Joe Nuthin’s Guide to Life - Helen Fisher

About the book… 

Joe loves predictability. But his life is about to become a surprising adventure.

Joe-Nathan likes the two parts of his name separate, just like his dinner and dessert. Mean Charlie at work sometimes calls him Joe-Nuthin. But Joe is far from nothing. Joe is a good friend, he’s good at his job, good at making things and good at following the rules, and he’s learning how to do lots of things by himself.

Joe’s mother knows there are a million things in life he isn’t prepared for. While she helps guide him every day, she’s also writing notebooks full of advice about the things she hasn’t told Joe yet, things he might forget and answers to questions he hasn’t yet asked.

Following her wisdom – applying it in his own unique way – this next part of Joe’s life is more of a surprise than he expects. Because he’s about to learn that remarkable things can happen when you leave your comfort zone, and that you can do even the hardest things with a little help from your friends.

Buy Links: 

Amazon: https://amzn.eu/d/0hF44klm

About the author… 

Helen Fisher spent her early life in America but grew up mainly in Suffolk, England, where she now lives with her two children. She studied psychology at the University of Westminster and ergonomics at University College London and worked as a senior evaluator in research at the Royal National Institute of Blind People. She is the author ofFaye, Faraway and Space Hopper.

Contact Links: 

Twitter:@HFisherAuthor

My thoughts…

Where do I even begin  - Joe-Nathan is an absolute dream of a character.  From the very first moment I heard about this book I wanted to read it and when I did I was left with a glowing heart and a smile on my face.  Joe is everything we all should aspire to be - innocent, determined and resolute.  He has a strength of character that breaks your heart when other s don’t see it.

This is a book that will stay with me forever and I will read again and again - in a world where there are so many choices of books to read and not enough hours to read them it’s not often you find that book - the book that will stand the test of time and will touch your heart with every read.

Joe-Nuthin is a character that melted my heart.  He made me laugh, he made me cry - he brought out the lioness in me - he’s just perfect - straight talking, literal and direct and he definitely does not have a mean bone in his body.

It’s not just Joe though that makes this book, Joe is the beating heart that keeps you reading, but its his interactions with everyone and the growth of each and every character that makes this book extra special, as they each view their lives through Joe’s eyes and learn a little bit of acceptance and of the unexpected friendships that grow and develop as a result.

This is a book that I’ve already recommended to so many of my friends and our book group - we all need a little bit of Joe in our lives, he definitely makes the world a better place.

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Spacehopper - Helen Fisher

About the book… 

This is a story about taking a leap of faith
And believing the unbelievable

They say those we love never truly leave us, and I’ve found that to be true. But not in the way you might expect. In fact, none of this is what you’d expect.

I’ve been visiting my mother who died when I was eight.
And I’m talking about flesh and blood, tea-and-biscuits-on-the-table visiting here.

Right now, you probably think I’m going mad. 
Let me explain…

Although Faye is happy with her life, the loss of her mother as a child weighs on her mind even more now that she is a mother herself. So she is amazed when, in an extraordinary turn of events, she finds herself back in her childhood home in the 1970s. Faced with the chance to finally seek answers to her questions – but away from her own family – how much is she willing to give up for another moment with her mother?

Space Hopper is an original and poignant story about mothers, memories and moments that shape life

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About the author… 

Helen Fisher spent her early life in America but grew up mainly in Suffolk, England, where she now lives with her two children. She studied psychology at Westminster University and ergonomics at University College London, and worked as a senior evaluator in research at the Royal National Institute of Blind People. Faye, Faraway is her first novel.

Contact Links: 

Twitter: @HFisherAuthor

My thoughts…

Space hopper is one of the most moving, books about motherhood, love, family, memories and relationships I’ve read in a long time.   Faye, is a mother of two girls and is married to husband Eddie who is training to be a vicar. They have a close relationship and a happy life but Faye is quietly worrying about her future role as a vicars wife, will she be good enough, can she meet the expectations of what will mean a new role for her too?   Maybe it’s this that has unsettled her but finding a photograph of herself, transports her back 30 years, opening up a Pandora’s box of emotions. She lost her mother when she was only eight years old and has no recollection of her father, as an adult so many questions for her mother. 

Faye finds a picture of her as a childhood sitting beside a Spacehopper box in front of a Christmas tree.  She still has the box from the picture, and it’s this that is pivotal in the story, she clings onto it as her link to the past which inadvertently does just that - transporting her back to her childhood taking me with her!  The story made me suspend belief, though it wasn’t a conscious thought at the time, I just did, probably because it’s such a nostalgic read that evoked so many memories of my own childhood - the descriptions, could have been Polaroid’s of my own childhood. 

Faye was just eight years old, when her mother suddenly died, leaving a hole in her life that she’d found impossible to fill - she had so many questions she wished she knew the answers to. When she unexpectedly finds herself in the 70’s as an adult observing her own childhood she’s thrown off balance.  The story was disconcerting, scary, yet exciting and intriguing at the same time. When Faye is returned back to ‘real life’ the pain, heartbreak and the emotion Faye was feeling was palpable - it poured from the pages. The grief genuine and raw.

All kinds of thoughts rattled round my head as I read, was Faye dreaming, having lucid dreams or was she Time Travelling? Is it even possible I don’t know, but at the time of reading I didn’t question it.  Helen Fisher’s skill as a writer to present something so out of the ordinary and have me suspend belief, accept the theory and jump with Faye was just something else.  

The pull of her life as a wife and mother and that of herself as an adult remembering her childhood, lost in the present, needing her mother was utterly heart breaking to read. To watch her torn between the past and the present, the deep aching love of her husband and children and that of her own need to know her mother was difficult to bear.  The dilemma and inner turmoil of being a mother but wanting to know more of her own mother, ruminating on the past but not able to settle in the present made the story edgy, sad and utterly heart breaking to read. 

Faye wants to talk to Eddie about what is happening but can’t bear to add to his burden, he’s too close, emotionally attached and she knows - her face is an open book, she can’t hide her turmoil, she aware he is worried about her, but doesn’t know how to explain so Faye confides and leans on blind friend and colleague Louis, trusting him with her innermost thoughts. An independent person with no emotional attachment.  She trusts him to guide her, his blindness making him ultra sensitive, able to listen on a deeper level. They formulate a plan that culminates in one of the most emotionally charged endings to a book I’ve read.  Spacehopper was beautifully written, sensitive and is a story that raised so many questions, I want to read the story again with fresh eyes.  I loved this book, it was captivating, beautiful and emotive and have already recommended it to so many friends.