---
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title: "When Breath Becomes Air: Pulitzer Prize Finalist"
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---

# When Breath Becomes Air: Pulitzer Prize Finalist

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#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • PULITZER PRIZE FINALIST • OVER TWO MILLION COPIES SOLD This inspiring, exquisitely observed memoir finds hope and beauty in the face of insurmountable odds as an idealistic young neurosurgeon attempts to answer the question, What makes a life worth living? “Unmissable . . . Finishing this book and then forgetting about it is simply not an option.”—Janet Maslin, The New York Times ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: The New York Times Book Review, People, NPR , The Washington Post, Slate, Harper’s Bazaar, Time Out New York, Publishers Weekly, BookPage An Oprah Daily Best Nonfiction Book of the Past Two Decades • A Kirkus Reviews Best Nonfiction Book of the Century 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 this profoundly moving, exquisitely observed memoir. Paul Kalanithi died in March 2015, while working on this book, yet his words live on as a guide and a gift to us all. “I began to realize that coming face to face with my own mortality, in a sense, had changed nothing and everything,” he wrote. “Seven words from Samuel Beckett began to repeat in my head: ‘I can’t go on. I’ll go on.’” When Breath Becomes Air is an unforgettable, life-affirming reflection on the challenge of facing death and on the relationship between doctor and patient, from a brilliant writer who became both. Finalist for the PEN Center USA Literary Award in Creative Nonfiction and the Books for a Better Life Award in Inspirational Memoir

Review: A life journey and death - We live in a society that esteems the young, beautiful and vibrant above all things. We live in a society that thinks it is invincible and that we will live forever. Doctors are Gods who bring us miracles every day and the advances that they lead are truly astounding. We turn away from death embarrassed, scared, and nervous. When the doctors fail us we sue them. We want them to do everything they can to save us without any examination of what that means. This book is so beautiful and profound because Paul Kalanithi and his wife Lucy stand tall in the face of illness and death and just talk about it. This book is refreshing for its honesty and especially for Paul's refusal to give in to platitudes like, "We are going to beat it!" "We will win!" I understand why people choose that approach, but I think Paul's book and the way he lived his life after his diagnosis shows what a disservice that can be to living the life you have been handed. This is best exemplified in the exchange between Lucy and Paul about whether or not to have a child: ""Will having a newborn distract from the time we have together?" she asked. "Don't you think saying goodbye to your child will make your death more painful?" "Wouldn't it be great if it did?" I said. Lucy and I both felt that life wasn't about avoiding suffering." That's not to say that Paul did not fight his cancer. He did. He desperately wanted to live. But as he said "...I would have to learn to live in a different way, seeing death as an imposing itinerant visitor, but knowing that even if I'm dying, until I actually die, I am still living." I also liked this book for the lessons that physicians can learn from how they talk about treatment and death. I have been blessed to have dealt with some fantastic health care providers in recent years. The doctors and nurses who cared for my father when he was dying last year were fantastic, especially his oncologist. But there were some doctors and nurses who still seemed to side-step the conversation. I know they do not want to be wrong and that there is always hope, but there were so many euphemisms. Instead of telling us that he was in fact dying, there was a lot of talk about labs, and phrases like, "He is a very sick man." When I pressed they agreed wholeheartedly that my brother should come now. But no one said "death." No one said "dying." Paul's desire to understand human relationality and death lead him to medicine. He is honest that he was seeking a kind of transcendence there. But he comes to learn that, "As a resident, my highest ideal was not saving lives - everyone dies eventually - but guiding a patient or family to an understanding of death or illness." And that, "Openness to human relationality does not mean revealing grand truths from the apse; it means meeting patients where they are, in the narthex or nave, and bringing them as far as you can." I could share quote after quote here, but that understanding and transcendence is the meat of this book. Go read it! This book was sad because Paul was so talented and he left behind so much. He was a brilliant and thoughtful doctor. He was also an incredible writer. As I read his book, I was fascinated by his time as a neurosurgeon, but I was equally sad that he would not be writing any more. I wished he had chosen a writing career so that we would have more of his words to read. A writer that can use the word "pluperfect" so well to make his point and to capture his struggle with tense is wonderful. This is another example of his talent: "At moments, the weight of it became palpable. It was in the air, the stress and misery. Normally, you breathed it in, without noticing it. But some days, like a humid muggy day, it had a suffocating weight of its own. Some days, this is how it felt when I was in the hospital: trapped in an endless jungle summer, wet with sweat, the rain of tears of the families of the dying pouring down." The book was also sad because it was so clearly not finished. It felt like the solid beginning of a book and as I neared the end I was a little let down. But Lucy Kalanithi's Epilogue saved it for me. Lucy is a talented writer in her own right. Lucy's Epilogue gave the book the balance and the ending that it needed. Lucy writes, "Although these last few years have been wrenching and difficult - sometimes almost impossible - they have also been the most beautiful and profound of my life, requiring the daily act of holding life and death, joy and pain in balance and exploring new depths of gratitude and love." Lucy signs off her epilogue, "I was his wife and a witness." I loved this book for allowing me to witness Paul's journey. I was honoured to witness his death from afar. I hope this book reminds us all what an honour it is to witness life, and death in particular, and to embrace that more.
Review: great lover of literature - _PAUL KALANITHI Name : Paul Kalanithi Gender : male Age : 35 Occupation : neurosurgeon and neuroscientist Additional notes : great lover of literature, deep thinker, good person Symptoms : unexplained weight loss and new-onset back pain He was diagnosed with lung cancer and died of it. His devotion didn't falter, hitting arduous and wrenching bumps on the road. ==================== This book, a culmination of his love for literature, shows the inextricability of life and death. It is a cogent and powerful tale of living with death. It epitomizes the life of a man who faced death with integrity and genuinely struggled for existential answers to the question "what makes human life meaningful and worth living". It is of great strength. I read it twice. Such a rare thing for me, part of whom always yields to the rest craving for exploring a next book. So sorry for thinking of him leaving behind great contributions he, as a neurosurgeon and neuroscientist, would have made if he had lived, I could hardly let go of him and this book, proceeding to a new one the next. Even though I was extremely impressed on first reading and I thought I grasped what he meant to say through his book, I just wanted to spend more time with it. I chose to hear his voice again, like voiceover to be heard in a tv documentary, stifling the itch to write my review about it. I opened the first page for second reading. Knowing the whole story, my throat was choked up from the first sentence. With my heart breaking, I read it through. Sometimes I stopped at unlikely points which I went past on first reading, my eyes blurring with tears, aware of how Paul and Lucy felt and the way they coped when they've been through what came up to them. ==================== Saying "I'm sorry" is not an option for some professionals like neurosurgeons. TECHNICAL EXCELLENCE IS A MORAL REQUIREMENT. GOOD INTENTIONS ARE NOT ENOUGH(Paul Kalanithi). As if one letter makes difference in court, one or two millimeters would make the difference between tragedy and triumph in the OR. Paul was perfect for that part. Even though his fully-guaranteed future spreading down the road gave way to the death, the years of ministering to terminally ill patients and their families would bear fruit. Lucy, Paul's wife, in the picture, gives a bright and unwavering smile, holding their baby girl unsuspectingly grinning, snuggling up to him who has only several weeks left until his deathbed. She deserves to be loved by such a good man like Paul. In it, she doesn't give off any fear of his imminent death and impending burdens to be shouldered. ==================== I know them only in my capacity as a reader. But it never keeps me from missing and loving them. Like Atul Gawande's endorsement saying(BEING MORTAL is his book and I read it), the dying are the ones who have the most to teach us about life. Paul's love for what he'd been pursuing during his short-lived life, remains exquisitely beautiful here in this book and touching the hearts of readers.

## Technical Specifications

| Specification | Value |
|---------------|-------|
| Best Sellers Rank | #297 in Books ( See Top 100 in Books ) #1 in Death #1 in Medical Professional Biographies #1 in Consciousness & Thought Philosophy |
| Customer Reviews | 4.8 out of 5 stars 7,711 Reviews |

## Images

![When Breath Becomes Air: Pulitzer Prize Finalist - Image 1](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/61gwba1pQnL.jpg)

## Customer Reviews

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ A life journey and death
*by A***Y on February 6, 2016*

We live in a society that esteems the young, beautiful and vibrant above all things. We live in a society that thinks it is invincible and that we will live forever. Doctors are Gods who bring us miracles every day and the advances that they lead are truly astounding. We turn away from death embarrassed, scared, and nervous. When the doctors fail us we sue them. We want them to do everything they can to save us without any examination of what that means. This book is so beautiful and profound because Paul Kalanithi and his wife Lucy stand tall in the face of illness and death and just talk about it. This book is refreshing for its honesty and especially for Paul's refusal to give in to platitudes like, "We are going to beat it!" "We will win!" I understand why people choose that approach, but I think Paul's book and the way he lived his life after his diagnosis shows what a disservice that can be to living the life you have been handed. This is best exemplified in the exchange between Lucy and Paul about whether or not to have a child: ""Will having a newborn distract from the time we have together?" she asked. "Don't you think saying goodbye to your child will make your death more painful?" "Wouldn't it be great if it did?" I said. Lucy and I both felt that life wasn't about avoiding suffering." That's not to say that Paul did not fight his cancer. He did. He desperately wanted to live. But as he said "...I would have to learn to live in a different way, seeing death as an imposing itinerant visitor, but knowing that even if I'm dying, until I actually die, I am still living." I also liked this book for the lessons that physicians can learn from how they talk about treatment and death. I have been blessed to have dealt with some fantastic health care providers in recent years. The doctors and nurses who cared for my father when he was dying last year were fantastic, especially his oncologist. But there were some doctors and nurses who still seemed to side-step the conversation. I know they do not want to be wrong and that there is always hope, but there were so many euphemisms. Instead of telling us that he was in fact dying, there was a lot of talk about labs, and phrases like, "He is a very sick man." When I pressed they agreed wholeheartedly that my brother should come now. But no one said "death." No one said "dying." Paul's desire to understand human relationality and death lead him to medicine. He is honest that he was seeking a kind of transcendence there. But he comes to learn that, "As a resident, my highest ideal was not saving lives - everyone dies eventually - but guiding a patient or family to an understanding of death or illness." And that, "Openness to human relationality does not mean revealing grand truths from the apse; it means meeting patients where they are, in the narthex or nave, and bringing them as far as you can." I could share quote after quote here, but that understanding and transcendence is the meat of this book. Go read it! This book was sad because Paul was so talented and he left behind so much. He was a brilliant and thoughtful doctor. He was also an incredible writer. As I read his book, I was fascinated by his time as a neurosurgeon, but I was equally sad that he would not be writing any more. I wished he had chosen a writing career so that we would have more of his words to read. A writer that can use the word "pluperfect" so well to make his point and to capture his struggle with tense is wonderful. This is another example of his talent: "At moments, the weight of it became palpable. It was in the air, the stress and misery. Normally, you breathed it in, without noticing it. But some days, like a humid muggy day, it had a suffocating weight of its own. Some days, this is how it felt when I was in the hospital: trapped in an endless jungle summer, wet with sweat, the rain of tears of the families of the dying pouring down." The book was also sad because it was so clearly not finished. It felt like the solid beginning of a book and as I neared the end I was a little let down. But Lucy Kalanithi's Epilogue saved it for me. Lucy is a talented writer in her own right. Lucy's Epilogue gave the book the balance and the ending that it needed. Lucy writes, "Although these last few years have been wrenching and difficult - sometimes almost impossible - they have also been the most beautiful and profound of my life, requiring the daily act of holding life and death, joy and pain in balance and exploring new depths of gratitude and love." Lucy signs off her epilogue, "I was his wife and a witness." I loved this book for allowing me to witness Paul's journey. I was honoured to witness his death from afar. I hope this book reminds us all what an honour it is to witness life, and death in particular, and to embrace that more.

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ great lover of literature
*by S***Y on September 19, 2016*

<WHEN BREATH BECOMES AIR>_PAUL KALANITHI Name : Paul Kalanithi Gender : male Age : 35 Occupation : neurosurgeon and neuroscientist Additional notes : great lover of literature, deep thinker, good person Symptoms : unexplained weight loss and new-onset back pain He was diagnosed with lung cancer and died of it. His devotion didn't falter, hitting arduous and wrenching bumps on the road. ==================== This book, a culmination of his love for literature, shows the inextricability of life and death. It is a cogent and powerful tale of living with death. It epitomizes the life of a man who faced death with integrity and genuinely struggled for existential answers to the question "what makes human life meaningful and worth living". It is of great strength. I read it twice. Such a rare thing for me, part of whom always yields to the rest craving for exploring a next book. So sorry for thinking of him leaving behind great contributions he, as a neurosurgeon and neuroscientist, would have made if he had lived, I could hardly let go of him and this book, proceeding to a new one the next. Even though I was extremely impressed on first reading and I thought I grasped what he meant to say through his book, I just wanted to spend more time with it. I chose to hear his voice again, like voiceover to be heard in a tv documentary, stifling the itch to write my review about it. I opened the first page for second reading. Knowing the whole story, my throat was choked up from the first sentence. With my heart breaking, I read it through. Sometimes I stopped at unlikely points which I went past on first reading, my eyes blurring with tears, aware of how Paul and Lucy felt and the way they coped when they've been through what came up to them. ==================== Saying "I'm sorry" is not an option for some professionals like neurosurgeons. TECHNICAL EXCELLENCE IS A MORAL REQUIREMENT. GOOD INTENTIONS ARE NOT ENOUGH(Paul Kalanithi). As if one letter makes difference in court, one or two millimeters would make the difference between tragedy and triumph in the OR. Paul was perfect for that part. Even though his fully-guaranteed future spreading down the road gave way to the death, the years of ministering to terminally ill patients and their families would bear fruit. Lucy, Paul's wife, in the picture, gives a bright and unwavering smile, holding their baby girl unsuspectingly grinning, snuggling up to him who has only several weeks left until his deathbed. She deserves to be loved by such a good man like Paul. In it, she doesn't give off any fear of his imminent death and impending burdens to be shouldered. ==================== I know them only in my capacity as a reader. But it never keeps me from missing and loving them. Like Atul Gawande's endorsement saying(BEING MORTAL is his book and I read it), the dying are the ones who have the most to teach us about life. Paul's love for what he'd been pursuing during his short-lived life, remains exquisitely beautiful here in this book and touching the hearts of readers.

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Poetic, vivid, gripping, eye opening
*by A***H on April 15, 2026*

An absolutely amazing book to read. I initially didn't want to read this book because I knew it would be sad. But then my dad was diagnosed with cancer and he would pass ten days later. The suddenness of it along with the hard reality of everything made me decide it was time to finally read this book, and I'm glad I did. The author's perspective on life and death is very refreshing and amazing to read. Dr Kalanithi was truly an inspiration that can revive some hope in humanity. I thought I would be sad for him, but I was more sad for everyone who lost him. He never talks about himself as being this or that, but just reading his words tell you so much about him and how he looked at life and death. The writing is very poetic, and visual. I would recommend this book to anyone and everyone and I'm thankful the Paul Kalanithi shared his story with us.

## Frequently Bought Together

- When Breath Becomes Air
- Being Mortal
- The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer

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*Last updated: 2026-07-06*