Patient

A New York Times Notable Book of the Year: Unforgettable . . . Few have told such a compelling life-story as skillfully (San Francisco Chronicle). In the summer of 1992, on the eve of an American tour, singer/songwriter Ben Watt, one half of the Billboard-topping pop duo Everything But The Girl, was taken to a London hospital complaining of chest pain. As his condition worsened, doctors were baffled. He was eventually he was diagnosed with a rare life-threatening autoimmune disease called Churg-Strauss Syndrome. To paraphrase Joseph Heller, Ben says, you know it's something serious when they name it after two guys. By the time he came home, two-and-half-months later, his ravaged body was forty-six pounds lighter, and he was missing most of his small intestine. Unfold[ing] like a page-turning mystery (The Los Angeles Times), and told with great wit and without self-pity, Patient is a sobering look at how life can suddenly be transformed into a humbling vaudeville of tests, IV's, catheters, and bedpans (The New York Times Book Review). Injecting a frankness and natural humility into his funny, frightening, and piercingly vulnerable (Interview) chronicle of a medical nightmare, Ben writes about his childhood, reflects on family, and his shared life with band member and partner, Tracey Thorn. The result is a vivid, finely wrought look at having one's future yanked away, and surviving physically and emotionally (Dallas Morning Star-Telegram). A Sunday Times Book of the YearA Village Voice Favorite Book of the YearAn Esquire (UK) Best Non-Fiction Award Finalist