The Blink of an Eye

March 1, 2019
A return-from-the-dead memoir that avoids the supernatural while illuminating the day-to-day detail of recovering a life.In early 2013, Danish scientist Kjaergaard (co-editor: The Aesthetics of Scientific Data Representation, 2017, etc.) fell ill and was initially diagnosed with the flu. By the next morning, however, it was clear that something was more seriously amiss. After being rushed to the hospital, she was diagnosed with bacterial meningitis and declared "clinically dead. No light at the end of the tunnel, no angels, no harps. No Heaven's Gate and no Hell. Nothing. Being dead means exactly that. You are gone. It's as simple and frightening as that." The precision of the author's prose, as well as her empathy for her husband and children, also suffering through this long ordeal, makes for a rich reading experience, as the author recounts the months she spent in various stages of hospital recovery, one in which "all parts of my body were fighting each other. It was a battle of multiple foes and no allies." She provides the backstory of an earlier health scare that weakened her immune system. She also testifies to her character as a "fighter" and how she had to draw on all her resources and resolve to regain a semblance of a normal life. As her chronicle begins, she admits that it was "like writing a biography of another person," and she relies on the notes and documentation her loving husband provided to help reconstruct the period when she was in a coma. She describes the slog of awakening, trying to communicate with blinks, and relearning just about everything--e.g., how to breathe, how to swallow, who she was. It took months before she could take her first step or eat on her own. Ultimately, though she only has one thumb as her "only unimpaired finger," she "realised I had gained so much more, which...added another layer to what it means to be human....I knew my life had changed for the better."An inspirational story of beating the odds.

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Starred review from April 15, 2019
On one New Year's Day, the world turned upside down for Kj�rgaard, a 38-year-old Danish scientist, when she experienced an acute bout of bacterial meningitis. Lying in intensive care in a comatose state for weeks and mired in a horrifying locked-in syndrome that left her unable to communicate except by blinking her eyes, she slowly comes back to life after a long and painful struggle. There are no Hollywood moments in waking from a coma, she writes. Anyone familiar with The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (1997) and its film adaptation will have an idea of what she is going through and the solitary prison she finds herself confined to; but reading it from her perspective is a new and harrowing experience. We root for Kj�rgaard as she gradually and carefully puts herself, and her broken body, back together. Among the most devastating results of her infection is the amputation of her fingers: the final pages, where she interacts with her young son in the family kitchen, will be sure to bring tears to many an eye. Kj�rgaard has since founded Graphicure, a company that develops software to help patients monitor and understand their own treatment. With a foreword by Bill Bryson, this is a true stunner, unbearably sad yet full of hope.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2019, American Library Association.)