5 comments about There Are Survivors: The Michael Cuccione Story.

1. guess im just gonna put this out there...
   michael, i never knew you but you were so special and i know that now. i know steven and i know he didnt mean what he felt and now he feels so guilty but he shouldn't should he?
   i wish i could have knwn you but after reading your book and meeting everyone who loved you i feel like your my friend.
   and your dream will come true. i just know it and its all going to be because of you.



2. I truely do believe this is one of the best books ever written. You can see right into Michael's life as he struggles with cancer, which threatens to kill him many times. The book is set up in a "diary" format, with actual exerpts from his grandmother's diary. At the end of the book, there are lyrics to Michael's songs on his solo CD (purchase at [internet address]) as well as the thoughts/situations that inspired him to compose each song. There are a lot of rare pictures in here, too. The book is not all sad cancer stuff, though. You also read about his life as a singer/actor and his "normal" school life. The book ends on a happy note that he is finally recovered, but unfortunately, that isn't how Mike's story ends. He died of complications in January of 2000. This is a wonderful story of a heroic boy who would do anything to help the world. I recommend it wholeheartedly! This book is good if you are a fan of Michael (or 2Gether) or even if you just want to learn about cancer -- the book discusses the different medicines/treatments/etc.



3. I love this book~ I ordered it from his website in 2001 and his story has totally inspired me to make a difference and has turned my life around, I now aspire to become a pediatric oncologist. I think this book is great for all ages! There are alot of facts but it wasn't confusing at all... I totally understood what was going on. I especially recommend this book to teenagers not neccesarily with a health problem but because these days, teenagers need a positive role model in life and Michael a great role model to follow! This book talks about various stages throughout his cancer and it has a lot of personal feelings and family reactions. This book ends with Michael triumphantly winning his struggle as you may be familiar. I honestly think that is will inspire anyone! He is very much my hero~ Even with his tragic death, I still consider him #1. He is the world's greatest...



4. I think this book is great, it tells about his life and how much of a brave person he was or is. If you are a 2Gether fan or just a Michael Cuccione fan then you need to own this book.



5. "Nature's first green is gold, Her hardest hue to hold. Her early leaf's a flower; but only so an hour. Then leaf subsides to leaf. So Eden sank to grief, So dawn goes down to day. Nothing gold can stay."
   Robert Frost

   This is far most the most heart warming book I've ever read! I have read it many times and I still cry I cried for Michael on the day of his death, I remembered back when my friends and I had backstage passes to see them and Britney Spears I was 15 at the time and now I'm soon to be 17, I remember how sweet and caring he was and so funny he remined me of my little brother who sadly passed away two years before Michael, My little brother would be 13 this year, I still can't believe that they are gone but I still remember that their not really gone they are still here with is in our hearts and I hope that you will go out and buy this book because it will bring you closer to Michael, God Bless You Michael and Brian! we will be 2get+her again!

   Love Always and Forever,
   Lindsey McCartney

No comments about BROKEN CIRCUITS: A Memoir of Alzheimer's Disease in Four Voices.

5 comments about Turn Around, Bright Eyes: Snapshots from a Voyage Out of Autism's Silence.

1. If you know of anyone who has been affected by an Autistic Spectrum Condition, regardless of his/her ability to verbally communicate, this book should be in your collection. Ms. Skye takes us on her and her son's suspenseful, winding journey through autism's silence toward her son's dynamic breakthrough with the use of PECS.

   In reading this book, you will find yourself laughing, crying, and shouting aloud: "Go David, go!" Thank you, Ms. Skye, for providing a powerful, no-holds-barred documentary of your family's triumph over the most confining aspect of Autism.




2. Anyone with a child with autism or knows of someone must read this book. I've read many many books on Autism and this by far is the best one yet. It is so real and true. The writer's/mom's emotions come alive in this book. Once I started reading this book I could not put it down. I ended up reading it till the end! You really feel like you know this family after reading their story. It goes through their many failures with different therapies and programs all the way to the one thing that truely worked, PECS. I highly recommend this book! I can't say enough positive things about it!!



3. Liane Gentry Skye has written a book that is so honest and straightforward, giving both the intense joy and the intense sorrow that often accompanies parenting a child on the Autism Spectrum, that I felt as if I were sitting across the table enjoying a cup of coffee while she recounted their journey out of Autism's silence.
   This book is a must read for any parent or family member facing the Journey of Autism. Your child does not have to be non-verbal for this book's honesty and joy to touch your heart in a very special way.
   I hope this book expands the use of PECS in the same way that Catherine Maurice's book expanded the use of ABA a few years ago.
   What a wonderful blessing to our children!



4. As i read this book, i felt as though i was reading about myself and my son. Liane Gentry Skye has written one of the most heartfelt and compelling books i have read, with the turn of each page you can feel the power of her love for her son. This book is a must read for parent's, grandparent's, anyone who is facing the difficult decisions about what form of treatment to use with their child. Liane & David's journey makes you laugh and cry and cheer at his accomplishments.



5. I think every parent with a child on the spectrum will hold Gentry's hand through this journey, sometimes painful, sometimes magical. It the journey of a brave woman who refused to give up on her child when everyone else did. It is a must read for every parent being coerced into ABA by a school district, when they know that is not *the thing* for their child. There are choices with autism. PECS can work wonders too. Read this book and walk away with hope.

4 comments about The Cancer Monologue Project.

1. I have known a number of people with cancer, and I think I had close relationships with them. However, somehow I learned more about what really happens when people get cancer from this book than I have learned from suffering friends and family. The reality is so grave that I suppose the people I know did not want to bring me in to the pain. But the participants in these workshops feel free to unburden themselves and get specific and I have a more real view of the cancer experience now than I did before. The scathing and lonely vignettes about radiation really got to me, and while it's painful it's also better to know than not to know.



2. When I read The Cancer Monologue Project, I made 30 new friends; each with their own very individual voice and outlook. They share a gruesome commonality, cancer, but something even stronger unites them. What I found most enlightening was the gratitude these survivors expressed for the very disease that brought them, or a loved one, to death's door. Wisdom, humility, and a deep appreciation for family seem to be the legacy of the pain, fear and degradation they endured. In celebrating life, these people made me laugh through my tears as they generously shared intimate details of their journey. I can't help feeling I've been given a primer on how to live my remaining years to their fullest; a gift from these extraordinary contributors.
   I wholeheartedly recommend this book to read, and reread, and give to everyone you love.



3. I purchased this book as a gift for an uncle who has just been operated on for colon cancer after reading about it in the Oprah Winfrey magazine which she highly reccomended. After leafing through a story or two I wound up reading it cover to cover on the weekend before mailing it out. It really is an exceptionally moving work and will inspire anyone that reads it whether they have been touched by the disease, know someone who has (as we all have)or just needs to be reminded how precious life really is. I cannot wait to see what the authors bring us in the future.



4. The authors didn't have to put themselves in others shoes to to convey these enormously brave and inspirational accounts. The authors in their own shoes, brilliantly edited, make this book a must for anyone directly and indirectly faced with cancer's devistation.

3 comments about A Healing Family.

1. My first book by Kenzaburo was Silent Cry. Recently I read A Healing Family and found that I really liked it a lot. Yukari's illustrations were beautiful. This book made me feel closer to Oe's family. It is very heart-warming.

   At the time I read it, I was in the process of deciding whether to get my wisdom teeth extracted by a dentist or an oral surgeon. I heard that my face would be bruised and swollen, my jaws unhinged, etc. after the surgery. It was quite unnerving just to think about it. Then I read that Hikari has to make weekly visits to the dentist, and that his epileptic pills make his gum terribly swollen. I felt that I am in a much much better situation than some people. It was a consolation to read this book.

   One thing I don't quite like about most of Kenzaburo's books is that he refers to a lot of other European writers and their works, which I find hard to understand. Well, that's just my ignorance.




2. Kenzaburo Oe, the Japanese novelist who won the 1994 Nobel Prize for Literature, was 28 when his son, Hikari, was born. This event was the most important in Oe's life. Born with a herniated brain, Hikari has needed almost constant care since birth. "A Healing Family" is Oe's first non-fiction attempt to make sense of Hikari's life and the effect it has had on the people around him, most importantly his family.

   This beautiful book shows the profound love, affection and pride the Oe family take in Hikari's accomplishments and happiness. From the age of five, Hikari has been obsessed with classical music, and eventually began to compose pieces for piano and violin. Much of "A Healing Family" concerns Oe's attempts to understand his son through music.

   "A Healing Family" is a book everyone should read. Finely crafted, perceptive, intelligent and moving, it shows us again that compassion and empathy can make all the difference in the world.




3. Hard to believe that no one else has written a review of this book because it is excellent... Oe's manner of dealing with his son's affliction and the effects it has on his family is truly amazing... His manner is truly one of love and serenity.... Without any reservations, I recommend this book to anyone who wants to know more about "heart"...

2 comments about The Quander Quality: The True Story of a Black Trailblazing Diabetic.

1. Reviewed by Debra Gaynor for Reader Views (11/06)
   
   James Quander was a trailblazer. He was an African American living in a society that had not yet accepted equality of all. He was a man with diabetes at a time when it was considered a disability and something that should be hidden.
   
   After a severe insulin reaction, Rohulamin encouraged his dad to write his courageous story. Rohulamin felt that reading about James' struggle with juvenile diabetes could encourage millions of others. Others needed to know that you can live successfully with this ailment. Together James and Rohulamin wrote this book.
   
   James was born in 1918 in Washington, D.C. He was officially diagnosed with diabetes.
   Bedwetting had become a problem. On one particular Easter Sunday James woke up tired and grouchy. He wasn't feeling well and was barely dragging along. "I collapsed onto one of the two forest green park benches that we always sat on in the front yard in the evenings. I just could not move and relished the fact that I was home... at least almost in my own room, in my own bed." When his father rushed to see if he was ok, "I answered, "Papa, Papa come get me. I'm too weak to get up. I can hardly move. Come get me." James was too weak to walk. Dr. Wilder was called, he suspected Juvenile Diabetes. Dr. Wilder and James became a team working together to prevent the condition from getting worse. "Never once did Mama or Papa ever let on to me that they believed that I was not going to make it. Instead they decided that they would do everything within their human ability to provide me with a quality of life equal to that of my two brothers and three sisters."
   
   James Quander shares his experiences with us, from being diabetic to playing basketball in high school, to his struggle with Scarlet Fever, to his academic achievements. I enjoyed reading Mr. Quander's story. It is one of success, and courage. The writing is superb; the cover introduces the book well. I highly recommend "The Quander Quality" to all who enjoy non-fiction, and to those who have diabetes or are parents of a diabetic.



2. The Quander Quality: The True Story Of A Black Trailblazing Diabetic co-authored by the father and son team of James W. Quander and Rohulamin Quander is the engaging biography of the late James W. Quander (1918-2004). Telling the intriguing story of Quander's diagnosis of diabetes shortly before his sixth birthday, and his dedicated and courageous pursuit to live a fulfilled and purposeful life, The Quander Quality is the inspirational and deeply personal history of how Quander eventually became on of the sixteen men ordained in the United States when the Permanent Diaconate was revived after an eight-hundred-year hiatus. An inspirational and engaging example of living and pursuing life to its greatest limits, The Quander Quality is very highly recommended as for all readers searching for a true life example of timely and enduring truths manifested in an ordinary human being with an extraordinary determination.

5 comments about Kelley's Journey: Facing A Rare Disease With Courage.

1. As a member of the medical profession I was able to identify most of the "types" of people presented in this remarkable book! Yes, I could put a face and name to them--but it would not match the face and name in the story! This is how I know it is true! Just as there are many heroes in medicine, so are there many others who I would not want near me nor my loved ones!

   I heartily recommend this book to anyone suffering from any kind of handicap. Kelley is such a source of inspiration! She deals with whatever comes her way and does so without fanfare or self-pity. What an example to us all! I was humbled by her bravery and her deep faith.

   Give someone the gift of hope--give them Kelley's Journey!




2. This is an terrific book that tells an inspiring and accurate story about someone who has faced life's challenges with faith, endurance, love and an indominable spirit. It offers encouragement to anyone confronting a personal crisis by its positive and common sense approach to what would seem insurmountable circumstances.



3. This is a terrific book if you are looking for true inspiration, common sense application to life's problems and a model of someone who has accepted life's challenges with faith, endurance and an indominable spirit.



4. As a mother of a young child with the same illness as Kelley, Denises words have been an awesome source of strength and wisdom for me to follow. My feelings are that any parent, family member or friend going through any illness will experience so much widsom and support through reading this book. Her words keep you riveted to Kelleys story, at times making you laugh and other times making you cry.
   She is positive and matter of fact, showing that good can come from even the very worst of situations.
   This book really is a journal of a mothers unconditional love for her daughter. I would recommend this book to as many people as I possibly can.



5. As a mother of a young child with the same illness as Kelley, Denises words have been an awesome source of strength and wisdom for me to follow. My feelings are that any parent, family member or friend going through any illness will experience so much widsom and support through reading this book. Her words keep you riveted to Kelleys story, at times making you laugh and other times making you cry.
   She is positive and matter of fact, showing that good can come from even the very worst of situations.
   This book really is a journal of a mothers unconditional love for her daughter. I would recommend this book to as many people as I possibly can.

5 comments about More Than Meets the Eye: The Story of a Remarkable Life and a Transcending Love (Harper Spotlight).

1. This is a remarkable autobiographical story told in a really interesting and powerful way by Joan Brock. She tells first hand of the challenges in her life and how she has dealt with them. High on credibility and very high on inspiration this is a worthwhile story for anyone to think about and learn from. I purchased this tape when on the lookout for a DVD of the telemovie made on Joan Brock's life. My mother had seen the movie on TV and wanted to share it with others. My mother loved this audio version of the story as told by Joan Brock and has recently started to read the book. If the audio tape fosters enough interest to read the book, this must be a worthwhile experience.



2. I was recently fortunate enough to hear Joan speak at the ICAN conference in Omaha. She is truly amazing! Hearing her story puts all of the little bumps in my life into perspective. I would recomend this book to anyone!



3. I knew Joan when she was going through her loss of vision. She is a very positive and uplifting person. Her book is true to the experiences we all had with her and her family. You have to read the book and feel that your outlook on life can be just as positive and happy!



4. I had the pleasure of hearing and seeing Joan Brock while at a convention in Oakland, CA in May of 1999. This woman has been through so much, yet still manages to see the good in life and in people. She will inspire you and lift you. The book make my mother cry with joy as she read it. I hope to have the pleasure of reading more books of Joan's should she choose to write them. Thank you Joan for the joy you have added to my life.



5. This is a wonderful story of love, devotion, and courage; the courage to have an attitude to adapt and make the best of whatever situation you are in. I was so touched by it's message, I return to it's pages when life seems TOO hard. It helps me regain my perspective. An excellent book!

5 comments about The Revelation of a Star's Endless Shine: A Young Woman's Autobiography of a 20-Year Tale of Trials & Tribulations.

1. As a positive psychologistEnchanted Self: A Positive Therapy (New Directions in Therapeutic Intervention , Vol 1) I am always on the look out for inspirational writings. All the better if they are truly the story of a person's efforts to make the most of her life. That's what we find in The Revelation of a Star's Endless Shine...We really get to see how day after day after day a person can struggle and succeed against what seem to be terrible odds. I actually had a chance to 'meet' Shirley in a teleclass we mutually took. I was so impressed with her actual being, not just her writings. She is very special and has a message for all of us: Don't give up! You have purpose and there is a way. I always try to give my clients that same message in some fashion or other, whether I try to infuse hope by my words, or share via my books, such as my new book,The Truth, I'm a girl, (I'm smart and I know everything)where I try to re-invest adults with the courage and fire they had as kids and at the same time help kids keep the fire.
   
   Even though this book is long, I still highly recommend it. You may want to randomly even open a page for a new dose of 'fairy dust' giving you encouragement to make the most of your life!



2. As a life and personal coach, I encourage my clients to read about people who face challenges and tragedies and manage not only to survive, but to thrive. Shirley Cheng's biography, "The Revelation of a Star's Endless Shine," is such a book.
   
   Shirley's life could have turned out very differently had she and her mother been cowed by the appalling behavior of doctors, teachers, landlords, social services employees, lawyers and even friends. Instead, their courage and willingness to confront rather than accept ill treatment, led Shirley, a blind, disabled woman, to create a life filled with meaning and singularly lacking in self-pity or bitterness.
   
   Reading of Shirley's physical pain, her increasingly weakening body, the slipshod way she was handled by school aids who were supposed to be helping her, the legal wranglings over her care, would make anyone scream in frustration. Even worse was the way Shirley was treated by an endless list of so-called professionals. Hardly anyone listened to Shirley or her mother regarding her pain, her intelligence or her thirst for education. The indictment of so many people who should have been on Shirley's side, is a sad commentary on our medical, social service and educational systems. In addition, Shirley's father evidently was a manipulator and a cruel man who refused to use his money for the benefit of his daughter. The hardships she and her mother faced feel unendurable. Yet they were endured. And despite poor medical care, despite teachers who seemed uninterested in helping this talented student, despite unfeeling "friends," in two countries, this mother and daughter fought and won many more battles than they lost.
   
   Unlike Shirley, few of us seem to have the innate ability to face every day and everyone with a smile regardless of our own painful circumstances. Yet we can read her story with an open heart and choose to integrate her positive outlook and determination into our own lives in a way that will serve us and those around us. After all, this is the reason Shirley wrote the book. She hoped that her story would inspire others to treat everyone with respect, to stand up for what we believe in and to reach out to those less fortunate.



3. "She was running toward a glistening stream with fish of all colors flying out of the water. With laughter escaping her lips, she chased a white butterfly amidst the green field of wildflowers. Her black hair glowed with a halo of brightness, with sunrays dancing about her. The blue sky was accentuated by a shimmering rainbow..." ~pg. 116
   
   Shirley Cheng is the author of Dance with Your Heart: Tales and Poems That the Heart Tells. She is a highly imaginative writer who has access to beautiful inner worlds where she creates mythological tales and beautiful stories.
   
   In "The Revelation of a Star's Endless Shine" we are able to access an extremely detailed portrait of 700 pages explaining Shirley Cheng's life and how she became a writer. As if observing her life as an angelic protecting presence, she writes of her life's struggles and challenges she faces due to many people in her life seeming to show a general insensitivity to her condition.
   
   As a child she is diagnosed with juvenile rheumatoid arthritis, but this is only the beginning of a long journey filled with therapies and medications, not to mention medical complications due to medication side effects. As Shirley Cheng seeks to make sense of why certain medical problems keep occurring, she faces life with a refreshingly honest and hopeful approach.
   
   "Picking up a book, Shirley began to enter into a different world, a world that she could escape to from her surroundings. After the first quarter, she had begun to increase her reading and writing volume. She read three books a day, averaging five to six hundred pages." ~pg. 375
   
   After spending the entire morning reading Shirley's work out on my deck in the sun, I can recommend anyone to do the same. This is a world where you can not only view the outer struggles of the poet's life, the inner world is also revealed in creative flourishes I started to look forward to finding throughout the writing:
   
   "The strong wind whirled, bringing dancing flakes in its invisible arms, equally distributing a thin layer of snow to other places of the frozen land. Small spheres of shimmering, crystalline flowers alighted upon the earth from their silvery home above, while the sun slept peacefully below the horizon..."~ pg. 6
   
   ~The Rebecca Review



4. Reviewed by Ellen Hogan for Reader Views (3/06)
   
   
   This book is about the young life of Shirley Cheng, but really it is the story of two remarkable women, Shirley and her mother Juliet. It tells of the trials, tribulations and obstacles that they had to overcome. Shirley was diagnosed with juvenile rheumatoid arthritis when she was 11 months old. Juliet then started her quest to find treatment for her daughter. Shirley's childhood was spent between America and China, looking for new
   medicines and treatments. Several times Juliet had to fight for custody of her daughter when doctors wanted to do things she did not approve of.
   
   The first goal in Shirley's life was to get an education, this did not go smoothly either. Between school administrators that would not listen to them, and aides that were very cruel, Shirley persevered and gained her GED diploma. She was also asked to speak at the graduation, an honor she embraced. Besides the arthritis, Shirley also suffers from several other diseases including heart problems, severe constipation, multiple allergies, asthma and blindness. It is through faith and sheer determination that Shirley has been successful.
   
   What will Shirley accomplish in the rest of her life? She has proven that she can do anything she puts her mind to. The love and joy that mother and daughter derive from each other is a precious thing to behold.



5. This is a complex story written in an easy to read, conversational fashion that is disarming, yet sometimes astounding in its micro-details (ie., telephone conversations you get word-for-word); Shirley Cheng seems to have the memory of a titan. Nevertheless, at times you feel some information is missing--must be missing, because why else the poor treatment by one person after another, one agency after another, one doctor after another, one medical aide after another? But then it hits you--these people, these agencies, these medical "professionals" are really, in many cases, THAT awful! The truth is that American medicine, American government schools and American government agencies all too often think they are GOD. But they're not.
   
   In fact, this book poignantly shows how the enormity of the misuse of power, such as trying to take an ill and hurting child away from its primary source of love and security--its mother--in the name of doing what's "best" for that child, is downright horrifying. And rightly so. The medical establishment is one of the biggest offenders in Shirley's life, and we can probably all relate. (No one is saying, incidentally, that there aren't good people to be found in these arenas of public service, and thankfully, Shirley and her mom find some good people, too.)
   
   If nothing else, Shirley's story is triumphant in that her mother rejects what she knows to be wrong for her child, fights the nightmarish resistance of said "establishment" and wins in the end. But the book is also more than that; it is the tale of a sensitive, intelligent, and observant girl who happens to be painfully disabled; she suffers enormously but has the extraordinary gift of a mother who is sold out for her well-being, hook, line and sinker.
   
   Did the mother make mistakes? Of course. She trusted the wrong people, particularly a relative who was no less than criminal, it seems to me, in her actions. But Juliet Cheng's gift of love to her daughter is something that many able-bodied people never get. She is the epitome of the selfless mother/caretaker extraordinaire, shining the light on the lives of quiet, exhausting devotion that mothers like her live daily.
   
   Overall, the author does an amazing job of keeping the reader's interest; I think the book could be shorter, but I honestly cannot say it was ever boring. When you finish the book you will feel an affinity to this Shirley Cheng and her mother, Juliet. You will admire them both, and hopefully, thank the Lord that your "trials and tribulations" have not been as devastating. If you are interested in a story of hardship and happiness, of personal triumph against horrendous disadvantages, of the experience of being female, Chinese, disabled and blind and yet achieving your dreams in an adopted country--then read this book. The level of success that Shirley achieves is remarkable and inspiring--no less than her achievement in writing this book. Her work and courage alone get five stars in my book.
   
   Shirley Cheng is a talented and bright-hearted young woman who is by no means finished achieving. I look forward to her next accomplishments!
   
   Linore R. Burkard
   www.LinoreRoseBurkard.com
   Inspirational Romance for Today's Woman of Faith

No comments about The Story of My Life.