WHEN HOPE IS YOUR ONLY OPTION

Super-survivor Stavis presents a memoir about a life marked by cheating death.

Even if Stavis’ memoir restricted itself to the time when he received a triple heart/kidney/pancreas transplant and survived, his story would still be unique. But this autobiography is so much more than that incredible feat. Death stalked Stavis early on. Diagnosed with diabetes as a teen in the early 1970s, he didn’t think he’d reach the other side of 50. That reality, Stavis realized, would affect every aspect of his burgeoning young life: from the friends he kept, to opportunities he pursued, and to the woman he would ultimately marry. He started taking note of tombstones and the special meaning behind the dashes etched between the date of a person’s birth and death dates. (“In 1971, the dash denoting the stop and start of my life seemed likely to be several decades shorter than the norm, so I wanted to fill the dash with as much life, success, and happiness as I possible could manage,” he writes.) Funnily enough, that attitude led the author to several hair-raising experiences long before he faced the triple organ transplant. Those brushes with death included nearly drowning, succumbing to a fire, going down in a plane crash, and being caught in a field with six bulls running after him. The author’s uplifting narrative is jam-packed with joie de vivre.When he advises against victimhood, it seems to emanate from a place of power rather than pitilessness. And, being a child of the 1970s, he quotes the song “Spinning Wheel” from Blood, Sweat & Tears to reinforce his philosophy: “What goes up must come down / Spinnin’ wheel got to go ’round / Talkin’ ’bout your troubles is a cryin’ sin / Ride a painted pony, let the spinnin’ wheel spin.”Stavis explains that he took risks because “I was not going to be cheated out of the fullness or richness of life.” That infectious spirit is writ large across every page of this wonderfully engrossing life story and should appeal to anyone who’s experiencing dark days of their own.

An endlessly entertaining, death-defying source of inspiration.