Open Heart

"In matters of the heart, a single lapse of judgment can prove fatal. In this wise and tender novel, a young man finds out if he can live

up to his father's reputation and his own expectations of himself. Greg Williams is a terrific writer!"

- Ron Carlson, author of the At the Jim Bridger and Return to Lone Pine

"In the tradition of great physician writers like Chekhov, William Carlos Williams, and Walker Percy, Dr. Greg Williams proves himself to be a master chronologist of both emotional and physical matters of the heart. With a diagnostician's keen eye for telling details, he brings the novel's scenes into vivid life. He shows his beautifully drawn characters the same empathy that I am sure he once showed his patients. Sharply honed as a scalpel, Open Heart is mesmerizing and profound, a superb novel that is guaranteed to bring pleasure and a deeper understanding of the human condition to those who read it."

- Daly Walker, author of Surgeon Stories

"An actual heart beats in this novel from the first line to the last. Make no mistake about it, with care and grace, and an urgency you'll feel on every page, Greg Williams has written a beautiful and evocative novel about a young man's singular and authentic quest to make meaning of life."

- Billy Lombardo, author of the The Man With Two Arms and How to Hold a Woman

" . . . a story about the boundaries of love, and how terrifying it can be to face up to our own emotional shortcomings."

- Clint McCown, editor of American Fiction

" . . . a tale that holds both surprise and inevitability, and evokes laughter even as it veers into pathos and tragedy."

- Peter Selgin, judge of the Arts and Letters Fiction Prize

"Open Heart is a gentle coming of age story that leaves readers wanting more, yet gives them a sense of comfort as they reach the end."

- Rabia Tanveer, for Readers' Favorite

"From his physician father's ability to save the day, which turns into an impossible legacy for his son to fulfill, to the career and love choices that create turbulence and complications in a son's life, Gregory D. Williams does a fine job of capturing the changing options and challenges facing a young man who breaks others' hearts because his own is being wrung by life circumstances and family ties."

- Diane Donovan, for Midwest Book Review