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3.94 AVERAGE
3.94 AVERAGE
reflective
sad
slow-paced
funny
hopeful
reflective
I appreciated this book for reminding me how lucky I am to have my health. It is an incredible accomplishment when you think about the circumstances of how it came to be. It is a bit sad but also touching and inspirational, not depressing as you might think.
sad
slow-paced
emotional
funny
hopeful
inspiring
sad
fast-paced
this book would be remarkable if it were a work of fiction. it is not and that is all the more remarkable.
it is well written and devastatingly melancholy. each word was painstakingly chosen by bauby and this shows. his prose is impressive and meaningful.
this book made me think a lot about my papa, who died recently. i loved him a lot and i regret the way i acted in the last few months of his life. this novel opened up my understanding of his perspective, and whilst i doubt that bauby and my papa’s personalities were all that aligned, this book helped me think a lot.
i really loved this. i cried.
it is well written and devastatingly melancholy. each word was painstakingly chosen by bauby and this shows. his prose is impressive and meaningful.
this book made me think a lot about my papa, who died recently. i loved him a lot and i regret the way i acted in the last few months of his life. this novel opened up my understanding of his perspective, and whilst i doubt that bauby and my papa’s personalities were all that aligned, this book helped me think a lot.
i really loved this. i cried.
inspiring
reflective
sad
fast-paced
It's a sweet short read. As an American reader in 2025, there are a lot of references to old films and European locations/cultures I am not too familiar that made me feel more disconnected.
Some chapters were short segments of the authors life which were beautiful. Well worth a read and feels like a quick airport read.
Some chapters were short segments of the authors life which were beautiful. Well worth a read and feels like a quick airport read.
It's impossible to separate this book from the manner in which it was written and the person who wrote it, which makes it challenging to rate and review. It's mind-boggling to think of someone composing an entire book in their head and then dictating it one letter at a time via blinking one eyelid. And yet — I can't escape the fact that this made the book much weaker than if it had been carefully crafted and edited on paper. Until the second-to-last chapter, I did not understand that Sylvie was not his partner. The few times he mentioned Florence, it was just as a name: "Sweet Florence refuses to speak to me unless I first breathe noisily into the receiver..." Is she one of his children? A friend? It's not clear until much later.
There's certainly a lot of interesting information about Bauby's experience having locked-in syndrome, but outside of that I didn't find anything particularly captivating about the book. Prior to his stroke he lived a life of luxury and privilege that I couldn't relate to, and the few stories we got of his early life, like about his friend who lied all the time, were not fleshed out but only introductions to a point he wants to make about his own mind in his current state.
It's a short enough book, and enough people have resonated with it, that it's probably still worth a read, but don't expect too much from it. Honestly, if you didn't know how the book came to be and instead imagined that it was written at some future point when Bauby had fully recovered his faculties, it would be a disappointing read indeed.
There's certainly a lot of interesting information about Bauby's experience having locked-in syndrome, but outside of that I didn't find anything particularly captivating about the book. Prior to his stroke he lived a life of luxury and privilege that I couldn't relate to, and the few stories we got of his early life, like about his friend who lied all the time, were not fleshed out but only introductions to a point he wants to make about his own mind in his current state.
It's a short enough book, and enough people have resonated with it, that it's probably still worth a read, but don't expect too much from it. Honestly, if you didn't know how the book came to be and instead imagined that it was written at some future point when Bauby had fully recovered his faculties, it would be a disappointing read indeed.
a simple set of recollections, framed by a man who became paraplegic after a massive stroke in his mid-forties. brief and inspirational. read it all in one go.
