Winner in the 2006 President's Book

Awards from the

Florida Publishers Association.

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Life Without Lisa

Life Without Lisa

A widowed father's compelling journey through the rough seas of grief

By Richard Ballo

2004 • 208 pp
Paperback • ISBN: 0 9675532 4 5 • $12.95
[$14.95 in Canada] • Hospice Price $5.99

   In Life Without Lisa, a poignant and highly personal story of one man’s healing journey through grief, hospice bereavement support is the hero.
    Readers walk a mile in author Richard Ballo’s shoes as they learn what it’s like to be widowed with young children to raise. Because everyone was in denial about the advanced stages of Lisa’s cancer, she and her family received no hospice or palliative care services. Thus, her rapid decline and death come as a brutal shock. Fortunately, Ballo learns about grief support classes available through his local hospice and enrolls himself and his two little boys. Without hospice, Life Without Lisa would not have such a hopeful ending.

High Praise from Experts:

"...a lifeline of help and hope..."

--Ira Byock, M.D., author of Dying Well and The Four Things That Matter Most

"...Rich Ballo's remarkable descriptions of his many painful, and frequently changing, reactions reassure the reader

of how normal these feelings are..."

--Patricia Kelley, RN, CHPN, author of Companion to Grief and co-author of Final Gifts

   Calling a grief support book a “pageturner” might seem a stretch, but not in this case. Ballo wraps the reader next to his broken heart and doesn’t let go until he transforms abject grief into warm, loving memories.
    Ballo is so eternally grateful to hospice that the Dedication Page of Life Without Lisa reads in part: “...And to hospice for helping me heal and find hope.”

Click here to read an excerpt from Life Without Lisa.