Hey, it's NPR's Book of the Day. I'm Andrew Limbaugh. Today's book, soundtrack of silence,

is ostensibly a medical memoir. It's by Matt Hay, who's got this genetic condition that leads to

hearing loss. And he broaches a lot of interesting ideas in this interview with NPR's Mary Louise

Kelly, who is also someone with pretty significant

hearing loss, by the way. Anyway, they get to talking about dealing with a slow-moving crisis,

learning to lip read, getting implants, and how music is helping him hear again. But what really

struck me was how he talked about his wife and how she helped him through this. And

listen, I'll be real.

I find the Beatles to be kind of corny. But there's a part in this interview where Hayes starts

talking about listening to Here Comes the Sun with his wife that, you know, just absolutely

touched me. Give it a listen after the break.

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This year will mark a decade since I realized I was going deaf.

Now, I've talked about this some publicly, but for those who don't know, I have severe

to profound hearing loss. I host this program, wearing hearing aids in both

years. So it was with special interest that I picked up the new memoir, soundtrack of silence.

The author, Matt Hay, has struggled with his hearing since he was a kid. As he grew up,

his hearing got worse, and then worse. In college, he found out he had NF2, neurofibromatosis

type 2. It's a rare genetic condition that caused tumors to grow on the nerves that transmit

...