A special book about the end of one life and the beginning of another. Life's That Way is a modern-day Book of Job. In August 2003 Jim Beaver a character actor whom many know from the popular HBO series Deadwood and his wife Cecily learned what they thought was the worst news possible- their daughter Maddie was autistic. Then six weeks later the roof fell in-Cecily was diagnosed with stage-four lung cancer. Jim immediately began writing a nightly e-mail as a way to keep more than one hundred family and friends up to date about Cecily's condition. Soon four thousand people a day from all around the world were receiving them. Initially a cathartic exercise for Jim the prose turned into an unforgettable journey for his readers. Cecily died four months after being diagnosed but Jim continued the e-mails for a year after her diagnosis revealing how he and Maddie coped with Cecily's death and how they managed to move forward. Life's That Way is a compilation of those nightly e-mails. Jim's experience is universal for anybody who has lost a loved one. But Life's That Way is not solely about loss. It is an immediate day-by-day account of living through a nightmare but also of discovering the joy of a child of being on the receiving end of unthinkable kindness and of learning to navigate life anew. As Jim says these are hard-won blessings. But then again life's that way.
