Between Two Kingdoms

A Memoir of a Life Interrupted

By: Suleika Jaouad

Narrated by: Suleika Jaouad

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A deeply moving memoir of illness and recovery that traces one young woman’s journey from diagnosis to remission to re-entry into “normal” life—from the founder of The Isolation Journals and a subject of the Netflix documentary American Symphony

ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: The New York Times Book Review, The Washington Post, Bloomberg, The Rumpus, She Reads, Library Journal, Booklist

“I was immersed for the whole ride and would follow Jaouad anywhere. . . . Her writing restores the moon, lights the way as we learn to endure the unknown.”—Chanel Miller, The New York Times Book Review

“Beautifully crafted . . . affecting . . . a transformative read . . . Jaouad’s insights about the self, connectedness, uncertainty and time speak to all of us.”—The Washington Post

In the summer after graduating from college, Suleika Jaouad was preparing, as they say in commencement speeches, to enter “the real world.” She had fallen in love and moved to Paris to pursue her dream of becoming a war correspondent. The real world she found, however, would take her into a very different kind of conflict zone.

It started with an itch—first on her feet, then up her legs, like a thousand invisible mosquito bites. Next came the exhaustion, and the six-hour naps that only deepened her fatigue. Then a trip to the doctor and, a few weeks shy of her twenty-third birthday, a diagnosis: leukemia, with a 35 percent chance of survival. Just like that, the life she had imagined for herself had gone up in flames. By the time Jaouad flew home to New York, she had lost her job, her apartment, and her independence. She would spend much of the next four years in a hospital bed, fighting for her life and chronicling the saga in a column for The New York Times.

When Jaouad finally walked out of the cancer ward—after countless rounds of chemo, a clinical trial, and a bone marrow transplant—she was, according to the doctors, cured. But as she would soon learn, a cure is not where the work of healing ends; it’s where it begins. She had spent the past 1,500 days in desperate pursuit of one goal—to survive. And now that she’d done so, she realized that she had no idea how to live.

How would she reenter the world and live again? How could she reclaim what had been lost? Jaouad embarked—with her new best friend, Oscar, a scruffy terrier mutt—on a 100-day, 15,000-mile road trip across the country. She set out to meet some of the strangers who had written to her during her years in the hospital: a teenage girl in Florida also recovering from cancer; a teacher in California grieving the death of her son; a death-row inmate in Texas who’d spent his own years confined to a room. What she learned on this trip is that the divide between sick and well is porous, that the vast majority of us will travel back and forth between these realms throughout our lives. Between Two Kingdoms is a profound chronicle of survivorship and a fierce, tender, and inspiring exploration of what it means to begin again.

Superb

I was almost 22 when my boyfriend died of leukemia. In fact today is the day he died 51 years ago. The memories of his hospital stays, bone marrows, waiting for test results can be pulled up easily. I now have been married 47 years and we have 5 adult sons, 3 daughters in love and 6 grandchildren. I would never want anyone to suffer or to die, but I would do it again for the depth of compassion and gratitude for life I gained. Thank you. All blessings and care, jp
I’m using a friends audible account so posting my name is not possible.

a most amazing story

this book was amazing. everyone should read it. every doctor should read it. thank you for the story your life experience will help me guide my own life.

Inspired

What a moving story of her journey. I was enriched by her story. Thank you

Traffic Jam

This is a beautiful, heartbreaking story of love and loss. I loved it. I was snarled in one of the worst traffic jams of my life. Living in San Francisco, traffic is a part of the landscape there but this jam was epic! Suleika’s voice and heartfelt story kept me company as I inched my way home bumper to bumper. Hearing her words of triumph and catastrophe, of love and loneliness made my mundane problem of sitting in the parking lot of highway 101 extraordinary. Four hours later and lots of tears, I finally make my way home. What a blessing. Thank you to this extraordinary person for sharing her story.

Beautiful Memoir!

I absolutely enjoyed Suleika’s story! This was recommended to me by a gentleman working at Barnes and Noble. Excellent read!!!