Fine, Thanks: Stories from the Cancerland Jungle

Mary Dunnewold was a yoga-practicing, organic-food-eating health geek. But six months after a clear mammogram, she was diagnosed with stage-three breast cancer. She had six tumors. The largest was the size of a summer plum.

 In the next two years, she endured a bilateral mastectomy, chemotherapy, radiation, and multiple reconstruction procedures. But she soon learned that navigating cancer involves more than suffering through the treatment gauntlet. How do you walk the aisles of a small-town Target, guilty of having cancer in public, wondering who knows and who doesn’t? Where do you look when the handsome plastic surgeon kneels in front of you to measure your body fat? What etiquette applies when, during a dinner party, your chest splits open like an overripe watermelon?

 In this memoir, the author moves from needing a reason to explain her troubles to finding meaning despite the randomness that afflicts us all.