When confronted with a serious illness it is difficult to know how to cope or prepare for what is to come. Reading books which describe others experiences, often through stories, can be a gentle way to learn.
These books have all been recommended by professionals who work in palliative care.
Practical guides to better endings
- With the End in Mind - by Dr Kathryn Mannix
- How We Die - by Sherwin B. Nuland
- Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End - by Atul Gawande
- Handbook for Mortals - by Joanne Lynne and Joan Harrold
- Do/Death - by Amanda Blainey
Biographies and personal experience
- Dear Life - by Dr Rachel Clarke
- The Language of Kindness: A Nurse's Story - by Christie Watson
- Gratitude - by Oliver Sacks
- When Breath Becomes Air - by Paul Kalanithi
- Late Fragments - by Kate Gross
- A Matter of Death and Life - by Irvin & Marilyn Yalom
- The Last Act of Love - by Cathy Rentzenbrink
- Not that Kind of Love - by Clare & Greg Wise
- The Unwinding of the Miracle - by Julie Yip-Williams