Jessica Morris's life dramatically changed course at the end of January 2016, when out of the blue a seizure led to the diagnosis of an aggressive brain tumour. Since then she has been on a whirlwind journey of experimental treatments at the cutting edge of the fight against the most difficult forms of this disease. Born in Greenwich, London, Jessica has spent the past 14 years living in New York. She cut her teeth as a campaigner working for the UK homelessness charity Shelter and with refugee groups, going on to provide communications consultancy to some of the biggest companies and government departments on both sides of the Atlantic. She responded to her diagnosis by setting up a unique patient community combined with the latest interactive technology in the form of OurBrainBank, that seeks to move her tumor, glioblastoma, from terminal to treatable. She has negotiated treatment from some of the world's leading neuro-oncologists and surgeons, as well as caring for her family of five in Brooklyn.
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
*Jon Snow, longest-running presenter of Channel 4 News*
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
*Philippe Sands, author of East West Street and The Ratline*
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
*Emma Brockes*
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
*Linda Grant, author of A Stranger City*
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
*Annalena McAfee*
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
*Gaby Wood, Director, Booker Prize Foundation*
A remarkable read - life-affirming and funny and full of force and
vigour and love
*Sabine Durrant*
Written in a voice that is loud, defiant and beautiful, and that
demands to be heard...a joyful, stubborn, rambunctious fight
*Observer*
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