This Will All Be Over Soon: A Memoir

Saturday Night Live cast member Strong shows her serious side in this uneven if earnest memoir about the death of her cousin. Covering a year in diary-style entries, she begins in March 2020, two months after her cousin Owen died at age 30 of brain cancer. With SNL on hiatus due to the pandemic—and a new romance with someone who’d contracted Covid-19 on hold—she had time to reflect on her friendship with the funny, bird-obsessed Owen. Strong shares Owen’s text messages and glimpses of him facing cancer with courage and humor (“You know how everybody goes... on WebMD and panics and convinces themselves they have brain cancer? Well I’m the one who actually had brain cancer”), but he remains somewhat remote. Strong’s writing is more vivid when she explores her own life, notably her 1990s childhood with her troubled but bighearted brother (“I bit him hard once in the armpit”) and the high school expulsion that led her to find her “people” at the Chicago Academy for the Arts. While fans may be left wanting more of Strong’s personal story, her sincere tribute is nonetheless touching. Agents: Cindy Uh and Cait Hoyt, CAA. (Aug.)