Pacemaker by David Toms. No Advance Reader Copy included. No affiliate links used. Read my full disclosure policy here.
Every time I write about my heart, I write about walking. Every time I write about walking, I write about my heart.
David Toms was born with a rare heart condition. A condition that has shaped his life through childhood surgeries, dictating which sports he can and cannot play, and the knowledge that his heart could stop working at any time. A condition that results in him needing a pacemaker.
Structured as a series of vignettes, David takes us through different periods of his life and how walking is a constant among the uncertainty surrounding his health. Now living in Norway, we get to walk with David through forests, while he runs errands, around hospital grounds, and on his daily outings with Madra. When David is hospitalised at the beginning of the pandemic, his partner Maria cannot be with him. His parents are also unable to travel to Oslo. Some of their text messages are included in the places where David has little memory of what happened, which adds to the intimacy of the story.
Pacemaker is a beautifully written memoir about chronic illness, walking, and how to live life while considering your body’s limitations. David’s prose is intimate, precise, and poetic. I’ve underlined so many sentences and paragraphs that I might as well have highlighted the entire book!
I’ll leave you with one of my favourite passages, “To have an invisible illness is to invite suspicion. I sometimes felt as though I should keep copies of my medical history on me to throw in the face of those who didn’t believe me. I could have it perfect bound, like a dossier, to drop on tables. A book of evidence."
Pacemaker by David Toms is published by Banshee Press and is available in hardback and ebook format.
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