Book Lovers Club
Comments
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Sandra, how are you like My Husbands Secret I have been contemplating reading it for a couple of months. A very good book I have read.."Never Fall Down" it is about the Cambodian killing fields (I enjoy reading about other cultures).
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I loved "Love in the Time of Cholera", but wasn't crazy about the ending. I didn't care the the movie at all. Interesting that everyone perspective is soooo different
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Love in the time was not my cup of tea. But i like the easy reads. I don't need to spend to much effort to understand one. My life takes a lot of effort so I am a lazy reader. I like Lisa Jackson. And I'm reading the new JR Robb (Nora Roberts) that just came out. I also got into the chronicles of Elantra - a fantasy series. Took me away from my problems. Since it is a series I read about 6 of the last week. LOL
We all have different tastes and view points but that's what makes the world go round!
Much love.
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I just finished Brain on Fire: My Month of Madness by Susannah Cahalan. I liked it a lot. I've been reading a lot of nonfiction lately. This book is about a young women who is a reporter for the New York Post who begins having several problems including delusions, hallucinations, paranoia, etc. and the top doctors can't figure out what she has, although several misdiagnose her.
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Also enjoyed "Brain on Fire." Different, and frightening what misdiagnosis can lead to. C
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I have Brain on Fire reserved at the library. Looked like a book I would enjoy. I have to admit to having less patience waiting for books to come on off my reserved list. With all the down time I have been able to breeze through quite a few good books lately.
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Ooh, Brain on Fire sounds like something I'd like. I read non-fiction and fiction...whatever looks or sounds good.
Moon, I love, love, love all the J.D. Robb books. I've read the first chapter of the newest book on my Kindle as a sample. That's one of the reasons why I like my Kindle...you can read a whole chapter and then decide if you want to read more. Two years ago when I was still working, I got one of the "in Death" series on as an audio book to listen to during my commute. It was terrific to hear the sounds of the voices. The actress who does them on the whole audio series is fabulous. I went back to the first audio book, however, and could tell the voices of a few of the characters were still not fully developed...mainly Peabody. But by the next audio book she had it down perfectly. Now when I read the "in Death" books, I hear those voices in my head and makes the reading even better.
The Husband's Secret by Liane Moriarty (careful...there are several with the same title by different authors) was very good and had some eye opening twists. Worth reading for sure.
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I recently had read reviews of Brain on Fire and was surprised by the uncanny resemblance between the disorder that she had with the illness, Paraneoplastic Syndrome, which a close family friend was recently diagnosed with. Paraneoplastic Syndrome is also an auto immunological response to the nervous system when a cancer is present in the body. The symptoms of the two EXTREME rare disorders are similar. Honestly, I could write a book about what happen to my friend and how he was finally diagnosed and how we got him to the hospital to get treated. It's been 6 months since my friend was diagnosed and has been treated and yet, STILL HAS NO RECOLLECTION OF WHAT HAPPENED OVER A PERIOD OF A FEW DAYS. I think out of dignity and respect for him, I'm not sure he would like knowing how he went missing and all of NYC' s finest were looking for him!
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voracious-wow, that's really scary. After I read the book, I wondered how many other people have this ailment or something like it and are misdiagnosed, and are in mental hospitals or worse. Is your friend doing better?
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I enjoy the James Rollins books. I love adventure stories, and I find his books addictive sometimes.
Oceana
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f.....Thank you for asking how he's doing. He is doing extremely well. He is a physician. When he started showing symptoms, last summer, he went from practicing at New York's most prestigious hospital and giving grand rounds all over the world, to going missing in a matter of weeks. Before being CORRECTLY diagnosed, following grueling tests, his family was frightened by his mental instability, seizures and falls.When his wife called the DH and me to ask if we heard from him, we knew we had to take the helm and find him as quickly as possible so he could get treated for the cancer AND for the paraneoplastic syndrome before the nervous system damage would become permanent and the lung cancer became deadly. I can't get into the nitty gritty details except to say that after we located him the second time he went missing in 24 hours, it took the assistance of 6 police officers, 3 EMT'S, 2 family members and 1friend to get him to agree to get in the ambulance. It took close to two hours to convince him to get in the ambulance. This happened right outside the New York City's Midtown Tunnel. Looking back, it was a miracle that he was diagnosed within a few weeks of his symptoms and it is a bigger miracle that he was neither hurt nor harmed while his brain was on fire. The NYC police officers who have seen EVERYTHING happen in New York, never saw anything like what they saw in those harrowing 24 hours. And the biggest miracle is that he is doing very, very well.
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vor....That's wonderful!!
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Voracious, I've never heard anything like your story. How shocking!
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Now you all know why I don't enjoy reading fiction. The stuff that goes on in my life is way more unbelievable than the fiction that I read! And speaking of being wrongly diagnosed...it took the DH and me 20 years before he was diagnosed with his rare genetic metabolic muscular dystrophy at age 42.... Would you like to hear how he had been wrongly diagnosed with a heart attack before being properly diagnosed? When he was diagnosed, there were fewer than 500 people in the world diagnosed with his illness. Wanna know who made the correct diagnosis??? The physician who I just told you all about!
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Oh wow. Voracious.
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I hate that. Sorry. I liked the book
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Voracious, holy cow!!! You could write a book. Frightening!!!
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Yikes!! Yes, your true life story definitely trumps fiction!
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VR, you should totally write a book. Your posts are always wonderfully written
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Bedo - hope you're OK. It's not like you to withdraw posts. Thinking of you.
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Have any of you read The God of Small Things? I've had it on my shelf for a long time. I read about 50 pages and stopped. I just don't care how it ends. What do you think?
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Hi!
What a great idea for a thread! I'm an avid reader. Haven't read a book since my surgery but am really chomping at the bit to start again. The last book I read right before surgery was The Secret Life of Bees and I loved it! I love historical fiction, chick lit, or any good story written by a woman.
Some of the books I read last fall are:
Blackberry Winter by Sarah Jio
Looking For Me by Beth Hoffman
Never Change by Elizabeth Berg
The Signature of All Things by Elizabeth Gilbert
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Sklott
Have a great weekend everyone!
~mary
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bc, if you liked The Secret Life of Bees, you'll love The Invention of Wings. Same author, Sue Monk Kidd. I too read The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. What an eye opener!
For some reason, I couldn't deal with reading novels right after my surgeries. My brain just wouldn't let me comprehend longer than a magazine article. I took books with me to the hospital all three times but never opened them. After a few weeks, it was ok and I was back to normal...at least one big book a week or two smaller or lighter books.
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Thanks, Sandra, I'll add that to my list. Sue Monk Kidd is awesome. LOVED Immortal Life, too.
I know what you mean about not being able to read after surgery .... altho the reason I couldn't is because my vision was blurry. I had a hard time even focusing on the TV! I was really scared that something was wrong with my eyes, but after a thorough exam the optometrist said I had dry eyes or possible corneal abrasion. Seemed like my eye muscles weren't working right... must have been the anesthesia. That stuff is killer! Still....it took several weeks before my vision cleared up. What a relief! Don't know what I'd do if I couldn't see to read.
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Bc101, how interesting. I wonder if others have had the same experience. Losing the ability to read would be the worst thing for me. Back in my 30's and 40's when I had migraines several times a week, I would get the first sign that it was coming because letters or words would suddenly disappear in something I was reading. Sure enough, in a few minutes the "theater marquee blinking lights" would start in a zig zag pattern that moved around for the next half hour or so. No reading at all then. The aura goes away but is replaced with pain and light sensitivity, so you can't read then either. It was the worst part of having chronic migraine. Fortunately one nice thing about getting old is migraines tend to be less frequent (I only get one or two a year now in my 60's) and the pain portion of the experience decreases 95%. The aura part is the same unfortunately, and always seems to hit when I'm just at the crucial part of a book and desperate to find out what's next.
No reading for me for the hour. Also I had a moderate brainstem stroke last year and it's the kind that affects your eyesight, hearing, and balance. For about six months I had double vision that would come and go and prevented me from reading. I've retrained my brain through rehab now and can read for hours and days again.
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sandra4611, It's interesting what you posted. My husband told me that I read too much. We are divorcing
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Hi All. I read Brain on Fire in a few hours yesterday...;) Interesting & scary. I mostly read nonfiction & love memoir & books on the brain/mental illness/addiction, etc.
A really great book is: EVIL GENES: Why Rome Fell, Hitler Rose, Enron Failed, and My Sister Stole My Mother's Boyfriend by Barbara Oakley, PhD. It's one of the most interesting & unique books I've ever read. It's largely about the connection between Machiavellianism, personality disorders, & the propensity toward evil. She discusses many Evil World Leaders throughout history--their personality traits, psychopathy, etc. She explains various personality disorders in a fascinating & easy-to-understand way, brain imaging, & the role genetics play...and much more. This is a book that is tough for me to sufficiently try and explain exactly what it's about...;)
If you are interested in these topics (& history!), you'll probably like the book. This book helped my elderly neighbor finally understand her Borderline Personality disordered daughter-in-law.
I'm wondering if anyone else has read it?
The author is a research expert, world traveler (among many other things), and currently, an associate professor of engineering at Oakland University in Michigan. She is a recent VP of the world's largest bioengineering society and holds a doctorate in the integrative discipline of systems engineering.
Violet...:)
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I haven't read it, but it sounds really interesting. I will put it on my list
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I'm with you on reading. My chemo wouldn't let me read a book. I couldn't concentrate long enough. And I was used to reading a book a day. Magazines had to hold me till I could. Not quite up to a book a day now but I blame facebook... LOL
Much love
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Violet....A few months back, I recommended Kevin Dutton, Ph.D.'s The Wisdom of Psychopaths which is similar to the book you describe. Furthermore, last month, when I read the book,The Best American Science and Nature Writing 2013, stories chosen and edited by Siddhartha Mukherjee, he ended the book with Dutton's essay about The Wisdom of Psychopaths written for Scientific American!
These researchers are firm in their belief that there is a genetic root to mental disorders. Dutton shakes things up by claiming that while there is a genetic root to psychopathy, for societies, that's not such a bad thing...He claims that that neurosurgeon that drills into your brain to fix that aneurism is probably a psychopath and that's a good thing! A provacative book!
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