The Invisible Kingdom: Reimagining Chronic Illness [L0131]

2022. HCDJ in nice clean condition. A New York Times Bestseller & Finalist for the 2022 National Book Award for Nonfiction. Named one of the BEST BOOKS OF 2022 by NPR, The New Yorker, Time, and Vogue. "Remarkable." -Andrew Solomon, The New York Times Book Review. "At once a rigorous work of scholarship and a radical act of empathy."-Esquire. "A ray of light into those isolated cocoons of darkness that, at one time or another, may afflict us all." -The Wall Street Journal. A landmark exploration of one of the most consequential and mysterious issues of our time: the rise of chronic illness and autoimmune diseases.

A silent epidemic of chronic illnesses afflicts tens of millions of Americans: these are diseases that are poorly understood, frequently marginalized, and can go undiagnosed and unrecognized altogether. Renowned writer Meghan O'Rourke delivers a revelatory investigation into this elusive category of "invisible" illness that encompasses autoimmune diseases, post-treatment Lyme disease syndrome, and now long COVID, synthesizing the personal and the universal to help all of us through this new frontier. Drawing on her own medical experiences as well as a decade of interviews with doctors, patients, researchers, and public health experts, O'Rourke traces the history of Western definitions of illness, and reveals how inherited ideas of cause, diagnosis, and treatment have led us to ignore a host of hard-to-understand medical conditions, ones that resist easy description or simple cures. And as America faces this health crisis of extraordinary proportions, the populations most likely to be neglected by our institutions include women, the working class, and people of color. Blending lyricism and erudition, candor and empathy, O'Rourke brings together her deep and disparate talents and roles as critic, journalist, poet, teacher, and patient, synthesizing the personal and universal into one monumental project arguing for a seismic shift in our approach to disease. The Invisible Kingdom offers hope for the sick, solace and insight for their loved ones, and a radical new understanding of our bodies and our health.

From recent Amazon/GoodReads reviews: "The Invisible Kingdom is not a text book. It reads much like a mystery, but is a synthesis of historical and current information on chronic illness. O'Rourke's prose is unsentimental and brutally honest. She quotes poets and philosophers as much as she does medical professionals, researchers, and scientists. A mere five stars cannot do justice to this fabulous book!";"I knew the author for her exquisite memoir of losing her mother to cancer, The Long Goodbye. Here the writing is more functional and journalistic, but I was still impressed by the attention she pays and the connections she draws. She's also a poet, so she's open to emotions and keen to capture them in words. There's a good balance of research, personal experience and general reflection in this one."; "I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in understanding what it means to suffer from a disease without a clear diagnosis or treatment. Meghan is fantastic at delving into the patient-doctor relationship and how friends and families react to the suffering of the sick among them. This book is a powerful lesson for all of us. We need to learn how to hear the suffering of the sick, their complaints, their anxieties, their fears, and their crying. Because this is the true support we all need when we are in pain."