Picked up from the free shelf at the used book store today. It has a big X on the front, which is the store's indication of a book they will not resell, but otherwise is in good shape.

From Amazon: Lia Lee was born in 1981 to a family of recent Hmong immigrants, and soon developed symptoms of epilepsy. By 1988 she was living at home but was brain dead after a tragic cycle of misunderstanding, overmedication, and culture clash: "What the doctors viewed as clinical efficiency the Hmong viewed as frosty arrogance." The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down is a tragedy of Shakespearean dimensions, written with the deepest of human feeling. Sherwin Nuland said of the account, "There are no villains in Fadiman's tale, just as there are no heroes. People are presented as she saw them, in their humility and their frailty--and their nobility."

This is an amazing story of a clash of cultures. I hope that it is better in the U.S. now, with more interpreters and more information on different cultures, but I fear there are still problems. The Hmong culture and Western medicine have very little in common! The author does a great job of showing both points of view respectfully. Highly recommended.

I have passed this along to a coworker who expressed interest in it, so am marking it as travelling.

This book was left in my Little Free Library Charter #96580 (@BirkdaleBooks). This is the first Book Crossing book that I have found in the library and wanted to make sure to log it before it continues on its travels.