cover image Picasso's Woman: A Breast Cancer Story

Picasso's Woman: A Breast Cancer Story

Rosalind MacPhee. Kodansha America, $20 (0pp) ISBN 978-1-56836-138-3

When she was told she had breast cancer, McFee, a Canadian poet, visualized her body as broken and rearranged, like those of the women in Picasso's cubist paintings. Yet, although she is unsparing in the details-the shock of discovery for someone otherwise healthy and vigorous, the surgery, the ensuing treatments-she is also sturdy and determined to savor the life she has. McFee faces her chances forthrightly with her loving and supportive children, husband and friends; and she plunges back into her work as a paramedic, her craft as a poet and her zest for the outdoors. And she can be tender with another woman who is dying of the dreaded disease. She nimbly brings to life her caring doctors and her terrors as well as her faith. Her attitude-that she ""was not dying of cancer-I was living with it. I knew there might be challenges ahead. But then, I've always liked adventures""-may give courage to others. (June) ~ FYI: This book won the Canadian Authors Association Literary Award in 1995.