As much about life in a foreign clime as about motherhood.
Leary, wife of comedian Denis, recalls with rueful humor the weekend in London that turned into a five-month stay when their son was born prematurely.
Leary is one of those rare chroniclers of motherhood able to find the middle ground between sentimentality and science as she records both her joys as well as fears—she was sure the baby would stop breathing if she left his room. Disarmingly frank about her naïveté, she is also touchingly appreciative of the care she received at University College Hospital, which has the best neonatology unit in London. In March 1990, Leary’s husband was largely unknown in the US, but the BBC had asked him to appear on a TV show in London—all expenses paid. Ann, 26 weeks pregnant, also came along, but the next day, while out walking, her waters broke and she was rushed to hospital. There she was examined and put to bed, but her son Jack was born a week later. Ann had packed only for a weekend, the couple didn’t have much money, but the hospital staff, her family, and the new friends she made, all rallied around to help. As she recalls those difficult months, her fears that Jack might not survive, and the loneliness (Denis had to go back to work in the US), she admits to crying a great deal. But she was impressed with the medical care she received, the kindness of the people, and the continued stiff-upper-lip attitude, though she was shocked when her fellow patients, waiting to give birth, smoked and drank caffeine. Jack was eventually strong enough to leave the hospital, but they couldn’t fly home until his lungs were more mature, which meant finding an apartment—and taking care of Jack on her own. Now, 14 years later, she confesses to having a lingering scar from the experience, “a heart wrenching awareness of the prodigious wonder of Jack’s existence.”
As much about life in a foreign clime as about motherhood.Pub Date: April 1, 2004
ISBN: 0-06-052723-4
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Morrow/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2004
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular...
A neurosurgeon with a passion for literature tragically finds his perfect subject after his diagnosis of terminal lung cancer.
Writing isn’t brain surgery, but it’s rare when someone adept at the latter is also so accomplished at the former. Searching for meaning and purpose in his life, Kalanithi pursued a doctorate in literature and had felt certain that he wouldn’t enter the field of medicine, in which his father and other members of his family excelled. “But I couldn’t let go of the question,” he writes, after realizing that his goals “didn’t quite fit in an English department.” “Where did biology, morality, literature and philosophy intersect?” So he decided to set aside his doctoral dissertation and belatedly prepare for medical school, which “would allow me a chance to find answers that are not in books, to find a different sort of sublime, to forge relationships with the suffering, and to keep following the question of what makes human life meaningful, even in the face of death and decay.” The author’s empathy undoubtedly made him an exceptional doctor, and the precision of his prose—as well as the moral purpose underscoring it—suggests that he could have written a good book on any subject he chose. Part of what makes this book so essential is the fact that it was written under a death sentence following the diagnosis that upended his life, just as he was preparing to end his residency and attract offers at the top of his profession. Kalanithi learned he might have 10 years to live or perhaps five. Should he return to neurosurgery (he could and did), or should he write (he also did)? Should he and his wife have a baby? They did, eight months before he died, which was less than two years after the original diagnosis. “The fact of death is unsettling,” he understates. “Yet there is no other way to live.”
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular clarity.Pub Date: Jan. 19, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-8129-8840-6
Page Count: 248
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2015
PERSPECTIVES
Well-told and admonitory.
Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.
Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.
Well-told and admonitory.Pub Date: June 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-074486-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
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