Customer Reviews

A Different Life: Growing Up Learning Disabled and Other Adventures

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I am in awe of this young man because he is determined to contribute, to have his life count. Anyone with a learning disability and any parent of a child with a learning disability or VCFS, and anyone who has been insensitive about learning disabilities, should read this book. Its about living well no matter what. Its also shows clearly what its like to have one's brain mix things up.

What held me to every page is that the author's reporting of his emotional experience is honest. We meet the real Quinn and the real-time experience of being differently-abled.

Its a marvelous book.

This book not only educates you on his syndrome, but is a real walk in his shoes. We THINK we can understand how it feels to someone special. Quinn Bradlee lets us become him. I am thrilled to have that experience. I better understand how to interact with all types of people. Should be required reading for all high school kids. Some language and personal experiences by Quinn make it questionable for kids under high school age. Parents,however, should read parts of this book to those younger kids. This is a book about understanding and tolerance.

What if your father is Ben Bradlee, your mother's Sally Quinn, and you're stuck with a learning disorder that disrupts even prosaic activities?

Never mind growing up to help expose another Watergate or skewer pretentious socialites. Suppose you have trouble understanding most books or face memory problems.

Just what to do, especially in a brutal, hierarchical place like Washington, D.C.? In politics and media, the generals and their families are expected to put on a good show for the troops. How to respond? Should your family hide you from the public or gloss over your shortcomings?

Luckily the parents of Quinn Bradlee, a plucky 26-year-old born with Velo-Cardio-Facial Syndrome, let him and a skillful collaborator tell the whole story or at far more than we might have anticipated. Ben Bradlee and wife had apparently envisioned their son writing a buttoned-down book without earthy language--perhaps a respectful look at the boy's ancestors, since Quinn is a genealogy buff. But Quinn and his not-so-hidden ghost wisely avoided this PRish tack.

The two paid due tribute to Bradlee and Quinn forebears, but kept in the S word. In fact, they even wrote a scene set on a Caribbean island, Saint Martin, where Quinn loses his virginity to a hooker with skin "as black as the night sky and black curly hair that came down to her shoulder." Quinn's hooker story would be mere titillation by itself; but A Different Life is full of, say, his reflections on women and life in general--naïve in places, but just the same, genuinely his. He does not just share his triumphs at a boarding school for people with disabilities; he also tells of the vicious hazing there. Honesty is the salient trait of this work. What Quinn's story misses in eloquence at times, he more than makes up in credibility of voice.

Beyond that, Quinn and collaborator skillfully weave into the book insights on VCFS: how to spot it, how to cope with it, how to accept it. At length they quote Dr. Robert Shprintzen, who, besides having helped Quinn, wrote of the first paper to describe the heart-related syndrome, in 1978. Some 150,000 people here in the U.S. suffer from VCFS, which comes with a whole range of mental and physical complications.

Quinn is into film, not traditional journalism; but with the help of his friend, tutor, and ghost, Jeff Himmelman, he appears to have made a solid contribution in the area of health coverage, efforts that go on via a stylish, useful Web site promoted in the book. FriendsOfQuinn.com also educates visitors about other learning disabilities.

A Different Life: Growing Up Learning Disabled and Other Adventures, the full title of the book itself, is a clever play on the one for Ben Bradlee's autobiography called A Good Life: Newspapering and Other Adventures. Without meaning to slight the father, may I suggest that to many readers, the son's book may be more memorable? The older Bradlee, born into an aristocratic Boston family, suffered from polio and had his own struggles. But they paled beside those which the young Quinn has faced, does face, and will face. Quinn's biggest challenge, of course, will be his destiny after his parents die. His father is 87; his mother, 68.

The good news for the parents is that the origins of Quinn's disease, while genetic, apparently haven't anything to do their ages at the time of conception. No need for guilt in that respect or probably most others. Ben Bradlee and Sally Quinn, as stated in the book, never hesitated to spend money on Quinn's tutors and other special advantages; and even more importantly, they gave him time rather than just locking him in an institution as an "expert" had suggested.

Still, is there anything more that the parents can do? Perhaps I've overlooked something; but I can't recall any mention in A Different Life of the role that the right technology might play in truly nudging Quinn into the world of books. Quinn can read out passages from books and is even a fan of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, drawn in by the conversational style, but he generally has trouble processing printed information. Imagine the benefits of text to speech. Has Quinn ever experimented with that capability on a Kindle or other machine?

I'm thinking of a Floridian who--with the help of software that read words aloud to him as they showed up on his laptop computer screen--turned himself from a Wal-Mart clerk into a teacher. I doubt that Quinn could effect a transformation of that magnitude; but tech is worth a try if he and others like him are to learn to enjoy more books. Searching FriendsOfQuinn.com, I didn't find one reference to "e-books" or "ebooks" with sound capabilities in use. If, in fact, nothing is there, perhaps Quinn and his Web community could explore these digital options.

Within the employment area, here's a possibility for Quinn himself although it could apply to others in his situation. Imagine Quinn as a Web usability tester working directly for the Washington Post itself, not just the company that created FriendsOfQuinn.com. If he can cope with a certain kind of interface, there is a good chance that the rest of the world can. Coal mines and canaries and all so on. That's just one tiny example of how people like Quinn can contribute to society and businesses.

Meanwhile bravo to Quinn for a heartfelt and informative book, and to his parents for raising him to make such achievements possible.

David Rothman
Author of The Solomon Scandals
(A Washington newspaper novel)
Editor-publisher, TeleRead.org
(Devoted to e-books and related topics)

Note: Sorry about the length of this review, but I felt that Quinn Bradlee's book was worth it.

Fast read; I scooped it up in an evening. Clear writing, to the point, funny, thoughtful and thought-provoking. I liked how the authors allowed important players in Mr. Bradlee's life to speak in their own voices in full passages, such as Mr. Bradlee's doctor.

Mr. Bradlee was pretty forthright about how his parents' resources and connections did garner him benefits that others might not enjoy. He was also candid about how sometimes it really sucked to have learning disabilities.

Some standout excerpts:

On his love of surfing: "I'm not a pro surfer or anything close to it, but that's not the point. The best surfer is the one that's having the most fun."

"Poetry by sixteen-year-old kids sucks by definition."

On what it's like to feel isolated: "Sometimes I'll see a leaf being driven over by cars, and it'll slowly get to the other side of the road. That's how I feel from time to time."

This is a good contribution to the collection of books by individuals whose brains work differently than most.

I stumbled upon reference to this book in the Sunday NY Times a while back. Got online to find it and ordered pronto! Even though Quinn's learning disability is couched within extreme wealth and privilege...his story of growing up and experiencing rights of passage in the "slow lane" still comes through loud & clear. As a single Mom of average income who has raised a son (now in college)with a learning disability in reading & written expression, I am keenly aware of the social and educational challenges such a disability presents. Nonetheless, Quinn's story opened my eyes on several topics and confirmed suspicions on others.
Definitely worth a few purchase dollars to expand one's perspective on the topic. Buy/read it!

Quinn Bradlee is the son of former "Washington Post" editor Ben Bradlee and his wife, reporter Sally Quinn. Quinn was born with a heart defect and had a number of health issues throughout his life. When he was 14, he was finally diagnosed with VCFS (velo-cardio-facial syndrome) a genetic abnormality which is the second most often occurring disability (Down's Syndrome is number one.) One consequence of the syndrome is having a learning disability. I read this book since I am married to a man with a severe learning disability (dyslexia), the mother of a son with a mild learning disability (dysgraphia) and taught students with learning disabilities in public schools for a number of years. I wished to compare Quinn's experiences with my observations. Quinn's prose seems brash, yet I know this partially relative to having a learning disability and might partially be due to his recognition of his parents' celebrity. At times I cringed, recognizing "traps" Quinn found himself in during his schooling. Thankfully, Quinn and his parents found a school and teachers who concentrated on Quinn's strengths. If only we could do this for all students - special needs or not.

Born with a hole in his heart and suffering from severe illnesses from birth on, author Quinn Bradlee was constantly ill for 14 years until he was finally correctly diagnosed with a rare ailment. This autobiography tells of growing up learning disabled and physically ill, and provides a story of a very different kind of life and perception of the world. General-interest libraries will find his an inspirational, compelling saga.

What is normal? Are any of us really normal? Very interesting to read from the perspective of a young man who grew up labeled learning disabled. I don't know if disabled is the proper word. Learning was difficult for him, but he is quite successful. Quinn shared his hopes, his fears, his disappointments and his achievements. It was no doubt difficult to put that all out there for the world to see.

Quinn Bradlee was only three months old when he was operated on for a hole in his heart, and from then on his young life was plagued by fevers, seizures, migraines--almost anything you could think of. This would have been hard for any kid to cope with, but what exacerbated the problem even more for Quinn was that he was the son of two highly gifted and accomplished parents, namely Ben Bradlee, distinguished editor of The Washington Post, and Sally Quinn, well-known author and commentator.

Although his parents were loving and supportive, gave him tutors and sent him to special schools, he had trouble talking and coping in social situations. He often couldn't connect with his peers and wasn't popular in school although no one knew exactly what was wrong with him. It wasn't until he was l4 that his problem was finally diagnosed as Velo-Cardio-Facial-Syndrome (VCFS), a little-understood disorder that leaves one with many physical ailments and learning disabilities. Because of VCFS Quinn often felt isolated and alone, as well as frustrated, yet somehow he managed and became adept at surfing and snow-boarding. As he grew older he worked on several documentaries for learning disabled kids and has now developed a website called Friends of Quinn, where the learning disabled can share their experiences and be helped. In spite of all that has befallen him Quinn has remained lovable and kind and always open to new adventures. This is a fine, uplifting book by a very special young man who is remarkable for his honesty, humor, and candor.

What a wonderfully written book! I've read many books on learning differences, but none gave me the information this one did, how my child will feel fitting in, in this world. My husband has started to read it and is blown away. When my child is a little older, I will make sure he reads it too. It will validate all those feelings he will have as a teenager and going forward in his life! Great job! Highly recommend this!!