Review: There's Nothing Wrong with Her, by Kate Weinberg

Another reviewer has remarked that this is a story you either get or you don't get. Agreed. I find a lot of depth here, starting with Luigi as avatar/mentor and ending with only a partial recovery after two losses, one chosen and one not. An analogue for chronic illness, of course (long Covid leaps into view on the first page), but this story is also an investigation of creativity, to include not only art itself but also pain, loneliness, disbelief, dread and self-doubt; a life's work, "not what job you choose in life, but where it takes you"; and the frustrating downside of medicine that "hasn't really helped you so far." Lots of metaphors here: climbing, control, force, moving forward, not knowing, and the juxtapositions of memory, ambition, and need.

Well worth a second or third read.