Breast Cancer Recovery: No One Wrote a Manual [Hardcover]

Fran Padgett (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 15, 2006

What Do You Give a Friend Facing Breast Cancer? This is the coffee table book you can take to the bubble bath and the gift book you can share with your best friend! On the morning after receiving her breast cancer diagnosis, Fran Padgett retreated to the beaches of Galveston, painting from sunrise to sunrise, and on to sunrise again. As she faced the year of treatment and the eventual pronouncement of becoming a "breast cancer survivor," Padgett chronicled - on paper and on canvas - her personal farewell to her body as she knew it. Through her art and through her book, Fran shares the triumphs, the sadnesses, the intensely personal choices; the ironies, the laughter, the tears; the sensations of survival, the complexities of healing. A gifted writer and prolific artist, Padgett is unpredictably lively, funny and feisty. With vivid candor and self-effacing humor she uses Breast Cancer Recovery: No One Wrote a Manual to offer comfort and inspire hope.

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

About the Author

(Houston, TX) A gifted artist and original thinker, Fran Padget chronicles what it means to face breast cancer. She founded the Weathervane Foundation to support breast cancer research and was awarded the BMW 2005 Houston Hero Award for her dedication to breast cancer cause.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 112 pages
• Publisher: Bayou Publishing; 1 edition (February 15, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1886298181
• ISBN-13: 978-1886298187
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 8.3 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,586,787 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Review from writer Bob May, February 15, 2006

By 

Bob May (Springfield, MO) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Breast Cancer Recovery: No One Wrote a Manual (Hardcover)

Breast Cancer Recovery - No One Wrote a Manual is a collection of essays and artwork chronicling the tumultuous impact of breast cancer. With vivid candor and self-effacing humor, Fran Padgett's private thoughts, jumbled emotions and intimate conversations spilled over and onto her paper and canvas. Padgett tells her stories with unflinching honesty that somehow comforts and inspires as she says goodbye to her body as she knew it and expectantly greets the next sunrise.

No One Wrote a Manual binds two years -- from breast cancer diagnosis through treatment, reconstruction and recovery -- together with paintings from Padgett's Sunrise to Sunrise series and her Moving On series of original works of art. The artwork in Sunrise to Sunrise eloquently articulates the introspection demanded by her breast cancer diagnosis. Faced with the realization that her body would never be the same simultaneously required accepting that from that moment on, her life would never be the same.

The Moving On series is equally self-revealing. Begun after her successful treatment and reconstruction, each painting reflects the resurgence of Padgett's charming femininity, irrefutable free spirit and artistic approach to the world at large and to life unconfined.

Padgett is unpredictably lively, funny and feisty. She doesn't sugar coat the anguish, fear, rage or disappointment. She shares her courage and her hope through art and anecdotes. This is the coffee table art book you can take to the bubble bath...and the inspirational gift book you can share with your best friend. Anyone facing a life altering decision needs this book on his or her bedside table.
[...]

5.0 out of 5 stars A beautiful book!, April 4, 2006

By 

Joanne Kirk (Louisiana) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Breast Cancer Recovery: No One Wrote a Manual (Hardcover)

This is a wonderful book - beautiful artwork and the very emotional, powerful story of a woman's journey with breast cancer. Breast cancer touches so many lives, this is a definitely a book you'll want to read and share with your mother, your sister, your friends.