Winded: A Memoir in Four Stages

by Dawn Newton

When Dawn Newton, an adjunct professor and mother of three, gets a terminal lung cancer diagnosis, the path forward appears rutted. The Great Recession has left her exhausted and juggling multiple jobs. Then she learns of her cancer’s mutation. She can take a pill each day to live longer.
Fifteen months into survival, she feels overwhelmed by the effort of staying alive. She longs to embrace moments and display gratitude yet can’t find words to articulate her needs. Regardless of any control she exerts over her body’s frailties, her emotional life asserts its own disruptive trajectory. Even as she labors to anchor herself to the love of family, she faces a blasphemous question: “If no cure is available, and death lurks around the next corner, is more time really worth it?”
In Winded, Newton describes life with terminal disease, exploring dark crevices of the psyche as she tries to assess the value of a life. The final lessons she imparts to her family may not be about resilience but about illuminating vulnerability and embracing the imperfect.

295 pages, Kindle Edition

Published October 1, 2019

Reviews

[Claudia Remenar · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this book by a local East Lansing author, someone I met while writing my own memoir. She was surprised by a diagnosis of stage 4 lung cancer in her early 50s. She has lived (and is still living) to write a book about her life and the impact of this disease on it. She has raised three kids similar in age to mine and has walked the same streets and interacted with some of the same people I have. It was a well-crafted dive into an ordinary life lived extraordinarily.

[Gilion Dumas · Rating 5 out of 5]

In her new book, Winded: A Memoir in Four Stages, Dawn Newton writes about living life to the fullest after she was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer. She has been treated with the drug Tarceva for the past seven years and writes unflinchingly but with great tenderness about her cancer fight and her struggle with depression.

Winded is a worthwhile read for anyone who has ever suffered from depression, cancer, or a chronic illness and the people close to them.

[Carole Duff · Rating 4 out of 5]

Winded is the author’s journey, living with cancer and depression while raising three children, managing a household, working, sorting through the past, and musing about the meaning of life.
The writing is strong and honest, though I longed for more of a definitive narrative arc, a transformation. Perhaps the manuscript would have benefited from one more edit.

[jan kociencki · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent and inspiring down to earth story of living with cancer

Writer doesn’t shy away from being imperfect. Very skilled with words and phrasing. Book flows well, liked descriptions of family and dog

[Cyndee Pierson · Rating 1 out of 5]

Repetitive and boring!

I would not recommend this book. It is repetitive and so boring.It took a week to read, where I normally read a book a day.