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A Sister's Tale; a family memoir
by Emma Dally
Product Group: Book
Publisher: Time Warner Paperbacks (2001-02-01)
ISBN: 0751530255
EAN: 9780751530254
Dewy Decimal #: 306
Paperback: 211 pages
Edition: New Ed
SKU: B467-1023u
Condition: Like New
Comments: UNREAD but may have minor imperfections such as a crease or mark. In stock - quick dispatch, from an efficient and professional leading British bookselling firm.
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Editorial Reviews
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Amazon.co.uk Review
34-year old John Dally flew home from New York to London in December 1993, only to be promptly admitted to hospital suffering from pneumonia. The disease, however, was only the first manifestation of something even more serious. John Dally had an AIDS-related illness. There have been a number of books in this genre, the Confession of Mortality memoir: John Diamond's C: Because Cowards Get Cancer Too and Ruth Picardie's Before I Say Goodbye are just two outstanding examples. Here is something slightly different, however. For Dying Twice is written not by John himself, but by his sister, Emma, who has previously published three novels. This gives the harrowing process of her brother's decline a powerful new perspective, because Emma can see all too well that her beloved brother, for all his charm and good looks, was also, "all his life, irresponsible and reckless and he left a mess behind him when he died." At school, "during games, all he wanted to do was smoke cigarettes in the bushes". In his flashy 20s he made, and spent, a great deal of money with his own courier business. He was "kind and generous, but he could also be shockingly selfish and thoughtless". He never had a formal education, rarely read a newspaper and never a book, and yet his sister remembers his "spontaneity of thought, full of curiosity and interesting observations about life". This is an honest book, as it needs to be. It is also moving and a fine memorial to an all-too-typical human being. --Christopher Hart
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Customer Reviews
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A wonderful book about sisterhood
Rating  (5)
Date: 2001-03-02
3 out of 3 customers found this reveiw helpful
I lost my brother to AIDS and I was recommended this book. I read it from cover to cover in one sitting and could not stop crying. Emma has managed to capture the feelings that brothers and sisters have for each other and convey the complexity of that relationship. Although the story is a tragic one, the book is not all sad. There's a lot of humour and wisdom. The saddest thing is that JOhn comes across as a lovely young man and you do feel his loss along with Emma.
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a searingly honest book
Rating (5)
Date: 2001-03-02
2 out of 2 customers found this reveiw helpful
This is an astonishing book which will move anyone who has had to cope with the death of someone they love. Written in the present tense, the book pulls the reader through the story with such a force that you feel as though you're living it yourself. Although it is about the way a young man's death affected one family, it rises above the personal to have universal appeal. An amazing achievement.
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Glad I didn't judge a book by its cover
Rating  (4)
Date: 2000-09-09
3 out of 3 customers found this reveiw helpful
To be quite honest I bought this book simply to fulfil my obligation to a book club I'd joined. The "blurb" in the magazine didn't do it much justice, nor did the cover but as it was a true story, it appealed to me more than any of the other books on offer.John Dally died from AIDS in 1993 aged 35. "Dying Twice" is his sister, Emma's, account of he, she and their family waiting for his death. She remembers John as a person, brother, friend and son rather than dwelling on him as an illness, an AIDS statistic, a homosexual. There are a few pages of family photographs in the centre of the book which help to make the family more "real" to the reader. It is a very moving story but not too sentimental and is quite matter-of-fact. It's hard to say that a book with this subject is enjoyable, but I found it a moving, well written read. As a sister myself I hope that I don't ever have to go through this scenario. Emma handled the subject with the sensitivity and dignity it deserved.
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