In 2013, 37-year-old Canadian artist Teva Harrison was diagnosed with stage four metastatic breast cancer that had also spread to her lymph nodes and bones. Her eloquent, moving and inspiring graphic memoir, In-Between Days, offers her space to sort through her past and come to grips with the realities of her present and future. "Living with metastatic cancer is like a game of Whac-a-Mole," Harrison writes. "There's no point trying to cut it out, because it will just keep popping up somewhere else."
Harrison finds it hard to be optimistic when her doctor's diagnosis ends with, "We are no longer looking for a cure." But she understands that without hope she would not be able to go on. "I need to be careful," she writes. "Hope is delicious, heady stuff, but reality has a way of upsetting the applecart." A simple but expressive full-page illustration precedes each short (one or two pages) chapter/essay. Harrison deals with chemo-induced menopause, the genetic heritage of her disease in other family members, learning to put herself first and trying to find the "sweet spot" in her pain medication.
Harrison captivates with her charming illustrations as she navigates her disease and her uncertain but hopeful life with wry humor and refreshing candor. The journey to sad and dark places is a little less scary with her leading the way. "I understand now, though, the fear of being forgotten, of being erased," she writes. No one reading this gripping and inspiring memoir will forget Teva Harrison. --Kevin Howell, independent reviewer and marketing consultant