Days earlier, she had been on the threshold of a new, adult life: at the beginning of her first serious relationship and a promising career at a major New York newspaper. When twenty-four-year-old Susannah Cahalan woke up alone in a hospital room, strapped to her bed and unable to move or speak, she had no memory of how she'd gotten there.

Annotation: An award-winning memoir and instant New York Times bestseller that goes far beyond its riveting medical mystery, Brain on Fire is the powerful account of one woman's struggle to recapture her identity.

I cannot day enough about this well written work, or my gratitude to Susannah for giving us all this most precious and personal gift.

More than simply treating symptoms when the illness doesn’t fit neatly into our preconceived notions, our responsibility is to work tirelessly to find the source. I suggest any person working in some form or capacity in heath care should read this amazing account, so that we may better understand what our duty to our patients really is. Eloquently written and supported with phenomenal research, we are given an inside look at *the patient and their family* that has not to my knowledge been duplicated. Susannah Cahalan has both the reporting genius and dedication to put down in words what too many have endured in their most vulnerable states. As a NeuroICU RN and as a patient who has experienced my own share of horrors, but who has never had the dedication or the ability to articulate my own story, I was moved from start to finish with this book. “A fascinating look at the disease uld have cost this vibrant, vital young woman her life” ( People), Brain on Fire is an unforgettable exploration of memory and identity, faith and love, and a profoundly compelling tale of survival and perseverance that is destined to become a classic.Ī must read for anyone in the medical field, and anyone who has ever gone undiagnosed.

In a swift and breathtaking narrative, Susannah tells the astonishing true story of her descent into madness, her family’s inspiring faith in her, and the lifesaving diagnosis that nearly didn’t happen. Now she was labeled violent, psychotic, a flight risk. Days earlier, she had been on the threshold of a new, adult life: At the beginning of her first serious relationship and a promising career at a major New York newspaper. When 24-year-old Susannah Cahalan woke up alone in a hospital room, strapped to her bed and unable to move or speak, she had no memory of how she’d gotten there.

Now a major motion picture starring Chloë Grace MoretzĪn award-winning memoir and instant New York Times best seller that goes far beyond its riveting medical mystery, Brain on Fire is the powerful account of one woman’s struggle to recapture her identity. Includes a brand-new afterword, written and read by the author

My brain on fire