While My Sister Sleeps

I feel like the synopsis of this book doesn't quite do it justice. It says Molly's cherished ideas about her sister are shattered, but in the end I think she cherishes her sister more than ever, or finally realizes how she has always cherished her. In the end, I felt worst for Robin and how little the world around her really knew about her. In the end, with Robin's accident and death, her family finally learns about her and learns to value and love her as they never could before. Though "asleep," Robin teaches them things they needed to learn about herself and themselves. In her most profound silence, she is able to speak most loudly: As Molly has to go through the odds and ends of her sister's everyday life, she learns about Robin and show more about herself. Little, everyday things reveal their hidden meanings. Robin reveals herself in unexpected, everyday places. When we can no longer speak for ourselves, the leftovers of our lives, our possessions and deeds, will need to speak for us. Until Robin can speak for herself, her family is swirling in uncertainty, thinking they know "what Robin would want" but in reality, projecting their own wants and needs and insecurities on to Robin's passive mirror. Luckily Robin has a loud voice, her own words, in her journal, which Molly eventually finds. It is with this support from Robin that Molly can grow, and strengthen, stretching her limbs and digging in her roots like any plant in her beloved nursery greenhouse. Robin's life had been full of accomplishments and things, predicated on her activity as a runner, but in the end it is her capacity to just be that makes the greatest mark on the world. If only we all were so lucky, to be able to just be, and to give our world the gift of our true selves --- hopefully without having to have a heart attack and go comatose first.

When Robin is felled by a lurking illness, she is only beginning to explore her sense of herself. We are all so busy doing, and going, and running, physically and metaphorically, that we can't stop and just be. Until all of a sudden, something big comes along and we're forced to stop and take a look around. We work twelve-hour days and bring work home on weekends; we fill our spare time, and our children's spare time, with scheduled activities in an effort to create a sense of momentum and purpose, and define ourselves by the accoutrements of our existence. I am a musician; I am a lawyer; I am a rock-climber; I am a champion marathoner. We rush and rush and run and run and run and as Robin says, if you aren't out of breath you are at THE BACK OF THE PACK. We are terrified of falling behind; like Robin, we'd rather pull out of the race completely than lose. We're so terrified of stopping running, but why? Are we afraid of what we'll find? What we won't find? What others will find or not find in us, or of what we will find, or not find, in others? We're so busy running, we end up not noticing when we've run far enough. We run away from, or perhaps away with, ourselves.

If only Robin had stopped; if only Molly had run. When Robin is jolted from movement to stillness, we, and her family, are finally allowed to learn about her; when Molly is jolted from stillness to movement, she finally learns about herself. We need both stillness and movement to keep our bodies and spirits in full and healthy function. Meden agan.

Robin's family learns the difficult way how hard it is to know, truly know, someone on the inside; we only think we know them, based on their outward projection. But people are not like clocks, you cannot open them and look at their inner works and see what's stuck or do maintenance to keep them going smoothly. You can go on for hours, days, months, years before you realize that something inside the clock has been slowly wearing out, when suddenly it bursts and makes itself known in dramatic fashion. A congenital heart defect, exacerbated by use; a brain aneurysm, weakened by time; a startling revelation, cards held close to the vest. Things lurk, things we know about and things we don't, physical things, spiritual things, and sometimes the truth comes with movement, and sometimes the real truth comes when we're standing still. Eventually Robin's lessons could get across to her family, worn down and made receptive by their harrowing week at her side; hopefully we are not entirely lost before we can learn to use our lives for good, and it will not be only in death that we are able to be known.

The Snows, as a family, are in a far better place at the end of the book than the beginning, even if they, and we, feel more than a little bruised from the journey. show less

Everything happens for a reason according to Nana and even though some things might not make your happy, they do have to happen. Potential Olympic runner Robin Snow is out on a run and has a heart attack. This leads to a week of anguish for a family but yet each of them grows in their own way. This book is tragic from the very start to the very end yet it is bittersweet. How is the Snow family going to cope with the tragedy of Robin's heart attack and what are they going to decide. Very sad book that makes you stop and think, how would I deal with this type of tragedy? Would I be like Katheryn watching her oldest daughter in the hospital not wanting to come to terms what is happening? Would I be like the younger daughter Molly who wants show more to be strong, wants to do what Robin would want and thinks she has never been good enough in her Mom's eyes. Or would I be like son Chris, detached and not one to show his feelings. Very beautifully written. show less

I typically don’t write reviews on already established books, I try to save them for new ones or ARC’s. But this book hit close to home in two ways. One in the younger sister and while neither me nor my sister are anything like Robin or Molly, the bond we have is still so special. And two, my Grandpa died very similarly to Robin. I remember spending that first night in the hospital waiting room, unable to sleep, waiting to hear anything, and occasionally dozing in a chair. I remember spending every day for a week in that hospital, until the day came that all of his kids had arrived and we gathered around the one man who had brought us all together, and watched as they turned off the machines and we had to say our final goodbyes. I show more remember him looking so much like himself and at the same time nothing at all like him. He had a heart attack while mowing the lawn, a neighbor found him, but it had been too late and he had gone without oxygen for too long. That neighbor performed CPR just as David did until the paramedics arrived, not knowing if what he was doing would help at all. I think one of the best things an author can hear is whether or not their book touched someone’s heart, and I can say 100% for certain, that this book did, and how. And I want to say to the author, Thank you, for sharing a story that happens to have remarkably similarities to my families and for portraying the raw emotions that she did. show less

I usually love Barbara Delinsky and she is one of my favorite authors. But I was very disappointed in her lack of research on this one. My family has been through the very hospital scenario described. This book has left me wondering if Barbara even spoke to anyone who has had to make these decisions, and if she did, did she take the time to research the EXACT scenario she describes. I wonder this because she mentions Teri Schiavo who was not in a coma or ever brain dead like the character in the book, but in a persistent vegetative state (although that has been disputed). I did not identify with any of the characters and their thoughts and actions during such a terrible tragedy within their family shocked me. I feel this book was show more written from Barbara's perspective of what she imagines it might be like, but she did not actually try to find out what it really IS like. Even the medical information regarding organ donation was all wrong and I couldn't even finish reading it because I was so angry that she is misinforming people.

I guess it would be a good book if you hadn't been through such a terrible tragedy yourself, but I would warn readers that there are a lot of inaccuracies. If anyone has questions about the different levels of consciousness, brain death, and organ donation, read Culture of Death by Wesley J. Smith. If I had not read this book prior to what happened to my family, I would have been very confused and I would have wondered for the rest of my days if we did the right thing. PLEASE don't base any of these life and death decisions on this fictional book! show less

Goodness, I had thought this book sounded so good when I read about it. So I contacted the author to see if she'd be kind enough to send me a copy. I have to say that this book is the most amazing book. It's going on my list of favorite books of all time! While the premise of the story is one we've heard before, I could never have imagined the depths that it would uncover. The emotions that it evokes are complex and will have you really feeling a bit raw. All of us have wondered at one time or another how we'd handle this type of tragedy in our family, which is why I'm sure this story will resonate so strongly with everyone who reads it. The struggles this family goes through as they accept what they have to do, and then actually doing show more it, is heartbreaking. But Barbara Delinsky doesn't stop with just that. We get an intimate look into the relationship of daughters and mothers, and two sisters, and husbands and wives. The layers that are peeled away little by little just make the story that much more intense. It makes you wonder if you know your family as well as you think you do. I have to admit that I was in tears at more than one point in the book. This book is being released today...and my recommendation is that you run out and get it...NOW! Obviously I loved this book. show less

I bought this book primarily because it was about sisters. I have a few, and I think the sibling relationship between sisters might be the most complicated one in the world. Delinsky explores it very realistically...not all love and roses, not all jealousy and resentment. Her main character, Molly, seemed quite 3D to me. Some of the other characters a little less so. Perhaps she was trying to examine too many relationships and twists, and as a result couldn't flesh-out the other characters quite enough.

I really enjoyed this book, especially learning about the characters and following their emotions throughout the story. This was a book that I constantly wanted to keep reading; it was difficult to put down because I wanted to know what would happen next.

My reservations come from the story line as it progressed. I found it very predictable, and would have liked to see some different twists and turns. I also thought that a few story lines were started that were never properly finished. I was left wanting to know more about many things.

All in all, this was a good read and I enjoyed it, but it is not something I am raving about.