Reading the late Paul Kalanithi’s spectacular memoir When Breath Becomes Air, a meditation about love, literature and science in the face of a terminal cancer diagnosis was a strange experience “The good news is that I’ve already outlived two Brontes, Keats and Stephen Crane,” Kalanithi wrote to a friend. “The bad news is that I haven’t written anything.” He was trying to be funny, using the kind of dark humor you get from people facing the unfaceable. But it also revealed Kalanithi’s tremendous ambition. He […]
A memoir that disappointed my expectations
I’m not much of a memoir reader, so reading someone else’s personal history/confessional/testimony is always a bit of a gamble. I really do appreciate someone else’s voice giving me their story, but unless the writing is truly excellent and the tone is one that catches my attention/empathy, I’m not likely to be too moved by it. And such is the result with Paul Kalanithi’s book, When Breath Becomes Air. Read my full review for the scoop, and do be sure to check out The Chancellor’s […]
When You Don’t Have A Lot of Time Left
Last week one of my city’s neighborhoods had a huge explosion, leveling three businesses and damaging three dozen more. On Friday my husband and I went there to meet up with friends and spread some local economy love, cash-style. We wandered into a (mostly) used bookstore called Couth Buzzard (plywood still covering nearly all of the windows) and this book just jumped out at me. I ended up reading it in one day because I could not put it down. Dr. Paul Kalanithi was 36 […]