Spotlight/US Giveaway: A Gift of Love by Tony Cointreau

A Gift of Love
Lessons Learned From My Work and Friendship with Mother Teresa
by Tony Cointreau
Published by Prospecta Press
Hardcover: 200 pages
September 6, 2016; $20.00 US/$25.00 CAN; 9781632260499

Description

Stories from a life of caregiving for others that will help those who have the responsibility and the privilege of caring for a loved one at the end of his or her life.

After experiencing a comfortable childhood as an heir to the Cointreau liquor fortune, and having had a successful career in show business, Tony Cointreau felt that he needed something more meaningful in his life. This led him to spend twelve years as a dedicated volunteer in Mother Teresa’s hospices in New York and Calcutta, helping more than one hundred people while they went through the process of dying.

Every family eventually has to deal with caregiving and the end of life, and Tony’s friends kept pleading with him to write his experiences so that when they had to face it, perhaps for the first time, they would have a better idea of the simple things they could do to help their own loved ones during those last months, weeks, days, or hours.

This book is Tony’s answer to those requests. His overall approach to caregiving for the living as well as for the dying shines through in each chapter, both in practical matters and in reverence for the privilege of sharing in life’s momentous transitions.

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Author Bio

Tony Cointreau, author of A Gift of Love: Lessons Learned from My Work and Friendship with Mother Teresa, is a member of the French liqueur Cointreau family. He was born into a life of wealth and privilege, growing up among the rich and famous. His maternal grandmother was an opera star, and Tony’s own voice led him to a successful international singing career. His paternal heritage put him on the Cointreau board of directors. But he felt a need for something more meaningful in his life—and his heart led him to Calcutta and Mother Teresa.

Tony’s childhood experiences—an emotionally remote mother; a Swiss nanny who constantly told him, “Mother only loves you when you’re perfect;” an angry, bullying older brother; and a sexually predatory fourth-grade schoolteacher—convinced him that the only way to be loved is to be perfect. He set out on a lifelong quest for a loving mother figure and unconditional love, and he found it with Mother Teresa and her work. She became another mother for him, as he describes in his memoir, Ethel Merman, Mother Teresa… and Me.

Tony volunteered in Mother Teresa’s hospices for twelve years, learning to give unconditional love, and helping more than one hundred people while they were dying.

For more information please visit http://tonycointreau.com

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Reviews for Tony Cointreau’s Work
“I was so interested in your life with Ethel Merman . . . she was a gifted and fascinating woman. And of course Mother Teresa is smiling down. I don’t think she would ever be anything but enthusiastic about your life and its far-ranging activity. Your book is a wonderful story that nobody else can tell. I even think your family background is fun! You are a Cointreau, but then you also had the important entertainer career — I don’t think they make many more like you.”
— Helen Gurley Brown, Author and iconic editor-in-chief of Cosmopolitan magazine

Tony Cointreau’s friendship with my mother was one of her life’s true blessings. Naturally comfortable in the brightest light of her stardom and the softest light of her vulnerable heart, Tony shared an everyday intimacy with Ethel like a second son . . . like my brother.
— Bob Levitt, Ethel Merman’s son

Dear Tony,
I am glad to know that you have experienced joy in sharing our works of love for the poor in our home for AIDS patients. Thank you for your generous gift of love. Please pray for me as I do for you.
God bless you,
— Mother Teresa, Missionaries of Charity

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US Giveaway

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GIVEAWAY HAS ENDED

Giveaway ends September 12, 2016