I noticed that Cancer Schmancer was an improvement from Enter Whining, Drescher's first memoir, published only a few years before. (Also, this may be a tall demand, but please, can I have a third memoir? What happened with John? Helloooo?) Anyway, the key factor of the improvement is simply that Cancer Schmancer feels more honest. As a result, it's darker, though not at the expense of losing any of Fran's humorous colloquial banter throughout the book. (I can understand how this would annoy some readers, because she does take it to an extreme, but I personally didn't find that it detracted from the story at all.) The honesty of the memoir makes it more engrossing, though it is a short, easy read.It was interesting to note that Drescher admits several times in Cancer Schmancer that the truths that she expressed in Enter Whining didn't hold true after the few years following the release of the first memoir. The most powerful example of this is the contrast between her confidence in having moved on completely from the 1985 burlglary and rape, and her recognizing how deeply traumatized she was by the rape later on. Her insights on her divorce are also startlingly frank -- she admits to unhealthy codependency and immaturity.Perhaps because I've only seen Drescher in "The Nanny," I haven't experienced these changes in outlook, even from the distance of a fan. I didn't expect the sudden maturity and growth evident in Cancer Schmancer's author. The two memoirs represent her growth, although I would recommend skipping over the more kitschy Enter Whining (complete with a billion family photos) and just reading Cancer Schmancer, even for fans.
I'm not sure if she wrote this by herself, but I think she did. And for a celebrity author, it's well written and not terribly self absorbed.I just finished this book in January 2014, though I have known that she had cancer and has been an advocate for women's health for years. What struck me as odd is that she describes her years long journey bouncing back and forth between 9 doctors and suddenly gets diagnosed by doctor number 9 and has surgery a week later without getting a second opinion. The book reeked of being uninformed or underinformed, but she is a celebrity, so.......take everything with a grain of salt. Maybe she was just so tired of going to doctors and just decided to trust doctor 9 because that was the only doctor who actually diagnosed her with something. And obviously, she wasn't misdiagnosed, I'm just saying that this particular part of the book was strange for me.I understand that her battle was hers and no one elses but part of the book made her seem like a martyr when, all things considered, she had it pretty easy since she never had to do chemo, radiation, reconstruction, or some of the worst things cancer has to offer. Not saying cancer is easy, just saying that she only knew she had it for a week, had one surgery and she was cured. In cancer world, that's "easy"I did enjoy the book overall. But I knew I would since I was a huge fan of The Nanny. I wish I could give it three and a half stars because it's better than "just ok" but not quite worth of 4 stars.
Do You like book Cancer Schmancer (2005)?
Fran tells it like it is. She doesn't hold back. She tells you how she found herself to be diagnosed with uterine cancer. She describes her symptoms and how hard it was to get a correct diagnosis and treatment. She went to many different doctors to find out what was wrong with her but they all proclaimed her to be normal, just fine. But she wasn't fine, no sir. She had cancer. She also talks about how she recovered after her surgery and how having cancer affected her and her loved ones. She talks about being a baby and selfish and lets it all hang out, which is one reason why I loved this book. This is a good book to read just to learn about uterine cancer if nothing else, oy!
—Liberality
This is a memoir written by Fran Drescher, the nanny. It seems she had another memoir for the preceding years, but I have not found that one. This one begins right as her marriage and her show are ending, and she begins experiencing lots of bad symptoms. she takes us through two years of being sick before discovering that she had cancer, and then takes us through her surgery and recovery. i was surprised that since she is a celebrity, she got such bad and wrong medical care, but it goes to show that anyone can be overlooked in our medical system. The writing style is very, very casual. it's more like she's actually there having a conversation with you instead of writing a book. this means that some things that maybe should be left out, get left in, but it also makes it seem more honest and real. We also get the story of a woman who had been in a relationship with one guy since she was a teen, and never really had a youthful youth, now trying to find herself at 40. Super quick read, very informational on the medical side, overall a good book that people should read so that they remember to take their health into their own hands.
—Merredith
This was probably important for her healing process and hopefully worked for that, but as a book, it's not very good written. There are short and somewhat loose stories, not always relative to the story. Also unfortunately she's also using couple of cheap tricks, like bringing up 'not wearing anything that day' and telling 'how she likes to be naked', which were not relevant for the story at that part of the book and hence sounded very strange to mention. The book was written more like act1, act2, then side story not so much related to anything, act 3 and so on. She actually explained how this happen, as she told she wrote the book in sessions, one chapter at a time. That might explain why the book is not consistent. The important message in the book that can be given credit for is 'you are the best one to decide whether there's something wrong about you or not. The doctors make mistakes, so you need to learn about the symptoms and decease that might cause it, to make sure the doctors get it right', to make it short. Which is important to remember, but in the end is kind of old news which you knew already. For me the book was disappointing.
—Dimi Doukas
