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Veronika Decides to Die: A Novel of Redemption (P.S.)
by: Paulo Coelho

List Price: $13.95

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Availability: unknown Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 813
EAN: 9785955000831
ISBN: 0061124265
Label: Harper Perennial
Manufacturer: Harper Perennial
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 240
Publication Date: June 01, 2006
Publisher: Harper Perennial
Release Date: May 23, 2006
Studio: Harper Perennial
Sales Rank: 10962

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Editorial Review:

Product Description:

Twenty-four-year-old Veronika seems to have everything -- youth and beauty, boyfriends and a loving family, a fulfilling job. But something is missing in her life. So, one cold November morning, she takes a handful of sleeping pills expecting never to wake up. But she does -- at a mental hospital where she is told that she has only days to live.

Inspired by events in Coelho's own life, Veronika Decides to Die questions the meaning of madness and celebrates individuals who do not fit into patterns society considers to be normal. Bold and illuminating, it is a dazzling portrait of a young woman at the crossroads of despair and liberation, and a poetic, exuberant appreciation of each day as a renewed opportunity.

Amazon.com Review:
When Paulo Coelho (The Alchemist) was a young man, his parents had him committed to mental hospitals three times because he wanted to be an artist--an unacceptable profession in Brazil at the time. During his numerous forced incarcerations he vowed to write some day about his experiences and the injustices of involuntary commitment. In this fable-like novel, Coelho makes good on his promise, with the creation of a fictional character named Veronika who decides to kill herself when faced with all that is wrong with the world and how powerless she feels to change anything. Although she survives her initial suicide attempt, she is committed to a mental hospital where she begins to wrestle with the meaning of mental illness and whether forced drugging should be inflicted on patients who don't fit into the narrow definition of "normal." The strength and tragedy of Veronika's fictional story was instrumental in passing new government regulations in Brazil that have made it more difficult to have a person involuntarily committed. Like any great storyteller, Coelho has used the realm of fiction to magically infiltrate and alter the realm of reality. --Gail Hudson

Customer Reviews

Average Rating: out of 5 stars

Rating:

- Surpisingly one of the Funniest books i have ever read..........
i love Paolo Coelho's sense of humor....
this book has a lot of humor....
and yet it does not go over the top..........
the most surpising thing of all is that there's always something to learn about life from his novels..........
this is such a fun and funny book that will teach some chapters of life....
and give us HOPE....
Highly recommended!!!!

Rating:

- wonderful book
I loved this book. You never expect a book to touch you... this one does.

Rating:

- Inner madness
My favorite book from Coelho. Read it through almost with one go and will definitely reread it soon. It's so crazy how many people have confined their inner craziness.

Rating:

- Decide to read this.
This is the first novel I decided to read by Paulo Coelho. Yes, the title is very blunt, quite literal, and perhaps a bit pretentious to a jaded generation who consider such things as "cool". However, the text itself is turely far from pretension. Infact, it's quite modest and dealing with such a subject as suicide and mental institutions, the story becomes simple,honest, and life affirming.

In the first page of Coelho's novel, Veronika decides to die (no pun intended). Her attempt, though, fails, and she awakes in a mental institution where she is told by the head doctor, Dr. Igor, that in her attempted suicide, she had in fact had done serious damage to her body, her heart to be exact, succumbing her to eventual death. So it seems she did succeed. The remainder of the novel is ... Read More

Rating:

- "About living like it is the last day of your life"
Veronika is a young woman in her 20's that decides life has nothing left to offer her, and comites suicide, only she was not succesful, but instead she wakes up in a mental hospital. She is told that her heart was damaged though, and she has about a week to live. During this time she meets other people comited to this hospital, who do make a contribution to her life, she learns to live like this is the last day of her life, and discovers she now desires to live, so this is what unfolds here. Amazing story who leads to self discovery and to find new meaning to our lives as well as promting us to pursuing dreams that we think are out of our reach, after all what have we got to lose, is better to try reaching our dreams even if they seem improbable than not trying at all.
Living life like ... Read More

Books : Veronika Decides to Die: A Novel of Redemption (P.S.)