Pale Girl Speaks

August 27, 2012
Composed as a screenplay with truncated chapters, very little exposition, and lots of punchy dialog, L.A. blogger Fogelson's memoir mines the panic and fear she felt when diagnosed with skin cancer just as she and her husband were thinking of having children. In her mid-20s, fair-complexioned, and a veteran sun worshiper, Fogelson had to make an about-face when her dermatologist revealed that a malignant melanoma required immediate surgery. She got strong support from family members including her clean-freak mother, laconic father, and TV-producer husband, Adam. And there were numerous, attentive doctors, all of whose quirky personalities are revealed via the book's dialogue. Fogelson renders her terrified, in-the-moment impressions as laugh-out-loud scenes. Trying to be admirably "proactive" as a cancer patient, she grew obsessively controlling about treatment and staying informed, calling her doctor repeatedly to find out test results, questioning whether surgery had removed the right mole, and applying vats of sunscreen. The experience was certainly bracing, but Fogelson's snappy account proves energetic and wonderfully accessible.

September 1, 2012
A year in the life of an anxiety-ridden melanoma patient. Fogelson was diagnosed with melanoma at age 25, an astonishingly young age to have to cope with such a serious diagnosis. Her youth, combined with the severity of the diagnosis, may serve as an excuse for the attitudes and behaviors Fogelson exhibits in this account of her first year living with cancer. Unfortunately, her personality flaws overshadow her worthwhile public-health message. When she wanted to volunteer for the hospital where she received treatment, she was told she had to go through orientation like all the other volunteers. For voicing this reasonable requirement, in her mind she called the volunteer coordinator "a big fat fucking bitch." Fogelson has little sense of perspective. Her response to 9/11 was that those who were shocked by the tragedy must be "damn lucky," because unlike her, they must have never experienced anything bad. She knows that "bad things happen all the time," evidently unable to comprehend the difference in scale between a personal crisis and a massive public catastrophe. The most unsettling part of the book is the way in which she pokes fun at the overweight, unkempt patient (suffering from mental health problems) who preceded her at the therapist's office. Fogelson's vicious mockery may lead readers to wonder if she believes that only wealthy and attractive people deserve compassion. Because of the disease's genetic component, her father was examined, too, and he received the same diagnosis. The author's obvious dismay at this development lends her some sympathy, which she squanders by chronicling her bullying of her father into a vaccine trial. Fogelson is not talented enough to turn her experiences into humor; instead, she comes off as irritating and even cruel.

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