Feliz ano velho

A classic of the 80s in Brazilian contemporary literature, it is the autobiography of this guy who just dives and becomes paraplegic. He has this way of using language that seems completely casual and friendly and like he's your childhood friend, and even though I haven't re read it and it's been at least a decade since I last saw my copy (wonder where it is), I still remember the feeling of “it absolutely sucks that it can happen to anyone, but it is the mother of the whole stupidity that it happened to such a cool guy”. Also, his father had disappeared (dictatorship in Brazil), and his family knew all kinds of interesting people. Definitely worth checking it out.