Inside The O'briens
Pages: 352
Edition: Hardcover
List Price: $26
Publisher: Gallery Books
ISBN: 9781476717777
First entered: 11th, Apr 2015
Number of weeks: 3
Book Summary
A Library Journal Best Books of 2015 Pick
A St. Louis Post-Dispatch Best Books of 2015 Pick
A GoodReads Top Ten Fiction Book of 2015
A People Magazine Great Read
From the New York Times bestselling author of Still Alice Lisa Genova comes a powerful and transcendent new novel about a family struggling with the impact of Huntington’s disease.
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.
Praised for writing that “explores the resilience of the human spirit” (The San Francisco Chronicle), Lisa Genova has once again delivered a novel as powerful and unforgettable as the human insights at its core.
Authors
Name: Lisa Genova
About the author:
Lisa Genova graduated valedictorian, summa cum laude from Bates College with a degree in Biopsychology and has a Ph.D. in Neuroscience from Harvard University. Acclaimed as the Oliver Sacks of fiction, she is the author of the New York Times bestselling novels Still Alice, Left Neglected, Love Anthony, and Inside the O’Briens.
Still Alice has spent 59 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list. It won the 2008 Bronte Prize and the 2011 Bexley Book of the Year, and it was nominated for the 2010 Indies Choice Debut Book of the Year by the American Booksellers Association. It was the #6 Top Book Group Favorite of 2009 by Reading Group Choices, a 2009 Barnes & Noble Discover Pick, a 2009 Indie Next pick, a 2009 Borders Book Club Pick, and a 2009 Target Book Club pick. There are over 2.6 million copies in print, and it has been translated into 37 languages. It was chosen as one of the thirty titles for World Book Night 2013. Still Alice is an Academy Award winning film from Sony Pictures Classics starring Julianne Moore, Alec Baldwin, Kristen Stewart, Kate Bosworth, and Hunter Parrish. Julianne Moore won the 2015 Best Actress Oscar for her role as Alice Howland. A Top 10 Independent Movie of 2015 on iTunes.
Left Neglected , also a New York Times bestseller, was the #1 Indie Next Pick for January 2011, the Borders “Book You’ll Love” for January 2011, and the #4 Indie Reading Group Pick for summer 2011. Left Neglected was chosen by the Richard and Judy bookclub in the UK.
Lisa’s third New York Times bestselling novel, Love Anthony was an October 2012 Indie Next pick and a People Magazine Great Read. USA Today calls it “beautifully written and poignant to the point of heartbreak.”
Lisa’s fourth novel, Inside the O'Briens, about a family living with Huntington’s Disease was published April 7, 2015. An instant bestseller on its first week, it became the #1 hardcover fiction title in Canada and #12 on the New York Times bestseller list. Library Journal named Inside the O'Briens one of the best books of 2015 and it was the Goodreads #6 fiction title of 2015. "An unsparing, heart-piercing portrait…compelling…enlightening." -Washington Post. "A gut-wrenching and memorable read." -Library Journal, starred review.
Speaking about the neurological diseases and disorders she writes about, Lisa has appeared on the Today Show, Dr. Oz, the Diane Rehm Show, CNN, Chronicle, Fox News, and Canada AM and was featured in the Emmy award-winning documentary film, TO NOT FADE AWAY.
In 2015, Lisa was named one of the U.S. Top 50 Influencers in Aging.
She is happily divorced and lives with her children in Massachusetts.
Awards:
The 2015 Pell Center Prize for Story in the Public Square
The 2015 Sargent and Eunice Shriver Profiles in Dignity Award
The 2015 Abe Burrows Entertainment Award for the film "Still Alice”
The 2015 Global Genes - Fourth Annual RARE Champions of Hope Award
The 2015 Bates College Sesquicentennial Award
The 2015 American College of Neuropsychopharmacology Media Award for Informing the Public about Treatment and Ongoing Research in Medical Illness
She is happily divorced and lives with her children in Massachusetts.
www.lisagenova.com
