Books like Between Two Kingdoms: A Memoir of a Life Interrupted

01

When Breath Becomes Air

Paul Kalanithi · Memoir

When Breath Becomes Air is Paul Kalanithi's account of his life before and after being diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer at 36, while completing his residency in neurosurgery at Stanford.

Both dig into identity.

02

The Year of Magical Thinking

Joan Didion · Memoir

Joan Didion's account of the year following the sudden death of her husband, the writer John Gregory Dunne, is the most rigorous and unflinching memoir of grief in American literature.

A kindred memoir read.

03

Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End

Atul Gawande · Health

Being Mortal is Atul Gawande's investigation into why modern medicine is so bad at helping people die well.

A kindred memoir read.

04

Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption

Laura Hillenbrand · Biography

Unbroken follows Louis Zamperini from his juvenile delinquency in Depression-era California to the 1936 Berlin Olympics, where he ran the 5,000 meters at nineteen and briefly caught Hitler's attention.

Shares survival and identity with Between Two Kingdoms: A Memoir of a Life Interrupted.

05

Scar Tissue

Anthony Kiedis · Memoir

Scar Tissue is Anthony Kiedis's account of his life from a chaotic childhood in Michigan through the formation and commercial peak of the Red Hot Chili Peppers, with addiction and recovery as the book's spine.

Shares survival and identity with Between Two Kingdoms: A Memoir of a Life Interrupted.

06

Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood

Trevor Noah · Memoir

Born a Crime is Trevor Noah's memoir about growing up mixed-race in South Africa during the final years of apartheid and its chaotic aftermath.

Shares survival and belonging with Between Two Kingdoms: A Memoir of a Life Interrupted.

07

Brain on Fire: My Month of Madness

Susannah Cahalan · Memoir

Brain on Fire is Susannah Cahalan's account of the month she spent in a New York hospital in 2009, during which she experienced psychosis, paranoia, violent behavior, catatonia, and seizures — and was nearly committed to a psychiatric facility before a doctor correctly diagnosed her with anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis, a newly described autoimmune disease in which the body attacks the brain.

Shares identity and recovery with Between Two Kingdoms: A Memoir of a Life Interrupted.

08

Crying in H Mart

Michelle Zauner · Memoir

Crying in H Mart is Michelle Zauner's memoir of her mother's death from cancer and the loss it made her confront: not just of a parent but of the Korean half of her identity.

Shares identity and belonging with Between Two Kingdoms: A Memoir of a Life Interrupted.

09

Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance

Barack Obama · Memoir

Barack Obama wrote Dreams from My Father in 1995, before entering politics, after being elected the first Black president of the Harvard Law Review.

Shares identity and belonging with Between Two Kingdoms: A Memoir of a Life Interrupted.

10

Hunger

Roxane Gay · Memoir

Hunger is Roxane Gay's memoir about her body, the trauma that shaped it, and the world's persistent refusal to accommodate it.

Shares survival and identity with Between Two Kingdoms: A Memoir of a Life Interrupted.

11

Know My Name: A Memoir

Chanel Miller · Memoir

Know My Name is Chanel Miller's memoir of being sexually assaulted behind a dumpster at Stanford University in 2015, being identified publicly as only "Emily Doe" throughout the subsequent trial, and the experience of navigating a legal process while the perpetrator — Stanford swimmer Brock Turner — became the more visible subject of the story.

Shares identity and recovery with Between Two Kingdoms: A Memoir of a Life Interrupted.

12

Lucky Man: A Memoir

Michael J. Fox · Memoir

Michael J.

Shares illness and identity with Between Two Kingdoms: A Memoir of a Life Interrupted.