--- product_id: 620062211 title: "[Paul Kalanithi] When Breath Becomes Air - Hardcover" price: "€ 12.87" currency: EUR in_stock: false reviews_count: 13 url: https://www.desertcart.sk/products/620062211-paul-kalanithi-when-breath-becomes-air-hardcover store_origin: SK region: Slovakia --- # [Paul Kalanithi] When Breath Becomes Air - Hardcover **Price:** € 12.87 **Availability:** ❌ Out of Stock ## Quick Answers - **What is this?** [Paul Kalanithi] When Breath Becomes Air - Hardcover - **How much does it cost?** € 12.87 with free shipping - **Is it available?** Currently out of stock - **Where can I buy it?** [www.desertcart.sk](https://www.desertcart.sk/products/620062211-paul-kalanithi-when-breath-becomes-air-hardcover) ## Best For - Customers looking for quality international products ## Why This Product - Free international shipping included - Worldwide delivery with tracking - 15-day hassle-free returns ## Description xxx Review: A beautiful and heartbreaking book - This is a hard but necessary book I believe, written for all of us. It is such a profound and beautiful testimony to living well and dying in a way that absolutely changed my perceptions of so much! One of the best books I’ve read. Paul and his wife are pilgrims and prophets. I will keep their story in my heart! 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 | |---------------|-------| | Customer Reviews | 4.7 out of 5 stars 119,531 Reviews | ## Images ![[Paul Kalanithi] When Breath Becomes Air - Hardcover - Image 1](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/71Vy4pM6HzL.jpg) ## Customer Reviews ### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ A beautiful and heartbreaking book *by D***S on July 31, 2026* This is a hard but necessary book I believe, written for all of us. It is such a profound and beautiful testimony to living well and dying in a way that absolutely changed my perceptions of so much! One of the best books I’ve read. Paul and his wife are pilgrims and prophets. I will keep their story in my heart! ### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ great lover of literature *by S***Y on September 19, 2016* _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. ### ⭐⭐⭐⭐ A surgeon's perspective on the book *by D***W on January 19, 2016* As an attending surgeon myself who specializes in treatment of tumors and those with cancer I remember reading Paul's initial opinion piece in The New York Times at the time of his diagnosis. I found it very insightful and thought provoking. As a result I was saddened to hear of his death last spring and was eager to read this book. Once finished with the book, I thought there were two separate components of it, one which was remarkable and one which I found disappointing. Paul's descriptions of being a young person diagnosed with cancer and the associated turmoil were very candid, deep, and lasting. I think there is much to learn here for any person, especially those with terminal illnesses. The struggle of how to live for today, when there may not be a tomorrow is something many of my patients struggle with. Paul's ability to write about and come to terms with that concept is enlightening. However, I found Paul's description of his life as a surgeon to be misleading and immature. Paul unfortunately only made it through residency, he was never able to practice. Therefore, much of his writing takes on the false bravado and confidence that most residents are prone to. In one story he talks about how he tried to save the attending from making a mistake but had to watch him mess up Paul's beautifully performed procedure. And other tales of how fast and slick he was at operating made me cringe. In this aspect, Paul's credentials for writing about life as a surgeon are as limited as mine about living with terminal illness. The reality is that being a resident is like sitting on your father's lap as a child when he was driving the car and being convinced you are the one driving. Only when one becomes an attending surgeon do they learn the stress that comes with being the person making the actual life and death decisions and accepting the guilt and responsibility when those decisions go wrong. While Paul may have one day become the great neurosurgeon he thought he was, I would like to think if he would have written this book 10 years into practice it would have been much better and deeper. Unfortunately for us all, we will never know. --- ## Why Shop on Desertcart? - 🛒 **Trusted by 1.3+ Million Shoppers** — Serving international shoppers since 2016 - 🌍 **Shop Globally** — Access 737+ million products across 21 categories - 💰 **No Hidden Fees** — All customs, duties, and taxes included in the price - 🔄 **15-Day Free Returns** — Hassle-free returns (30 days for PRO members) - 🔒 **Secure Payments** — Trusted payment options with buyer protection - ⭐ **TrustPilot Rated 4.5/5** — Based on 8,000+ happy customer reviews **Shop now:** [https://www.desertcart.sk/products/620062211-paul-kalanithi-when-breath-becomes-air-hardcover](https://www.desertcart.sk/products/620062211-paul-kalanithi-when-breath-becomes-air-hardcover) --- *Product available on Desertcart Slovakia* *Store origin: SK* *Last updated: 2026-10-04*