Reading Between Two Kingdoms really showed me that timing is everything. I actually started this book last summer but DNF at 20 percent. Not because it was “bad”, but the topic was just so heavy, and I couldn’t do it at the time. I tried again this year, and dang—this is such a powerful memoir.

Between Two Kingdoms chronicles Jaouad’s multi-year battle with leukemia in her 20s and the time immediately after doctors declared her cured of cancer. This memoir raises so many provoking questions: What is “cured”? How does one begin life again after having everything upended for several years? When you’ve spent years just trying to survive, how do you start living?

This wasn’t an easy memoir to read, but there is so much I learned and appreciated from this one. And I highly recommend the audiobook (narrated by the author).