What a beautiful day is was for a book club meeting! We welcomed two new faces and had great conversation surrounding When Breath Becomes Air, our November selection. The Year of Less, by Cait Flanders, is coming up next for December~ we have limited copies, so if you have an opportunity to find the book elsewhere, we would encourage you to do so. Also, if you don't need a copy of this title, would you mind letting us know? It helps us be more efficient in book distribution~ thanks in advance for your help!
Onward!
At the age of thirty-six, on the verge of
completing a decade's worth of training as a neurosurgeon, Paul
Kalanithi was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer. One day he was a
doctor treating the dying, and the next he was a patient struggling to
live. And just like that, the future he and his wife had imagined
evaporated. When Breath Becomes Air chronicles Kalanithi's
transformation from a naïve medical student "possessed," as he wrote,
"by the question of what, given that all organisms die, makes a virtuous
and meaningful life" into a neurosurgeon at Stanford working in the
brain, the most critical place for human identity, and finally into a
patient and new father confronting his own mortality.
What makes
life worth living in the face of death? What do you do when the future,
no longer a ladder toward your goals in life, flattens out into a
perpetual present? What does it mean to have a child, to nurture a new
life as another fades away? These are some of the questions Kalanithi
wrestles with in When Breath Becomes Air.
It was unanimous, we all liked this one! We are fond of Paul, we thought he was warm, and genuine, and truly set out to make a difference in the world. Just as it was wondered aloud what more of a difference he could have made if he had lived, it was added, "But what more of a difference is he also making with his memoir?" It was an excellent, valid point. A couple members bravely and solemnly shared that they too have faced the loss of loved ones to cancer, some very recently, and they found comfort in this book~ were thankful to have read it. One other member said they don't generally buy books to add to a personal collection, and they aren't personally walking through this trial right now, but they will buy this book regardless~ just to mark parts and places that resonated with them.
We liked and appreciated the writing and the honesty of this book. We are grateful that Paul got to be everything he had originally considered pursuing... scientist, doctor and writer. We found Paul to be brave and honorable to the end.
We liked Lucy, Paul's wife, and are so pleased she agreed to finish his book. If there was anything we weren't unanimous about, it was Paul and Lucy's decision to have a baby after the terminal diagnosis. On the one hand, by choosing to have a child, it meant that a part of Paul lives on. On the other hand, newborn babies require a lot of round the clock time, and attention, and commitment... we imagine so does caring for someone with terminal cancer. What would this mean for Lucy? What about in the future if Lucy decides she'd like to remarry? What would this mean for the child, bonding with, and then losing, their father?
One of us was pretty sure they wouldn't choose to have a child if ever in a similar circumstance... the rest were pretty sure they would. Of which opinion are you? Let us know in the comment section below! 👇
P.S. If you'd like an update on how Lucy and Cady are doing these days, here's a link to an interview Lucy did about just that in 2020! Enjoy!
https://stanmed.stanford.edu/lucy-kalanithi-love-five-years-later-husband-paul/
Did you really like When Breath Becomes Air? Fans of the book also enjoyed, Being Mortal, by Atul Gawande, Tuesdays with Morrie, by Mitch Albom, and Educated (a previous book club title!), by Tara Westover. All of these titles are available within the Viking system~ reserve your copy today!
Would we
recommend this to a friend to read?
"YES"
Would we
recommend this to another book club for discussion?
"YES"
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