Better

How I Let Go of Control, Held on to Hope, and Found Joy in My Darkest Hour

By: Amy Robach

Narrated by: Amy Robach

Length: 7 hrs and 59 mins

Publisher's Summary

"I have breast cancer." When Good Morning America anchor Amy Robach revealed her shocking diagnosis on live television in November 2013, the seasoned news reporter embarked on the most difficult and illuminating journey of her life. In this intimate memoir, she retraces the 12 months following her announcement and speaks candidly, for the first time, about how her illness affected her family life and her marriage, tapped in to her deepest fears and strengths, and transformed her in ways she never could have imagined.

Only weeks earlier, in September 2013, ABC producers asked Robach to get an on-air mammogram to highlight Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Her first instinct was to say no - there was no history of cancer in her family, she was only 40 years old, and she felt strange drawing attention to herself when she had no personal connection to the issue. (She'd been meaning to get her first mammogram that year but had conveniently "lost" the prescription.) Her colleague, Robin Roberts, herself a cancer survivor, convinced her to do it with one simple sentence: "I can pretty much guarantee it will save a life."

To Robach's surprise, the life she saved was her own: tests revealed malignant tumors in her breast, and she immediately underwent a bilateral mastectomy, followed by six months of chemotherapy treatments.

Better is more than a story of illness and recovery. Robach recounts the day she and her husband, Andrew Shue, got the terrible news; the difficulty of telling her two young daughters; and the challenges of carrying on with the everyday duties of parenting, nurturing a fledgling second marriage, and managing a public career. She lays bare the emotional toll of her experience and mines her past for the significant moments that gave her the resilience to face each day. And she describes the incredible support network that lifted her when she hit bottom.

©2015 Amy Robach (P)2015 Random House Audio

Critic Reviews

"By selflessly sharing the incredible story of her unexpected journey with breast cancer, Amy has given countless others hope. Better is the perfect title for her beautiful book." (Robin Roberts, coanchor of Good Morning America)

"In Better, Amy Robach deftly brings us to the brink and back, showing us how, in life's most wicked rapids, we can rise above our fear and find safe passage." (Kelly Corrigan, author of Glitter and Glue)

"Amy Robach describes her experience with cancer in a way that incorporates the medical, emotional, personal, professional, maternal, and romantic aspects of life. You will laugh, cry, and learn." (Jennifer Ashton, MD, ob-gyn, ABC News senior medical contributor and cohost of The Doctors)

Read this book!

I am a 3 year breast cancer survivor and it was cathartic to listen to Amy read her story, her experiences with breast cancer and many other life events. I've always thought she was beautiful on the outside, but it was a treat to feel as though I actually got to know her by listening to her book. She is quite feisty! Love that fighting spirit!! The part that resonated with me the most is toward the end of the book, when she explains her thoughts on the hurtful criticism toward her from some in the metastatic community. Now that I have listened to it, I must have a hard copy for my book collection. 😊

Thanks Amy!

This was such a warm & sweet story of something so awful! I too am a 3 yr survivor and feel better knowing someone else has the same questions & feelings daily! No one really knows how you feel unless they have gone through it and that's what makes it so hard we as women carry on like nothing is going on! Thank you for sharing and screw the male docs who will never understand that early detection does save lives!

Amazing Amy

What a story! Very inspiring ! I’ve watched Amy on GMA and never would have known all the challenges she has had in her life. Thanks to her for sharing !

LOVED

I thoroughly loved this book. It's honest and poignant and so wonderful. You feel like Amy's best friend by the end, and, at least for me, wish the conversation would never end. Definitely keep the tissues handy.

Really great story

I loved Amy's book. She really showed the human side of this disease and that even if you come out okay, there is still a lot of anxiety.

boring narrating -

Narrating too monotone. story was good, though I found the author to be a bit too full of herself. the epilogue was the best part of the whole book!

So inspiring!!

An honest and heartwarming memoir that will make you want to live a "Better" life. Amy is able to transport the reader to the doctors appointments, news room and into her home, making you feel all the emotions that come with cancer and it's treatment . Hearing Amy read it herself, you feel like a friend is telling the story and you want to hug her through your device. All the beauty you see on the outside is multiplied on the inside.