The Unwinding of the Miracle

A Memoir of Life, Death, and Everything That Comes After

By: Julie Yip-Williams

Narrated by: Emily Woo Zeller, Joshua Williams

New York Times best seller

Read with Jenna Book Club Pick as Featured on Today

As a young mother facing a terminal diagnosis, Julie Yip-Williams began to write her story, a story like no other. What began as the chronicle of an imminent and early death became something much more - a powerful exhortation to the living.

"An exquisitely moving portrait of the daily stuff of life." (The New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice)

Named one of the Best Books of the Year by:

• The New York Times Book Review
• Time
• Real Simple
• Good Housekeeping

That Julie Yip-Williams survived infancy was a miracle. Born blind in Vietnam, she narrowly escaped euthanasia at the hands of her grandmother, only to flee with her family the political upheaval of her country in the late 1970s. Loaded into a rickety boat with 300 other refugees, Julie made it to Hong Kong and, ultimately, America, where a surgeon at UCLA gave her partial sight. She would go on to become a Harvard-educated lawyer, with a husband, a family, and a life she had once assumed would be impossible. Then, at age 37, with two little girls at home, Julie was diagnosed with terminal metastatic colon cancer, and a different journey began.

The Unwinding of the Miracle is the story of a vigorous life refracted through the prism of imminent death. When she was first diagnosed, Julie Yip-Williams sought clarity and guidance through the experience and, finding none, began to write her way through it - a chronicle that grew beyond her imagining. Motherhood, marriage, the immigrant experience, ambition, love, wanderlust, tennis, fortune-tellers, grief, reincarnation, jealousy, comfort, pain, the marvel of the body in full rebellion - this audiobook is as sprawling and majestic as the life it records. It is inspiring and instructive, delightful and shattering. It is an audiobook of indelible moments, seared deep - an incomparable guide to living vividly by facing hard truths consciously.

With humor, bracing honesty, and the cleansing power of well-deployed anger, Julie Yip-Williams set the stage for her lasting legacy and one final miracle: the story of her life.

Praise for The Unwinding of the Miracle

"Everything worth understanding and holding on to is in this book.... A miracle indeed." (Kelly Corrigan, New York Times best-selling author)

"A beautifully written, moving, and compassionate chronicle that deserves to be read and absorbed widely." (Siddhartha Mukherjee, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Emperor of All Maladies)

©2019 Julie Yip-Williams (P)2019 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

“Eloquent, gutting and at times disarmingly funny... Yip-Williams writes with such vibrancy and electricity even as she is dying.... This memoir is so many things - a triumphant tale of a blind immigrant, a remarkable philosophical treatise and a call to arms to pay attention to the limited time we have on this earth. But at its core, it’s an exquisitely moving portrait of the daily stuff of life: family secrets and family ties, marriage and its limitlessness and limitations, wild and unbounded parental love and, ultimately, the graceful recognition of what we can’t - and can - control.” (The New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice)

“Everything worth understanding and holding on to is in this book.... A miracle indeed.” (Kelly Corrigan, New York Times best-selling author of The Middle Place and Tell Me More)

“A beautifully written, moving, and compassionate chronicle that deserves to be read and absorbed widely.” (Siddhartha Mukherjee, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Emperor of All Maladies)

“Julie Yip-Williams lived a life defined by effort and incredible self-reliance. But in this searing memoir of increasing vulnerability, she dismantles and then reconstructs what it means to be triumphant. Her writing examines not only her disability and illness - and their cultural, medical, and narrative constructs - but love, authenticity, hope, egotism, even rage. I didn’t know Julie, but in these pages, I grew to love her.” (Lucy Kalanithi)

Death is mandatory. Living is optional

Julie couldn't be more different than I on the exterior. We are however very similar on life philosophy on many aspects of the miracle that is life. Because of that, this book touched me profoundly. I look forward to my adventures in Antarctica. I look forward to spending daily walks with my dogs. In other words, I am more cognizant that death is mandatory, life is optional.

Read this book. Be present every day. Travel. Be brave. Seek out adventures. Appreciate the loved ones in your life.

Very private memoir and a reflection on life.

Great memoir ❤️ It bounced around and was a little repetitive, but still wonderful. I can't imagine how hard this was for her to write and for her family to read. God Bless her daughters❣️

So sad but heart warming

Very sad and emotional. Inspiring at the same time. Glad there was an epilogue. thank you Josh for letting us know how her last days were. heartwarming sediments. God bless you and your girls.

Beautiful tribute to both life and death

This book is a beautiful tribute to life with all of its ups, downs, questions, jealousy, anger, happiness, independence, fragility, and LOVE. Julie gave me all the feels! I admire her ability to be REAL in her writing despite the challenges she was facing in her life. This morning I lectured my kids on how many times I had to ask them to put their coat and shoes on for school. Then I found myself thinking “what would Julie give to be able to do that just 1 more time?” I will live life differently because of Julie. Thanks for that! This book is a beautiful tribute and writing from a resilient and strong woman!

Helpful and profound

As I mourn the passing of my best friend who died of metastatic breast cancer at 42, I needed to understand what she was going through. While she had shared with me a lot, it was helpful to hear Julie’s story and how she was finding her way through her journey with metastatic cancer. Sure there were parts of the book that felt redundant, but come on, we are listening to a woman talk about her life, her journey with cancer and what she thinks it means. I am grateful for the opportunity to have heard her story.

Very Moving and Inspiring.

This was thought through very well. Thank you Julie! I would have love to have met you. You shared parallels to cancer that I could relate to having lost my brother to cancer. It changed my life. Thank you for speaking how I felt going through that time. Bless your family!

Excellent book!!!

One of the best, most honest
books I've read. Everyone needs to hear Julie's story.

A true gift!

Julie Yip-Williams memoir is a true gift to those lucky enough to have good health and to those dealing with life limiting illnesses. I am grateful for what she has shared here and am even more determined to shake things up and pay attention to the things that are most important in my life.
Her honest account of her and her family’s journey through her illness is a testament to her strength and dedication to her husband and child. Thank you to Julie and her family for sharing the intimate details of this inspiring story.

Sad story

This book is very well, excellently narrated, however 2 stars for the story. This is a sad story, a lot of detail of what happens in the life of a terminal cancer patient. did not leave me any hope for happiness even tough at times for whatever reason was my original expectation/hope. Moreover it scared the shit out my me that something like this happens to someone really close to me.

On the other hand, a confirmation that there is no such thing as justice in life. Julie was destined to die since she was a baby but escaped death from Vietnam and flourished in America all the way to an Ivy League college. Then she got the cancer, again sad story and very detailed chronicles of her dead.

God bless Her memory as well as Josh and the girls all the love to them.

Dying from a new perspective

I have nothing but respect & gratitude for the author for choosing to share this most personal of journeys with us. This has given me a whole new perspective on the journey to the life beyond this one. It was very well written and narrated, and I would highly recommend it.