praise
“The musical precision of her words is felt in the body, cutting straight to the core. You emerge from Who in This Room as if from a vigorous swim, refreshed and more alive.” — Claire Fuqua Anderson, Shelf Awareness for Readers, Featured, Starred Review
“Katherine Malmo has written an unflinching, unsentimental, profoundly moving, wickedly funny (yes, I said funny) deeply courageous book detailing one woman’s diagnosis, treatment and recovery from inflammatory breast cancer. These stories are made of a fictioneer’s wit, a poet’s sensibility, a storyteller’s enthusiasm and a survivor’s heart. They have the power to reconnect us to that part of ourselves we need when anything bad happens, that gritty, humored, resilient, unspeakably beautiful spark in the center of each of us that knows only how to lock its jaws and hang on.” —Pam Houston, author of Contents May Have Shifted
“This moving, courageous, honest, and beautifully written account is not about the life of a cancer survivor, but rather of a life defined by living. It was a privilege to read it.”–Nancy Pearl, NPR commentator and author of Book Lust: Recommended Reading for Every Mood, Moment, and Reason
“The kind and clear gift of this lovingly rendered book is not only about surviving cancer, but also that the unwelcome, terrible, and questionably survivable tragedies that visit every human life must not only be faced and handled, but lived.”–Lisa Romeo, ForeWord Reviews
“It’s pretty easy now for breast cancer stories to be swathed in pink, to be about survival and triumph, to have an easily identifiable arc. Katherine’s book is like flint, like hard rock on frozen water. There’s no sentimentality here. But there’s no self-pity and wallowing in the details either. It’s even funny in some parts. It’s clear and strong and utterly horrifying. It’s art, not a memoir.” — Shauna Ahern, Gluten Free Girl and The Chef
“It’s a hell of a thing for anyone to get diagnosed with aggressive breast cancer. Katherine Malmo shares the terror of that – and keeps going. Who In this Room puts breast cancer square in its place, right in the middle of life: messy, funny, scary, mundane, over-the-top-emotional life, life filled with fly-fishing and chemo, birthday parties and best friends and breast inserts. Malmo writes with honesty and a hard-won, appealing humor about the gritty and absurd aspects of living with cancer. That this young woman makes it out alive is amazing; by writing about it so gracefully, she lets us take heart from her long haul. Brava, Katherine Malmo. Who In this Room is an extraordinary achievement.”–Summer Wood, author of Wrecker
“Who In This Room is an honest, unflinching look at life with cancer, welded into a thing of lyrical beauty. Katherine Malmo, an observant and gifted writer, never misses the irony or insight of a moment, including the one that gives the book its title.”–Erica Bauermeister, author of Joy For Beginners
“…it was the first I’ve read that really connected with me on how it feels to have cancer… And I do want you to read this book. I want my friends to read it. I want my family to read it. Because even though this is Kate’s story, it is my story, too. And the story of all my friends who have looked cancer in the eye, and stared down death… even if only for a little while.” — Coffee Jitters Blog Review
“Her writing is in a league of its own. It’s authentic, poetic, sophisticated and told from a bitingly keen perspective. Katherine tells her story in an intimate way and takes you with her and keeps you close. I felt it really showed the struggle of wanting to focus on who you are outside of your cancer, and equally so, the person you become because of it.” —Boob is just Bob with an O Blog
“If all stories are in some fashion a quest, Katherine Malmo’s story quests toward the triumph of curiosity over fear. “Sometimes we don’t control our own destinies,” Malmo notes near the end of this book, which is her way of shifting the essential question from “what is it?” to “don’t think I didn’t notice” my questions aren’t being answered and what are we going to do about this? Employing “a language as precise as possible,” a recipe recommended by Italo Calvino in his essay “Exactitude,” with prose welded out of a grab bag of whippet smart observations and searing self-inspection, Malmo guides us from salad spinners to vultures—“these birds didn’t cause cancer, but they were attracted to particles in the air that did”—to welding to adoption on her often funny but never self-pitying quest to de-mythologize cancer. It’s a quest this reader wouldn’t have wanted to miss.”–Scott Driscoll, author of Seattle
“Lyrical, vivid, a memoirist work of art that glitters as it charges forward and takes your breath away.”– Priscilla Long, author of The Writer’s Portable Mentor: A Guide to Art, Craft, and the Writing Life
“Katherine Malmo touches the most tender subject with intimate grace, subtle wit, and piercing honesty.Through the crucible of her own experience, she has forged a life-affirming collection of dazzling stories, lit by hope and sparked by compassion.”–Melanie Rae Thon, author of The Voice of the River
“A moving, touching memoir about the trauma and triumph of surviving breast cancer. An inspiring read!”–Nick O’Connell, author of On Sacred Ground: the Spirit of Place in Pacific Northwest Literature