Review of First Survivor
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Hope Wuellner-Brooks
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- Latest Review: First Survivor by Mark Unger
Review of First Survivor
[Following is a volunteer review of "First Survivor" by Mark Unger.]
The nonfiction novel First Survivor, penned by Mark Unger in 2018, is a poignant and deeply personal account. It chronicles a parent’s journey through the harrowing experience of a family member's cancer diagnosis. My initial interest in this book was to gain insight into the profound challenges faced by families in such circumstances. The emotional impact of the narrative was so profound that it took me a considerable time to gather my thoughts for this review.
In this book, Mr. Unger details the experience of finding out that your minor child has a potentially fatal disease. He is frank and almost detached in his effort to detail this experience. This book seems clinical and overly specific in the medical aspect of the retelling. This is necessary for the reader to understand that this fight is not one to attempt with blinders on! By including images from his actual notebook, Mr. Unger is able to show how this small effort to write everything down is the necessary catharsis to survive this time. Mr. Unger writes about the good and bad days and the impact on his other child. He details some of the thought processes he and his wife unfortunately had to go through. They had to make some incredibly tough judgment calls and argue with knowledgeable doctors about what they, in their whole beings, knew to be the correct choices. None of these would be an easy choice for you or me during the ordinary course of the day.
Mr. Unger writes this first person to detail how this amazing and resilient child becomes the titled “first survivor.” I like to think that by making the decisions he and his wife made in 2018 have resulted in the survival of my friend's child almost four years later. For his son’s battle with neuroblastoma, the medical doctors and scientists were able to make substantial discoveries that, to this day, are increasing survival rates. This was not the typical result during his child’s battle.
This book had minor grammatical or typographical errors, none of which caused an effort in reading the text. For the sheer magnitude of effort and heart the author put forth, I rate this book a 5 out of 5. I applaud Mr. Unger and his son for taking the painful decisions and steps necessary to become the first survivor. The day I finished reading this book, the reality of cancer stuck home when my spouse was diagnosed. This book taught me the need to document everything….for no reason other than my brain not grasping reality. Thank you for a poignant book and for being a brave family. Whether cancer has impacted you or not, I highly recommend this book for reading so we, as mere mortals, can understand how strong and resilient humans are.
******
First Survivor
View: on Bookshelves | on Amazon
The nonfiction novel First Survivor, penned by Mark Unger in 2018, is a poignant and deeply personal account. It chronicles a parent’s journey through the harrowing experience of a family member's cancer diagnosis. My initial interest in this book was to gain insight into the profound challenges faced by families in such circumstances. The emotional impact of the narrative was so profound that it took me a considerable time to gather my thoughts for this review.
In this book, Mr. Unger details the experience of finding out that your minor child has a potentially fatal disease. He is frank and almost detached in his effort to detail this experience. This book seems clinical and overly specific in the medical aspect of the retelling. This is necessary for the reader to understand that this fight is not one to attempt with blinders on! By including images from his actual notebook, Mr. Unger is able to show how this small effort to write everything down is the necessary catharsis to survive this time. Mr. Unger writes about the good and bad days and the impact on his other child. He details some of the thought processes he and his wife unfortunately had to go through. They had to make some incredibly tough judgment calls and argue with knowledgeable doctors about what they, in their whole beings, knew to be the correct choices. None of these would be an easy choice for you or me during the ordinary course of the day.
Mr. Unger writes this first person to detail how this amazing and resilient child becomes the titled “first survivor.” I like to think that by making the decisions he and his wife made in 2018 have resulted in the survival of my friend's child almost four years later. For his son’s battle with neuroblastoma, the medical doctors and scientists were able to make substantial discoveries that, to this day, are increasing survival rates. This was not the typical result during his child’s battle.
This book had minor grammatical or typographical errors, none of which caused an effort in reading the text. For the sheer magnitude of effort and heart the author put forth, I rate this book a 5 out of 5. I applaud Mr. Unger and his son for taking the painful decisions and steps necessary to become the first survivor. The day I finished reading this book, the reality of cancer stuck home when my spouse was diagnosed. This book taught me the need to document everything….for no reason other than my brain not grasping reality. Thank you for a poignant book and for being a brave family. Whether cancer has impacted you or not, I highly recommend this book for reading so we, as mere mortals, can understand how strong and resilient humans are.
******
First Survivor
View: on Bookshelves | on Amazon
Latest Review: First Survivor by Mark Unger
