Now a major motion picture—The Upside—starring Bryan Cranston, Kevin Hart,
and Nicole Kidman. Discover the moving and heartfelt #1 international
bestseller and inspiration for the film The Upside about an aristocratic
Frenchman who is paralyzed in an accident and has to adjust to his new
normal with the help of his unlikely caregiver. As the descendant of two
prominent French families and director of a legendary vineyard, Philippe
Pozzo di Borgo was not in the habit of asking for help. Then, in 1993,
right on the heels of his beloved wife’s diagnosis of a terminal illness, a
paragliding accident left him a quadriplegic. He was forty-two years old
and unable to do anything—even feed himself—without the help of another
person. Passing his days hidden behind the high walls of his Paris
townhouse, Philippe was totally isolated. His paralysis rendered him unable
to reach out to others and seemed to make people unwilling to touch him or
acknowledge the reality of his existence. For the first time, he learned
what it felt like to be excluded. The only person who seemed not to be
bothered by Philippe’s condition was someone who had been marginalized his
entire life: Abdel, an unemployed, uninhibited Algerian immigrant from the
outskirts of society who would become Philippe's unlikely caretaker. With
his tenacious spirit and irreverent sense of humor, Abdel is able to
reawaken Philippe’s connection to people and the larger world around him. A
Second Wind is the inspiring true story of two men who refused to ask for
help, and then wound up helping each other in more ways than they could
imagine.