Will Schwalbe was a former editor at a major publishing house, so it was no surprise that he loved to read - and grew up surrounded by books.
When his mother, Mary Anne Schwalbe, was diagnosed with terminal pancreatic cancer in 2007, the two began spending time together in hospital waiting rooms. They often would talk about the books they were reading and books that they shared. And so began the "End of Your Life" book club.
Even though the outcome is obvious in the title, it's worth the read to see how their relationship grows in the last stage of Mary Anne's life.
Will's mother is a spitfire, as my grandmother would say, someone who knows what she wants and doesn't want to sugar-coat it.
She is a strong, well-traveled, well-educated woman, who despised being called a "working mother" during her career as dean of admissions for Harvard University and Radcliff College.
Mary Anne never fully retired, and after her first career she began another one as a humanitarian and one of the founders of the Women's Commission for Refugee Women and Children, which she directed for several years.
She also was a founder of the International Rescue Committee, and it was through the IRC that her passion to build mobile libraries in Afghanistan emerged. She traveled across the world raising money and awareness for this project - even when it was detrimental to her health.
Each chapter is a book title they read and why it is important to them. Will discusses the themes that emerge in each book and how that applies to their situation. Mary Anne is an extremely accomplished and well-read woman, so it was interesting to hear her responses to a particular book. One of my favorite was the following, from Geraldine Brooks' "People of the Book": I love how Brooks shows that every great religion shares a love of books, of reading, of knowledge. The individual books may be different, but reverence for books is what we all have in common. Books are what bring the different people in the novel together that's why everyone in the book goes to such lengths to save this one book - one book stands for all books.
When I think back on all the refugee camps I visited, all over the world, the people always asked for the same thing: books. Sometimes even before medicine or shelter - they wanted books for their children."
But in later chapters, her responses are not as complex and detailed. And it is in those moments that it becomes obvious the toll the chemotherapy - and the cancer - is taking on her mind and body; the "End of Your Life" part of her story is nearing.
Toward the end of the book, passages from Mary Wilder Tileston's "Daily Strength for Daily Needs" become a source of inspiration for Mary Ann and she left pages earmarked for her son to "accidentally" see - issues they couldn't talk about as mother and son but they could discuss as readers.
What quickly emerges from the titles the two select is their bond. What they couldn't say to each other they could say while discussing the books. The two begin to have insightful and philosophical discussions about the books, which makes the reader want to join the book club, too (well, not a book club where I die at the end, but you get the picture!).
Although this would seem to be a sad book, it really is a celebration of Mary Ann and her amazing life. And a celebration of books - the power that comes from the joy of reading and sharing a story with others, how books can be a source of comfort, how books can be revealing and inform us about the world around us.
This was a book made for book-lovers and readers of all genres.
In the beginning, you learn that Mary Anne always skipped to the end of a book so she knows what to expect. Will takes you on a sweet, loving journey, and from the title, we know how Mary Anne's story ends.
It's everything in between that makes it such a touching story.