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All in My Head

On sale

9th June 2022

Price: £19.99

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Selected: Audiobook Downloadable / ISBN-13: 9781405551823

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All In My Head is a memoir by a woman who in her early fifties received a life-shattering diagnosis. It is about her determined search for effective treatment, the birth of a campaign to get proper data and funding for research into glioblastoma (GBM), and finally her coming to terms with the knowledge that she has reached the end of the road.

Jessica Morris takes the reader on a whirlwind journey. How does an ordinary person who last studied biology aged sixteen negotiate with world-renowned doctors and surgeons about cutting-edge treatments she must decide between? How do you remain positive when the median statistics suggest you have only fourteen months to live? How instead do you cast those fears aside and bounce back?

All In My Head is much more than a book about GBM. It takes the reader into the life of a woman who when confronted by devastating news chooses to be strong. It is about fighting adversity with hope and finding reasons to be positive in the darkest moments.

Reviews

Annalena McAfee
What a force she was, to turn her harrowing experience into something so positive, for the benefit of others. So much vision and energy in the face of such an ordeal. The book is infused with her generous spirit and self-debunking humour and evident throughout are her great gift for friendship, her love of family and zest for life
Sabine Durrant
A remarkable read - life-affirming and funny and full of force and vigour and love
Philippe Sands, author of East West Street and The Ratline
The pages are immense, in many ways grueling and painful and affecting, but also so deeply uplifting and wondrous. The writing is meticulous, I felt that Jess was holding my hand as I read it, she is so very present. This is a book of love and life, of courage and hope, of loss and togetherness
Nicci Gerrard, Observer
Written in a voice that is loud, defiant and beautiful, and that demands to be heard...a joyful, stubborn, rambunctious fight
Emma Brockes
Jessica Morris' account of living with brain cancer is not a book about illness, or loss, or navigating treatment options, although all of these elements are there. But in a story that travels to the outer edges of human experience, Morris's wit, determination, and powerful literary insight make this book an extraordinary exercise in joy, even as it breaks your heart. It is impossible to read All In My Head and not come away ignited
Gaby Wood, Director, Booker Prize Foundation
Indomitably optimistic yet sharp, philosophical and frank, Jessica Morris is alive in these pages: a woman faced with a terminal illness who galvanised her doctors, supported fellow patients and outlived expectations. But even if luck or medicine had not made that possible, her contagious warmth and wit would remain a force to be reckoned with. To meet Jessica in this book is to join the ranks of those who loved her, and whose lives she improved every day
Jon Snow, longest-running presenter of Channel 4 News
For five years Jessica Morris fought the deadliest of brain tumours - glioblastoma (GBM) - but that was not all. She set up an international charity in the battle to render GBM treatable rather than terminal. This utterly uplifting book is a remarkable insight into a disease and one woman's battle to beat it. Doctors and patients alike responded to her determination to galvanise them in the search for a cure
Linda Grant, author of A Stranger City
All In My Head is both painful and uplifting. It taught me a valuable lesson - to go on fighting even when you can't win. Jessica charts the ups as well as the downs with searing honesty. I felt by the final beautiful chapter nothing could take away the essence of Jess, her boldness, optimism, intelligence and the will to fight on. She made me think, and she made me cry, and of course, being Jess, she made me laugh