Debut Author Snapshot: Will Schwalbe

All you need for a book club are two readers and one book. Writer Will Schwalbe discovered this as he discussed literature, life, and death with his mother during her chemotherapy sessions for Stage IV pancreatic cancer. He captures their lively banter in his debut memoir, The End of Your Life Book Club. Schwalbe's mother, Mary Anne, was a tireless campaigner for humanitarian causes, including libraries in Afghanistan and refugee rights, and refused to be sidelined by her disease. He tells of his mother's uncanny strength to survive past her prognosis and how their shared love of books buoyed them both.

Schwalbe is founder of the recipe-sharing site Cookstr.com, former editor-in-chief of Hyperion Books, and an author advisor to Goodreads. He shares part of his inspiration for The End of Your Life Book Club and discusses what one should read—because time is short.

Goodreads: Many Goodreads reviewers found The End of Your Life Book Club to be uplifting, and one reviewer calls it a "celebration of [your mother's] life" rather than an observation of her passing. What was your goal when you began writing?

Will Schwalbe: I did indeed want to celebrate my mother's life and pass on to others some of what I'd learned from her. But I also wanted to celebrate reading and the role that books can play in all our lives. It always bugs me when I hear people say, "Why don't you put down that book and do something." Reading is doing something—something huge.

GR: Did your mother know of your plans for the book? What was her reaction?

WS: A few months before my mother died I told her that I wanted to write about our book club—about the books we read and the conversations we'd had. Her first reaction was to say, "Oh sweetie, you don't want to spend your time doing that. You have so many other things to do and to write." But the next day she sent me an e-mail with a list of all the books we read and notes. We never talked about the book I wanted to write again, but she kept sending me e-mails with additions to the list and topics to include.

GR: What books do you most cherish having shared with your mother?

WS: Crossing to Safety by Wallace Stegner. Why I Wake Early by Mary Oliver. Gilead by Marilynne Robinson. Big Machine by Victor LaValle. Unaccustomed Earth by Jhumpa Lahiri. There were so, so many—it's very hard to single out a few.

GR: What is your take on escapist book choices? If you never know what book will be your last, should our book choices always be "good" for us—opportunities to learn something or understand something?

WS: I did come to agree with my mother that there are some books that are silly because the writer has nothing to say, or it's all just a lead-up to a trick at the end, for example. But I think that you can learn something from most books—and a book one reader might consider escapist reading could be life changing for another.

Just because you never know which book or conversation about a book will be your last, doesn't mean you can't read for all sorts of reasons, including for fun. I believe it does, however, mean that you should read thoughtfully, passionately, and even eclectically. And you should engage those around you, whenever possible, in conversations about the books you're reading.

GR: What's next for you as a writer?

WS: Something very different.