The best memoirs of all time including Michelle Obama's Becoming, Paul Kalanithi's When Breath Becomes Air, Chanel Miller's Know My Name and Patricia Lockwood's Priestdaddy.

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Reading lists

The best memoirs of all time, as chosen by our readers

Paul Kalanithi

A vital book about dying. Awe-inspiring and exquisite. Obligatory reading for the living.

Rattling. Heartbreaking. Beautiful.

Extraordinary...Remarkable... luminous, revelatory memoir about mortality and what makes being alive meaningful ... Lyrical, intimate, insistent and profound. Kalanithi had the mind of the polymath and the ear of a poet.

A stark, fascinating, well-written and heroic memoir.

When I came to the end of the last flawless paragraph of When Breath Becomes Air, all I could do was turn to the first page and read the whole thing again. Searingly intelligent, beautifully written, and beyond brave, I haven't been so marked by a book in years.

A meditation on what makes a life worth living.

Dr Kalanithi describes, clearly and simply, and entirely without self-pity, his journey from innocent medical student to professionally detached and all-powerful neurosurgeon to helpless patient, dying from cancer. He learns lessons about the reality of illness and the doctor-patient relationship that most doctors only learn in old age but Paul Kalanithi died at the tragically early age of 37. 
 
Every doctor should read this book - written by a member of our own tribe, it helps us understand and overcome the barriers we all erect between ourselves and our patients as soon as we are out of medical school

Thanks to When Breath Becomes Air, those of us who never met Paul Kalanithi will both mourn his death and benefit from his life. This one of a handful of books I consider to be a universal donor - I would recommend it to anyone, everyone.

It would be hard to conceive of a more tragic story... Kalanithi provides a uniquely valuable perspective... [He] writes with eloquence, humour and honesty from both sides of the medical fence. His prose is fluid and precise, enlivened by brisk dialogue and offbeat anecdotes, mixing a surgeon's precision with a human touch... Filled to the brim...with joy, humour and meaning.

Devastating account of the shift from doctor to patient.

A deeply thoughtful and beautifully written book on the question of what makes life worth living.

Through reading this book I have looked the bogeyman death in the face. Maybe it was the briefest of glances, and I want to play a little before I look again, but I feel richer for it. It is a sombre richness and there is sadness in it, but I am grateful. Grateful for this book and to its valiant author.

His exquisitely written, inspiring memoir is inevitably unfinished, but delivers the final word on dying with dignity.

An unforgettable reflection on the practice of medicine and the relationship between doctor and patient, from a gifted writer who became both.

[Kalanithi] wrote about practising medicine, about mortality, about finite time, with unfathomable tranquility and humour.

Writing isn't brain surgery, but it's rare when someone adept at the latter is also so accomplished at the former... A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular clarity.

In this slim but extraordinarily powerful memoir, Kalanithi grapples with the hardest questions with grace and courage... Lucid, humbling and heartbreaking.

A gripping and emotionally charged account.

When Breath Becomes Air is a life-affirming reflection on facing our mortality and on the relationship between doctor and patient, from a gifted writer who became both.

Far more than a beautifully written account of a life cut cruelly short: it is a meditation on living well.

[H]e writes with an eloquence that befits his love of the literary.

He writes movingly about how to make sense of a life so suddenly interrupted and what makes life worth living even as it fades away. A beautiful book about the resilience of the human spirit.

Informative, emotive, honest and a stark look at the path one takes when life pulls the rug out from under you.

This book has stayed with me ever since I put it down. Absolutely extraordinary. This book is an example of how fragile and unfair life can be.

Poignant and life-affirming, it's a devastating must-read

Beautifully written... utterly heartbreaking and yet somehow life-affirming

Mike Gayle, author of THE MUSEUM OF ORDINARY PEOPLE

The writing is beautiful and the whole book feels like a wondrous gift

A devastating account of making a meaningful life in the face of death

i, *The most gripping non-fiction of all time*

At a time when the NHS and key workers are doing their utmost to make sure people are safe, this medical memoir is one that will make you realise how courageous and hard-working our medical staff really are... The moving and intimidate book brings readers on a valuable and gut-wrenching journey through the meaning of life, exposes universal truths surrounding terminal illnesses and highlights the fragile relationship between doctor and patient

** SUNDAY TIMES NUMBER ONE BESTSELLER** 
 
 'Rattling. Heartbreaking. Beautiful.' Atul Gawande, bestselling author of Being Mortal 
 
At the age of thirty-six, on the verge of completing a decade's training as a neurosurgeon, Paul Kalanithi was diagnosed with inoperable lung cancer. One day he was a doctor treating the dying, the next he was a patient struggling to live. 
 
When Breath Becomes Air chronicles Kalanithi's transformation from a medical student asking what makes a virtuous and meaningful life into a neurosurgeon working in the core of human identity - the brain - and finally into a patient and a new father. 
 
What makes life worth living in the face of death? What do you do when when life is catastrophically interrupted? What does it mean to have a child as your own life fades away? 
 
Paul Kalanithi died while working on this profoundly moving book, yet his words live on as a guide to us all. When Breath Becomes Air is a life-affirming reflection on facing our mortality and on the relationship between doctor and patient, from a gifted writer who became both. 
 
 'A vital book about dying. Awe-inspiring and exquisite. Obligatory reading for the living' Nigella Lawson

Paul Kalanithi

Praise for When Breath Becomes Air

A vital book about dying. Awe-inspiring and exquisite. Obligatory reading for the living.

Rattling. Heartbreaking. Beautiful.

Powerful and poignant.

A vital book about dying. Awe-inspiring and exquisite. Obligatory reading for the living.

Rattling. Heartbreaking. Beautiful.

Powerful and poignant.

A vital book about dying. Awe-inspiring and exquisite. Obligatory reading for the living.

Rattling. Heartbreaking. Beautiful.

Powerful and poignant.

Articles featuring Paul Kalanithi

The best memoirs of all time, as chosen by our readers

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