10/25/2021
Cohen’s sensitive, stirring account of the 160 days between his wife’s diagnosis with stage 4 pancreatic cancer and her last breath finds “beauty within crisis” and invites readers to take inspiration from the “Smooth River” approach to ending a life that Cohen and his wife, Marcia Horowitz, arrived at in those last months. “Normalizing end-of-life matters—and dispelling societal distortions that avoid addressing them—are critically important,” Cohen notes in an introduction, and the narrative that follows exemplifies his argument. Once treatment options had been exhausted, the couple determined to face Horowitz’s probable final days with clear eyes and open hearts, making the most of each day, thinking of her life not as a tragedy cut short but as fully lived.
In short, they prepared for her to “leave this world in peace.” In crisp prose suffused with feeling, Cohen contests the societal tendency, shared by many doctors, to view terminal disease as a “fight” to be won or lost. That’s not to say that Horowitz, a crisis management expert, didn’t “fight” in the traditional sense, consulting with numerous experts, undergoing chemo, and pursuing all viable options. But Cohen argues, with both persuasive and emotional power, “A win is not necessarily defeating the cancer. A win is having lived a good life.”
That’s the current that courses throughout: their dedication to ending a life well, on their own loving terms. The book memorializes that life while showcasing a healthy approach to preparing for hard possibilities. The couple developed and held to both a Medical and Life Plan, which Cohen details throughout. Cohen movingly covers the medical practicalities—choosing navigating the system; handling “a thin-skinned, sensitive doctor”; dealing with “chemo brain”—while emphasizing the Life Plan, especially the urgency of filling time well, with heart-to-heart talks, simple pleasures, and the embrace of loved ones. Bursting with life, The Smooth River leads by example.
Takeaway: An inspiring, beautifully written account of living a life of purpose when faced with a terminal illness.
Great for fans of: Patricia Weenolsen’s The Art of Dying, Nina Riggs’s The Bright Hour: A Memoir of Living and Dying.
Production grades Cover: A- Design and typography: A Illustrations: N/A Editing: A Marketing copy: A
