Heart In Darkness

At 39, Russell Cobb may have a time bomb ticking away in his chest. For two generations, all the men in his family have developed heart disease in the prime of life -- his father and grandfather both died before the age of 50. In his Star Dispatches ebook, Heart in Darkness: The Genetic Defect that Could Kill Me, Cobb chronicles his journey to understand the family “curse” and discover whether he, too, is at risk of developing familial dilated cardiomyopathy. Along the way, he conjures up larger-than-life family members who lived and drank hard, or sought help in Pentecostal religion and faith healing, or both. Funny and poignant, Heart in Darkness is a revealing description of what it’s like to live with uncertainty. 

Star Dispatches is a weekly series of quality journalism in ebook form from the newsroom of the Toronto Star, Canada's largest newspaper.