Review: The Mercy Papers by Robin Romm

Fierce, emotional, and painful, this book is Romm's recounting of her mother's last three weeks before dying of breast cancer. Her mother was diagnosed with Stage IV breast cancer when Romm was only 19. She lived for nine more years. Nine short years. Nine not-nearly-enough years. But then she died, slowly, painfully, and too soon. Romm tells roughly not only of her mother's last three weeks but also the ways in which her mother's dying affected her. She was angry and selfish and bitter, raging against the universe and the hospice nurse and her mother's longtime friends and her father and herself.

This is not an easy book to read, despite its slight size. It is packed with incredible depth of emotion, such that sometimes the reader has to take a breather, the very thing that Romm could not do, could not afford to do, in the time of her mother's dying. And as much as this is the memoir of a woman dying, it is also very much the story of Robin Romm, the daughter losing her mother. It is peppered with memories and remembrances, because even before her mother is physically gone, she is no longer the mother Romm knew, instead floating on a sea of pain killers and barely conscious. Romm does not sugar-coat her feelings about the people surrounding her mother. She is oftentimes nasty and snipes at them, either on the page or in fact. She is selfish, not wanting to share her mother, wanting her to be present as long as she can. Throughout, it is clear that she is devastated and fighting no matter the cost. This book is raw, it is angry, it is philosophical, and it probably isn't for everyone. But it is well-written and intense and true too. The final twelve pages of the book, blank because loss never ends, are stark reminders of the hole left behind for Romm and her family, and really for all of us. And those readers who don't shy away from the pain depicted here will find a gem.