Though the author admits to some dark memories that she chooses not to share—“some memories I’ve definitely tried to...
The inspiring, page-turning story of Col. Luz, a 25-year member of the Army Reserves who in 2007 was awarded a Bronze Star for her service in Iraq.
The author teams with Brotherton (We Who Are Alive and Remain: Untold Stories from the Band of Brothers, 2009, etc.) to create an engrossing account of her adventurous life. In 2006, her unit was called to active duty in a combat zone. Even though she was 56 at the time, she was undaunted by the rigors of basic training. A nurse with dual specialties—public health and psychiatry—she would be caring for the wounded and establishing community health services for soldiers and Iraqi civilians. As a young woman out of college during the Vietnam War, Luz planned to become an Army nurse. However, because her father—George Luz Sr., of Band of Brothers fame—feared for her safety, she joined the Peace Corps instead. Stationed in a small Brazilian town, she enjoyed her work among the poor, until she was brutally raped and beaten. After a painful period of recovery, she finished her tour of duty, earned a graduate nursing degree and returned to Brazil to work for Project HOPE, this time in a large city. Upon arriving in the United States, she became a school nurse and worked in an inner-city school that resembled a combat zone (“changing dressings on gunshot wounds got to be routine after a while”). Because three of her nephews suffered from cystic fibrosis, she took on a second job, in a psychiatric prison hospital, to help pay their medical bills. Luz offers many fascinating stories about her often hair-raising experiences at home and abroad, and her devotion to public service is admirable and impressive.
Though the author admits to some dark memories that she chooses not to share—“some memories I’ve definitely tried to forget…this is not a ‘tell-all’ book by any means, but a slice of my life as it relates to the greater theme of service”—their omission does nothing to detract from the importance of her story.Pub Date: May 4, 2010
ISBN: 978-1-60714-631-5
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Kaplan Publishing
Review Posted Online: Dec. 23, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2010
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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