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Title details for The Man Who Couldn't Eat by Jon Reiner - Available

The Man Who Couldn't Eat

by Jon Reiner
Dan John Miller
Audiobook
1 of 1 copy available
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1 of 1 copy available
Jon Reiner was happily married with two children, living on Manhattan's Upper West Side, when a near-fatal medical crisis that resulted in emergency surgery threatened to take his life. He was sentenced to months of intravenous feeding that required him to abstain from eating anything, in order to give his digestive tract a rest. The medical commandment 'nothing by mouth' came to represent not only the prolonged food deprivation that would have a radical impact on Jon's relationship with food, but the intense and enduring effect it would have both on his emotional state, and his relationships with family and friends. Jon's vulnerability during this profoundly difficult time altered these relationships, but the amazing support he received deepened his understanding love, friendship, and community.

  • Creators

  • Publisher

  • Awards

  • Release date

    September 6, 2011

  • Formats

    • OverDrive Listen audiobook

      • ISBN: 9781666596854
      • File size: 262738 KB
      • Duration: 09:07:22

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

    • AudioFile Magazine
      Reading this graphic medical memoir, Dan John Miller sounds like he's overacting at first. But once he begins to unfold his remarkable skill with dialogue, he settles into a comfort zone that finds him sounding more authentically engaged with the humanity and pathos in the author's story. The treatment for Jon Reiner's gastrointestinal problems (Crohn's disease) requires a three-month period of intravenous-only feeding followed by a severely restrictive diet in perpetuity to prevent flare-ups. He holds back no details in describing his embarrassing symptoms and drastic life adjustments. But his ordeal is moving and instructive because of the humble way he connects with the support of others, his lack of self-pity, and the universality of the discipline and emotional balance he had to find to tackle these challenges. T.W. (c) AudioFile 2011, Portland, Maine
    • Publisher's Weekly

      May 30, 2011
      In this engrossing and candid memoir, James Beard Awardâwinning writer Reiner tells of his doctor's orders following a diagnosis of a torn intestine: eat nothing. Reiner, who at age 46 had a history of Crohn's disease, gets even more bad news when emergency surgery results in a severely infected abdomen, among other complications, that force him to get his nutrition intravenously. The bulk of the book is given over to the singular experience of not eating at all and the graphic details of his treatment, while chronicling its impact on the author, his wife, and his two young sons. He endures a feverish dream of food-related memories from his childhood in the Caribbean and his adulthood in New York. Questions of mortality and even suicide arise, and while the immediate ability to taste does not return, the narrator's capacity for eating solid food eventually does, though swinging at times between extremes of hunger and appetite. Reiner's use of detail amid the haze of sickness sometimes tests the suspension of disbelief, but as a piece of writing it's fearless and singular.

Formats

  • OverDrive Listen audiobook

subjects

Languages

  • English

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