Author: Miriam Engelberg        

ISBN: 978-0-06-078973-2

The following review was contributed by: Sue Vogan: To read more of Sue's reviews Click Here

Cancer brings different reactions from different people, depending on how the person is involved with the big "c" word. I can't imagine being the patient who must deal with this dreadful disease; or the caregiver that changes bandages; or the friend or family member who watches their loved one suffer. But if I ever were to get cancer, I can only hope that I would handle it in the fashion Ms. Engelberg illustrates in her book, "Cancer Made Me a Shallower Person." 

Engelberg’s book is an autobiographical comic and has been described as "offbeat and darkly humorous." I found it honest and direct, much the way I envision myself handling cancer.

Engelberg meets the questions, comments, stress, and blah-days head on. In one cartoon, her character realizes that "a lack of stress doesn't work" for her, but she has cancer and states that she needs to "make some kind of dramatic change"...."right?" The cartoon moves to "months later" where the same character, "after surgery and chemo," finds herself resting in front of a television, "Yeah - I know, I should be meditating and journaling and reflecting...but I don't feel like it." She claims she is "still waiting for some kind of epiphany" so she can turn her life around. Page after page, you’re up, down, and everything in between -- as in the life of someone with cancer.

The cartoon that brought tears to my eyes (from laughter) was where her character is sitting in an exam room. The doctor asks where his patient is and the nurse points out that she is sitting directly behind him. The doctor apologizes, explaining that he didn't recognize her from the "photo." When she asks what photo he is speaking of, it turns out to be a photo of her -- exposing her nakedness from the bottom of her neck to just above her bellybutton. I don’t think I would recognize anyone from a photo like this either.

My own mother just recently passed away from cancer. I wish that she had lived to read this book, or that I had read it so that I would have better understood the emotional and physical roller coaster ride of this disease better. By no means is cancer a funny subject, but if humor is a tool that gets us through some of life's toughest moments, this book is the hardware store.

In the fall of 2001, at the age of forty-three, Miriam Engelberg was diagnosed with breast cancer. She created her first cartoon as she waited for the biopsy and states, “They say that hardship reveals one’s true-character, and it was clear right away that I wouldn’t be the heroic type of cancer patient portrayed in so many television shows and movies.” She claims that she “didn’t go inward” but “looked for pop culture distraction.” And, she makes it clear that there should be a “line of breast cancer t-shirts to cut to the chase.” It would certainly save people from starring at your chest as they try to figure out which one had the big “c.”

Miriam Engelberg will be interviewed on In Short Order (www.highway2health.net) on September 7, 2006 at 9PM EST.