivid, lyrical, and evocative. She uses creative imagery to depict the people she has known and the experiences that have shaped her life. The author includes in her memoir engrossing anecdotes about a wide variety of topics, including her troubled Grandmother Ansay, the way that Chaim Potok's novel, "The Chosen" changed her view of the world, her ambivalence about religion, and her childhood worries and escapades.
   
   The book is most affecting when Ann talks about her illness and how it transformed her. She attended and completed college, even though she was unable to take notes or written exams. Strangers stared and pointed at her in her wheelchair or made rude comments about her disability, such as, "You've got it easy--the rest of us have to walk." However, the illness brought Ann closer to her parents, especially her mother, who was an invaluable asset to her sick daughter. In 1986, Ann's mother took her on a seven-hour drive to the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota every six weeks for treatments.
   
   Today, Ansay is a successful writer, and she has come to terms with her condition. She says, "It's a good life, made up of the people I love, the novels I've written and those I plan to write . . . ." Her persistence, determination, and resilience are inspiring, and I recommend "Limbo" for those who are interested in a true story of courage and grace under pressure.



4. 
   "The abyss opens beneath our feet, and we leap it,
   *not* because we are particularly brave, but simply
   because we must. We land in a whole new country. We
   put on its clothing, learn its customs, begin again .
   . . ."
   
   This book is the saga of one person's approach to the
   abyss, her eventual leap, and the long process of
   resettlement in the "whole new country" -- a locale in
   which she resides with grace and wisdom.
   
   The book is also a succinct autobiography,
   selective in its particulars. While it begins and ends with the author's transition to chronic disability, its substantial midsection constitutes one long flashback to her most
   formative years. In these pages, she allows us ever so gradually past the periphery and closer to the essence of her active, exploratory childhood and her "good-girl" adolescence in the small community of Port Washington, Wisconsin.
   
   Especially subtle and well-crafted
   are the evolving portraits of the most influential
   people in her life: the feisty, sometimes fiery
   immigrant grandparents; the mother who drives long
   distances (often through the chilliest northern landscapes, in an unheated car) to deliver the author
   to the best available music lessons; perhaps most endearing, in the end, the taciturn breadwinner-father
   -- for it is her father's story, once his speech begins to flow in the face of his daughter's suffering, that ultimately anchors, even permits the telling of, her own story. As Ansay flowers into full personhood, becoming ever more accessible and sympathetic to the reader -- so does he: a man whose life was,likewise, disrupted and derailed by serious illness in his youth. They share a certain resigned if sorrowful firsthand knowledge, as well as a deep camaraderie, borne of their historical social isolation and gratuitous suffering
   
   As the author recounts her life, she mentions almost in passing -- confessing to what she seems to
   consider an amateurish avocation -- that she has written some poetry early on. However modest she herself may consider those early efforts, a fine poetic sensibility is evident throughout the description of her odyssey to the edge
   of the abyss and beyond: the rhythmic flow and careful patterning of her prose, her well-honed capacity for understatement and nuance.
   
   No doubt her writing has also been influenced by her
   long and rigorous training in music. Until she is
   stricken by the still-undiagnosed (demyelinating?)
   disorder that forces her to leave the Peabody
   Conservatory and abandon her longtime dream -- a career as a concert pianist -- music is her daily regimen, even obsession. It becomes her spiritual sustenance as well: "the purest language I knew, the bridge between what I was supposed to believe and what I knew in my heart to be true." The transition to a whole new language -- to literature and the writing of novels -- becomes her ultimate redemption and salvation; inevitably, her first language informs her second.
   
   It is that first and dearest language -- the hours of grueling piano practice -- the push for a better instrument, a better instructor, a scholarship -- that carries her safely through the Port Washington years. Even in childhood, though, we see evidence of other strengths, such as her keen observational powers, her sensitivity to sensory input. We see through her young eyes the lush checkerboard of Wisconsin farmland, viewed from a child's perch on a bicylcle -- the squares reflecting the whole ordered lifestyle of immigrant farmers, the clearly delineated boundaries of their industrious and God-fearing moral code. We come to know, too, through the author's neurons and receptors, the omnipresence of Lake Michigan in its many moods; at a certain season, mentally strolling its beaches beside her, we can almost inhale the rich rankness of the alewives.
   
   We also come to see how asphyxiating a small community can be in terms of its moral strictures -- its church-bound preoccupations -- and we catch glimpses of its predictably sinister underbelly. Ansay writes of growing up amid a vast, extended Catholic family, primarily originating in Luxembourg and Germany. The somewhat monolithic family, the insular and even xenophobic community (its first Jewish family arrives during Ansay's eighties-childhood, but soon returns to the city) impresses upon her relentlessly the obligation not to make waves, never to stand out too noticeably or think too highly of oneself.
   
   Thus, as she navigates an adolescence both gifted and
   repressed, it seems somewhat inevitable that resentful classmates take to terrorizing
   her -- threatening gross punishments (assault, even rape) for her alleged aloofness or visible self-regard; bringing her to fear she may not even make it to graduation before she is annihilated. Her descriptions of the high school sociopaths who lurk in the shadows, of the horrifying notes slipped anonymously into her locker, will ring true for everyone who has ever been bullied in school -- for every woman or girl who has dared not to apologize for intellectual excellence or
   outstanding achievment.
   
   In fact, though she doesn't say so explicitly,
   the creepy two-bit persecution Ansay recounts from her high school years is probably good preparation for her later encounters with adult-aged creeps and insensates -- with the whole gallery of unthinking, gaping, sometimes reproving or sermonizing strangers who tend to assail a visibly disabled person wherever she goes, intruding on her privacy and dignity with their endless repertoire of bizarre questions and surreal remarks.
   
   By the time Ansay reaches her twenties -- an
   expatriate Catholic with severe new medical limitations,
   reconciling herself to assistive devices such as wheel
   chairs and power scooters -- she seems eminently well
   equipped to deal with such individuals. She dispatches
   them with a wonderful, dry, ironic sense of humor that
   had me laughing and reading passages out loud to those
   few people in my own life who might understand. The
   smarmy, patronizing salesman; the man in the cultish
   pain management program whose hand she would rather
   not be holding during Twelve-Step-esque vespers; the
   intrusive evangelist who speaks to her of throwing away her wheel chair -- all are fair game for Ansay's droll, subtle, devastating wit.
   
   This memoir properly belongs to the genre of
   such outstanding works as Nancy Mairs's *Waist-High in
   the World,* Oliver Sacks's *A Leg to Stand On,* and
   the wonderful New Yorker piece by Laura Hillenbrand
   (author of *Seabiscuit*), "A Sudden Illness -- How My
   Life Changed.* It might be read especially
   appropriately as a complement to the fine expository
   volume and research study *When Walking Fails* by Lisa
   Iezzoni, a distinguished Harvard health researcher and
   veteran of MS.
   
   All refugees -- abyss-leapers, entrants into the
   wilderness -- must typically limit their luggage
   severely, settling on a few spare, precious remnants
   they will transport into that whole new country.
   
   This spare, poetic, insightful memoir --
   marked up in black ballpoint and yellow highlighter,
   extruding additional notes and comments on multiple
   rainbow-Post-Its -- elegantly truthful, no matter how
   hard the truths -- calmly, sometimes delightfully companionable in its recounting of familiar interpersonal misunderstandings at once horrific and hilarious -- is definitely one of my own essentials, to be tucked into my specially lightweight backpack or that small, handy storage space just under the seat of my walker.
   
   Elizabeth Rasche Gonzalez
   Medical/Legal Writing & Editorial Services
   Chicago, Illinois
   Email: poetryperson@sbcglobal.net
   
   The author is a longtime medical writer and midlife law graduate (admitted to the bar in 1994). Since 1997, she has been disabled by defective spinal hardware, surgically implanted to correct scoliosis. In the past five years, she has undergone six additional spinal revision surgeries. Elizabeth owns and manages a 488-member forum for other adults with scoliosis who are coping with ongoing problems arising from Harrington rod instrumentation: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FeistyScolioFlatbackers



5. Since writing my own memoir, BABY CATCHER: Chronicles of a Modern Midwife (Scribner 2002), I have been studying the style of other memorists. I found Ansay's prose lyrical, mesmerizing, and almost poetic throughout this beautiful book. To be able to write about her losses as a result of a still-mysterious illness similar to MS, with calmness and lack of hyperbole, is admirable and enviable. From the very beginning you know this story doesn't have a happy outcome, but at no time did I feel depressed. On some level, I rejoiced for this author, for her own successes and insight and hope and the joy in small gains, small triumphs over her difficulties. Limbo is a love story, an admirable one. I wish this author lived next door to me. I would sit at her feet in awe and bake her cookies and bread at every opportunity. May she continue to write and write and write.

1 comments about Learning to Live With Huntington's Disease: One Family's Story.

1. So many people have written rave reviews to the Sulaiman's and the publisher on this book, I was surprised not to see any posted under Amazon's book review!
   
   Huntington's Disease has been so intricately entwined into the fabric of my life since the early 1980's when my only child, Kelly, was diagnosed with the Juvenile form of this devastating disease. Throughout Kelly's life, and since her death at age 30 to complications of JHD in 1998, I have been deeply involved in trying to help families living with Huntington's Disease by providing resources and support where I can. "Learning to Live With Huntington's Disease: One Family's Story" is one of the best non-fictional books on HD to be written since Carman Leal's "Faces of Huntington's" was published in 1998! Whether you are a professional involved in providing support to HD families, a person diagnosed with HD, a young person growing up in an HD family, a person at-risk for inheriting the disease, a friend or a relative of a family living with HD, or a spouse thrown into the role of a "caregiver" in an HD family, each chapter in this book not only will touch your heart but will provide you with insight on how this disease affects every single aspect of the life of anyone who is living with HD!
   
   I highly recommend reading "Learning to Live With Huntington's Disease: One Family's Story"!
   
   Jean E. Miller
   HD Patient Outreach
   HDSA HD CoE at USF~Tampa, FL.
   HD Links: http://get-me.to/hdlinks