Reviews

Stage Four by Sander Kollaard, Michele Hutchison

yvo_about_books's review

4.0

Finished reading: January 18th 2018

"Everything she was, was stored in her soft brain tissue. The tumor growing in that tissue - the meteorite on its way to destruction - threatened not so much her life as her identity."

*** A copy of this book was kindly provided to me by Netgalley and AmazonCrossing in exchange for an honest review. Thank you! ***

Spoiler

I vowed to read more international authors/translations this year, and somehow this book spoke to me when I saw it mentioned. I know technically I could have tried reading Stage Four in Dutch, but my language skills are more than rusty so I decided to cheat and read the translation instead. This story was first published five years ago, but its translation is scheduled to be published next month. There is no doubt that Stage Four is a very interesting read. It tells the story of a Dutch couple who first met in Sweden back in 1968, and now want to enjoy their golden years by traveling around Europe in a camper van. Those dreams are crushed as Sarie is diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer before the trip has even started... Stage Four both shows us the past, how the two main characters first met, and how they react to the terrible news all those years later, try to live with this new reality and make the most of the time they have left. The writing is interesting and includes a lot of descriptions of both the places they visit (which made me feel as if I were visiting Sweden myself) and facts related to Sarie's illness. The decline in Sarie's character is tragic and heartbreaking; their love and devotion beautiful. I have to say I was quite shocked by the ending though!



Dutch couple Sarie and Barend Vervoort decide to celebrate their retirement by buying a camper van and travel around Europe. They also want to return to some of the places in Sweden where they traveled together when they first met back in 1968. But this dream is shattered before the journey has even started as Sarie falls ill in Belgium and is diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer. After one too many invasive treatments, Sarie decides to face the inevitable head on and wants them to go to Sweden anyway... Going back to where it all started all those years ago.



Stage Four is both a beautiful, tragic and heartbreaking love story of a couple trying to accept and live with the diagnose of stage IV lung cancer. The flashbacks to 1968 help build their characters and it was interesting to see their relationship evolve as well as how they deal with the progress of the disease. There are lots of descriptions of the Swedish destinations included, making it feel as if you were there yourself... A very intriguing read although the ending was quite shocking.

P.S. Find more of my reviews here.

pandora8655's review

1.0

I received this book as a Goodreads giveaway.
I did not enjoy this book at all.

The only good thing about this book was that it was short. It jumped around from past to present way too often and seemed to just be repeating the same information over and over.