Gila Pfeffer, creator of the "Feel It on the First" campaign promoting breast health, details her extraordinary history of preventative medicine in Nearly Departed: Adventures in Loss, Cancer, and Other Inconveniences. "By thirty, I was the oldest living member of my family," she writes. Both of her parents died from cancer, her mother at 42, her father at 54. Determined to avoid the same outcome, Pfeffer adopted a rigorous "prevention protocol: check, double check, get on with the business of living, and then check some more." When genetic testing revealed she carried the BRCA1 gene, indicating a high likelihood that she would develop breast cancer, she pursued a double mastectomy. When a biopsy revealed the presence of two tumors, she underwent chemotherapy and eventually the removal of her ovaries.
Pfeffer does not shy away from the grisly details of her treatments--or the agony of making what were often deemed risky medical decisions--but does so with a biting sense of humor that makes Nearly Departed as funny as it is revealing. ("Look, you can replace my breasts with two frozen rib eye steaks, or a pomegranate and one balled up sock--I don't care, just get these two ticking time bombs off me.") Through it all, she remains supported by her family, friends, and faith, and she infuses her story with elements of her Jewish cultural identity and religious practice. Passionate about the benefits of cancer prevention, Pfeffer notes that early in her efforts, all she "was missing was a pulpit." Nearly Departed gives her just that, combining an introspective and surprisingly humorous memoir with a plea to all readers to understand their medical history and prevention options. --Kerry McHugh, freelance writer