NO TIME LIKE THE FUTURE
BY MICHAEL J. FOX
Published: 17th November 2020
HEADLINE BOOKS
The entire world knows Michael J. Fox as Marty McFly, the teenage sidekick of Doc Brown in Back to the Future; as Alex P. Keaton in Family Ties; as Mike Flaherty in Spin City; and through numerous other movie roles and guest appearances on shows such as The Good Wife and Curb Your Enthusiasm.
Diagnosed at age 29, Michael is equally engaged in Parkinson’s advocacy work, raising global awareness of the disease and helping find a cure through The Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research, the world’s leading non-profit funder of PD science. His two previous best-selling memoirs, Lucky Man and Always Looking Up, dealt with how he came to terms with the illness, all the while exhibiting his iconic optimism. His new memoir reassesses this outlook, as events in the past decade presented additional challenges.
This unflinchingly detailed, personal memoir takes the listener on a journey over the last thirty years of Michael’s life since his diagnosis with Parkinson’s disease, and beyond.
But, if you were to buy this book and expect a maudlin tearjerker, you’d be sorely disappointed. Instead, Fox recounts his story in the most charming way, injecting events with self-deprecating humour. It very much feels like everything is laid bare; surgery and recovery details, the massive support from his wife Tracy, the initiation of the Parkinson’s disease foundation in his name, and the almost billion dollars raised.
After gaining this insight into the life of an actor who will forever be Marty McFly, you can’t help but wonder what the rest of us are complaining about. Michael is humble, honest, and appears to have accepted whatever life has thrown at him and met it head on. What an inspiring, courageous, wonderful man.
5 / 5
Humbling, inspiring and both heartwarming and heartbreaking.