Recovery

“Francis sheds nuanced light on an often fraught and private experience, and encourages readers to reimagine illnesses as ‘stories of the mind and body’ because ‘within limits, stories can be rewritten.’ Those on the mend may gain the most, but readers of all stripes will find wisdom here.” –Publishers Weekly, starred review

“Recovery is an essential book for our times, full of wisdom, compassion and sound advice. Every patient needs a copy of this gem.” –Katherine May, author of Wintering and Enchantment

“Healing can be maddeningly slow work, Gavin Francis recognizes, but it offers us the opportunity to live differently. Beyond the fantasy of the quick and easy cure is the reality of living with and through our physical limitations, which requires creativity. Recovery offers inspiration and advice for practicing this lost art. Throughout, Francis is alert to the political and economic forces that undermine our efforts.” –Eula Biss, author of Having and Being Had and On Immunity

“We spend too much time thinking about illness and hardly enough thinking about recovery and recuperation. Gavin Francis’s literary talent combined with his years as a seasoned medical practitioner make Recovery a unique and delightful read.” –Abraham Verghese, author of The Covenant of Water and Cutting for Stone

“Recovery is an excellent book about the long, difficult, and often interesting way back from illness to health. Gavin Francis writes with clinical wisdom and grace about doctors and patients—their expectations, strengths, and vulnerabilities—and suggests ways to navigate and learn from convalescence.” –Kay Redfield Jamison, Ph.D., Dalio Professor in Mood Disorders and Professor of Psychiatry at The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine