This was not a perfect book by any means. The Vonnegut references were grating; saying 'so it goes' at the end of a sentence worked in Slaughter Five, but not here. The absence of any contractions made speech stilted ("I want to feel my feet, even if I cannot walk." "I am sure.") The hyperbole at times contrasted with the meticulous research ("My brain had died." "I am brain-dead." - No, it hadn't, and no, you weren't - these are specific medical conditions from which there is no recovery!)

However, the author is a phenomenally talented writer. I dog-ear pages in books that touch me or stand out as striking, and this book has more folded pages than most I've read. The story itself is inspiring and I have absolute admiration for anyone who can survive what this woman survived, and to create such a moving and articulate work out of it. The author manages to put into words experiences which are esoteric and which many of us will (thankfully) not experience, and she brings them into an arena where we can understand them completely. Her language does this. Her primary talent is making language do impossible things.

I will definitely be reading future work by this author, with the single hope that she learns to lean less on other authors - she doesn't need to invoke Vonnegut to be profound. Her own words stand on their own merit. Those are the words I want to read.