Every note Played by Lisa Genova

Every Note Played by Lisa Genova
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Time taken to read - < 1 day

Pages - 316

Publisher - Allen & Unwin

Source - Bought

Blurb from Goodreads

An accomplished concert pianist, Richard received standing ovations from audiences all over the world in awe of his rare combination of emotional resonance and flawless technique. Every finger of his hands was a finely calibrated instrument, dancing across the keys and striking each note with exacting precision. That was eight months ago.

Richard now has ALS, and his entire right arm is paralyzed. His fingers are impotent, still, devoid of possibility. The loss of his hand feels like a death, a loss of true love, a divorce—his divorce.

He knows his left arm will go next.

Three years ago, Karina removed their framed wedding picture from the living room wall and hung a mirror there instead. But she still hasn’t moved on. Karina is paralyzed by excuses and fear, stuck in an unfulfilling life as a piano teacher, afraid to pursue the path she abandoned as a young woman, blaming Richard and their failed marriage for all of it.

When Richard becomes increasingly paralyzed and is no longer able to live on his own, Karina becomes his reluctant caretaker. As Richard’s muscles, voice, and breath fade, both he and Karina try to reconcile their past before it’s too late.


My Review

Richard is a gifted piano player, travelling and playing worldwide. He left his wife and daughter three years ago, lives in a beautiful apartment & eats and drinks the best of foods. Karina his ex wife gave up her own musical career so he could flourish and she would raise their kid. Grace is now in college - loves mum, hates dad, Karina (wife/mum) is a bit lost and Richard is intolerable with his self absorbed attitude. Everyone knows their place in the world and everything is fine until Richard starts to experience some issues with his fingers/hand. Richard is diagnosed with ALS, he remains stubborn and refuses to accept the inevitable, regardless of his acceptance or telling anyone ALS is here and life as they know it is about to change.

Oh you guys, I love Genova's books (not always how they end) but she brings these horrific diagnosis's to life, gives them faces, names and the reader experiences and lives it with the characters. The one with the condition, the families and loved ones viewing it, processing it, enduring it, the person trying to come to terms and a very real picture of how it tears their lives apart.

I had a hard time relating to Richard, he is not a likable character but you soon feel for him as everything he knows is stripped away. I had a lump in my throat a few times because it is just such a horrific condition that strips the person of everything, literally everything they have. By using an unlikeable character I think it punches in a bigger impact because you can't help but be pulled through it, from all their experiences. The wronged ex wife, the neglected child (playing second best to his precious career) and him, the person as he is and his battle as he is stripped, bit by bit, of the very things we all take for granted every day.

Hard hitting, graphic descriptions and scenes of exactly what this condition steals from you and in such a short period of time. Character development, sadness, grief, relationships, family, love, loss, health and at the end of the book a website you can read more on this and donate. 5/5 for me, I think I went through a whole host of emotions and I have never known anyone personally who has had this, I can only imagine the impact of someone who has reading it. Grab the tissues and comfort food, you will need it. I love these kinds of books because despite it being fiction, because of her career she pulls from actual experience and creates characters to give it heart, a face, ooft it is brutal and lets you learn as you go, absolutely recommend!

I read this last year, no idea why I forgot to post it here, this book has stayed with me!

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Inside The O'Briens by Lisa Genova

Inside the O'Briens: A Novel by Lisa Genova
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Time taken to read - 2 days

Pages - 352

Publisher - Gallery Books


Blurb from Goodreads

Joe O’Brien is a forty-four-year-old police officer from the Irish Catholic neighborhood of Charlestown, Massachusetts. A devoted husband, proud father of four children in their twenties, and respected officer, Joe begins experiencing bouts of disorganized thinking, uncharacteristic temper outbursts, and strange, involuntary movements. He initially attributes these episodes to the stress of his job, but as these symptoms worsen, he agrees to see a neurologist and is handed a diagnosis that will change his and his family’s lives forever: Huntington’s Disease.

Huntington’s is a lethal neurodegenerative disease with no treatment and no cure. Each of Joe’s four children has a 50 percent chance of inheriting their father’s disease, and a simple blood test can reveal their genetic fate. While watching her potential future in her father’s escalating symptoms, twenty-one-year-old daughter Katie struggles with the questions this test imposes on her young adult life. Does she want to know? What if she’s gene positive? Can she live with the constant anxiety of not knowing?

As Joe’s symptoms worsen and he’s eventually stripped of his badge and more, Joe struggles to maintain hope and a sense of purpose, while Katie and her siblings must find the courage to either live a life “at risk” or learn their fate.


My Review

Joe O'Brien is an everyday kind of guy, he's a cop, he has a family and he is fourty four years old. When symptoms can no longer be ignored or be passed off Joe is tested for Huntington's disease and is positive. The story follows pre diagnosis, the introduction to Joe and his family and the progression of the disease and how it can affect a families lives.

I love this author, she takes hard subjects, diseases and brings them to the reader in an informative way that keeps the knowledge and seriousness of the disease at the forefront whilst giving it a human face. You get to know and care about a family and watch them try to deal with this condition, manage it, and deal with their own feelings as well as the aspertions from some of the town folk.

Joe and his family go on an emotional journal taking the reader with them, it packs quite a punch knowing it is a fictional story based around a very real condition. Not only has Genova brought the spotlight to a condition I hadn't had a great deal of knowledge on, she has also set up a fund for it. This lady does fantastic work educating through fiction and I hope she continues to write for a long time. 4/5 for me, thanks to Netgalley for providing me with a review copy in exchange for an honest review, this book is available to buy now.

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Review - Love Anthony by Lisa Genova

Love Anthony by Lisa Genova
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Time taken to read - less than 1 day

Blurb From Goodreads


Two women, each cast adrift by unforseen events in their lives, meet by accident on a Nantucket beach and are drawn into a friendship.
Olivia is a young mother whose eight-year-old severely autistic son has recently died. Her marriage badly frayed by years of stress, she comes to the island in a trial separation to try and make sense of the tragedy of her Anthony’s short life.
Beth, a stay-at-home mother of three, is also recently separated after discovering her husband’s long-term infidelity. In an attempt to recapture a sense of her pre-married life, she rekindles her passion for writing, determined to find her own voice again. But surprisingly, as she does so, Beth also find herself channeling the voice of an unknown boy, exuberant in his perceptions of the world around him if autistic in his expression—a voice she can share with Olivia—(is it Anthony?)—that brings comfort and meaning to them both.


My Review

The book starts off with a slow introduction to both Olivia, Anthony's mum and Beth and her family situation. After a small chance meeting at the beach that isn't revisited or the significance shown until later, the story begins at present day. Olivia has come to the island to pick her life up after losing her son and the breakdown of her marriage. Beth is just about to have her world and marriage turned upside down with the shock news of her husbands infidelity. Both women are struggling with their own demons and life changes, living close to each other but unaware of the other.

I was expecting this to be about friendship right from the start however the ladies don't actually properly cross paths until over half way through. Olivia visits the past through her journals and slowly we are introduced to her life with Anthony and her journey after his diagnosis and back to what she is doing now to get back to 'normal'. Beth's path is her journey trying to cope with everyday life after the revelations with her husband and picking up the pieces with her girls, rediscovering who she is. Both women are on journeys and eventually their paths cross and an unexpected link will bring them together.

I enjoyed this story so much that I stayed up until after 3am to finish it. I loved the glimpses of Anthony and think any story that will open peoples eyes and begin an understanding into autism is always a good thing. I liked and disliked Beth's story almost equally, it gives a fantastic insight into what it may be like for an autistic child through the childs's eyes. However the person in Beth's story is identical to someone she has never really met with no real explanation of why. This is just a small issue, the rest of the book I devoured and wanted to read faster than my eyes could manage. I do enjoyed Genova's writing style and her subjects always leave you thinking so 4/5 for me this time.

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Review - Left Neglected by Lisa Genova

Left Neglected by Lisa Genova

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Blurb From Goodread

Sarah Nickerson, like any other working mom, is busy trying to have it all. One morning while racing to work and distracted by her cell phone, she looks away from the road for one second too long. In that blink of an eye, all the rapidly moving parts of her over-scheduled life come to a screeching halt. After a brain injury steals her awareness of everything on her left side, Sarah must retrain her mind to perceive the world as a whole. In so doing, she also learns how to pay attention to the people and parts of her life that matter most.

In this powerful and poignant New York Times bestseller, Lisa Genova explores what can happen when we are forced to change our perception of everything around us. Left Neglected is an unforgettable story about finding abundance in the most difficult of circumstances, learning to pay attention to the details, and nourishing what truly matters.

My Review

Sarah is a high powered business woman, workaholic and mum of 3. Life is full on, busy busy busy and that is just how she likes it. A horrific car accident puts everything in Sarah's life on hold and she needs to go back to basics to learn things she has taken for granted (as most of us do).

This book was so very different from what I was expecting, I thought it would be very similar to Still Alice but obviously a different subject. I feel this was written so different it could have been a different author. Whilst I still liked the story I found myself struggling to get fully into it whereas with the other book I couldn't put it down.

I found Sarah a hard character to like at times but felt sorry for her and certainly warmed up to her nearer the end. It was hard to read in that her struggle really made you think how much we take for granted and how just one minute can take it all away. The writing was fine and nothing too troubling but there was something about the book I found hard to get on with but I couldn't tell you what.

The story focuses on two issues, Sarah's recovery (and the actual syndrome which is fascinating in itself) and progress and her relationship with her family and mostly her mother. I did enjoy parts of this book but did struggle getting through it (4 days on a book minus work etc. is a long time for me) so therefore I have to give a 3/5 rating.

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Review - Still Alice by Lisa Genova

Still Alice by Lisa Genova

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Blurb from Goodreads

Genova's debut revolves around Alice Howland - Harvard professor, gifted researcher and lecturer, wife, and mother of three grown children. One day, Alice sets out for a run and soon realizes she has no idea how to find her way home. It's a route she has taken for years, but nothing looks familiar. She is utterly lost. Is her forgetfulness the result of menopausal symptoms? A ministroke? A neurological cancer? After a few doctors' appointments and medical tests, Alice has her diagnosis, and it's a shocker -- she has early-onset Alzheimer's disease.

What follows is the story of Alice's slow but inevitable loss of memory and connection with reality, told from her perspective. She gradually loses the ability to follow a conversational thread, the story line of a book, or to recall information she heard just moments before. To Genova's great credit, readers learn of the progression of Alice's disease through the reactions of others, as Alice does, so they feel what she feels -- a slowly building terror.

My Review

What a wonderful yet sad and heartbreaking story. We are introduced to Dr Alice Howland, a woman with an excellent and intelligent mind used for her career as a Harvard professor, lecturer, researcher and author. We are introduced to Alices life, work and family and how her disease is uncovered and how the family and Alice try to cope and live with it.

Whilst some of it gets into the more complicated side of drugs and trials and how the disease is effecting the brain and the terminology used, it isn't done in gargon that you cannot follow. I found even the medical explanations were fairly easy to follow and it is only a small part of the story.

The bulk of the story is in Alice trying to cope with the loss that comes with the disease, how the family react and cope with each stage and the journey as Alice slowly loses her independance, memory and confidence as Alzheimer's takes over.

I found this book so sad and felt for Alices struggle and being brave trying to maintain what she could of her normal everyday life. It really opens your eyes to what life with this disease can actually be like, whilst a fictional story it has been researched well and paints a vivid picture of what this disease is like to live with. I could hardly put it down 4/5 for me.



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