Synopsis

A devastating diagnosis. A family with a broken past. Embark on an uplifting journey of love, hope, and the ultimate second chance.

When health-conscious Sarah gets diagnosed with breast cancer, her world spins out of control. She’s supposed to grow old with her husband and see her daughter graduate college. Her future is all planned out. Getting sick wasn’t part of her plan.

Friends and family rally around Sarah as she battles the disease. Her best friend offers inspirational advice while her mother takes her to treatment, her daughter makes green juice, and her older brother provides emotional support and makes her laugh with his ever-present potty mouth.

Then Sarah’s estranged father returns. She gave up on him long ago and doesn’t want to reconnect, but he won’t go away, so she’s stuck dealing with him at the worst possible time. His presence forces her to face a past she’d rather forget as she uses all her strength to fight for her life.

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Review

This novel about Sarah’s journey through breast cancer treatment might have hit fairly close to home. While it has been 20 years since I went through my diagnosis, most of what Sarah was thinking and feeling was close to my experience. It made me a little uncomfortable, but I think that was because it was like reliving that year of my life. I even had the same triple-negative cancer diagnosis. Some of my treatment varied, but that isn’t surprising since this character had a few other things on top of what I had.

Despite that feeling, this book was fraught with emotion. Sarah was definitely on a rollercoaster with how she felt during her treatments, her interactions with her family, her new friend Nancy, a fellow cancer fighter, and her wayward father reappearing in her life, wanting to be a part of it all. There are times when Sarah is hard on herself. Cancer doesn’t care that you have done your best to lead a healthy life; it just pops up out of the blue, and there is nothing you could have done to stop it from appearing. That is probably the hardest battle Sarah has to fight: blame. There is no one to blame for this situation, especially not herself.

I was glad to see that Sarah had a great support system from her husband, daughter, mom, and brother. Her father made an appearance after decades of little contact and not the best childhood for Sarah or her brother. There is some great advice given by Nancy later in the book: to accept him for what he can give if he is going to be a part of her life. Sarah knows what he didn’t do for her growing up, and she can’t really expect him to change. I think this is sage advice for most people.

This book addresses the reality of cancer treatments. While situations will vary, the treatments and emotions are real. I remember how I felt when I started losing my hair. It was hard to cut it off, so it didn’t come off in clumps in the shower or wherever. It isn’t all about vanity. Sure, part of it is feeling like a part of you is missing, but it is about announcing to the world that something is wrong. I will confirm that “chemo brain” is real. Trying to remember everything, the right word, or processes can be daunting.

While fictional, it is based on the author’s own fight with cancer, and any person who has fought cancer will be able to relate to this book.

We give this book 5 paws up.

About the Author

Kim Cano is the author of six women’s fiction novels: A Widow Redefined, On the Inside, Eighty and Out, His Secret Life, When the Time Is Right, and The Healing Train. Readers say her books are about strong women who struggle but survive, hard-won second chances, family life, and friendship.

Kim lives in the Chicago suburbs with her husband and cat.

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