Pacemaker by David Toms
176 pages
Hardback
15 September 2022
ISBN: 978-1-8383126-5-7
Blood is pumped from our hearts out and around the network of vessels that stretch for thousands of miles. Our blood flows, courses, from the chambers of the heart – the innermost rooms, private interior, secret portion. Perhaps, though, it makes more sense to think of our blood walking through our bodies across those thousands of miles. Blood is pumped from the heart around the body at a speed of between three and four miles per hour. The average person walks at the same pace. Blood and feet synchronized as we walk streets, paths, trails, first steps to last.
In Pacemaker, acclaimed poet David Toms confronts what it means to live life while always walking in tandem with a rare heart condition.
In this reflective hybrid memoir, he invites us into the most intimate of struggles; to be keenly aware, with every step, that one day your heart may give out. He climbs mountains for leisure and in his personal life; explores heartbreak both metaphorical and literal; and takes us on journeys both real and imagined.
Written with beauty and economy, Pacemaker speaks to all of us in its exploration of what it means to live in a fragile yet resilient body, to walk multiple challenging paths, and to always find a way to keep moving.
About the Author
David Toms is a writer from Waterford, now living and working in Norway. His poetry collections include Northly (Turas Press, 2019), Soma | Sema (Knives Forks and Spoons Press, 2011), and several chapbooks. His creative work has been published in a wide range of magazines and anthologies across Ireland, the UK, the US and Europe, including in several issues of Banshee.
Author photo by Derek Foott
Media
The best book covers of 2022 | Fast Company | 5 December 2022
The Irish Times books of the year 2022: the best titles from fiction and sport to music and art | The Irish Times | 26 November 2022
David on Saturday Live | BBC Radio 4 | 5 November 2022
Extract from Pacemaker | inews.co.uk | 20 October 2022
20 new non-fiction books to sink your teeth into | The Irish Times | 15 October 2022
David Toms writes poetically about living with a heart condition in Pacemaker | Buzz | 5 October 2022
Matters of the heart | The Telegraph Magazine | 1 October 2022
David on All About Books | Dublin City FM | 22 September 2022
David Tom’s Pacemaker – a thing of beauty and a celebration of the act of simply walking | View Digital | 22 September 2022
Pacemaker – a deep, meditative memoir and a love letter to Norway | Books Ireland | 22 September 2022
Anna Morrison on designing David Toms’s Pacemaker | Spine Magazine | 14 September 2022
David Toms explains how to keep a happy heart in new book Pacemaker | The Sunday Times | 11 September 2022
Sara Baume reviews Pacemaker: ‘Space literature’ at its strongest | The Irish Times | 10 September 2022
Praise for Pacemaker
“Pacemaker is a rare volume, a deeply considered meditation on the heart and the stride that encompasses so much more besides. It trembles with the truth of a self, articulated with an eloquence seldom encountered. David Toms has written a beautiful, beautiful book – I loved it.”
“A work of intimacy and shimmering precision, Pacemaker is the testament of a unique mind and heart, alive to the world in extraordinary times. Toms’ prose is poetic, vital and inventive, with a lightness that makes it compulsively readable.”
“Pacemaker is a moving, beautifully-written memoir about the body’s limits, walking and hope.”
“A deeply moving personal meditation on walking, health, and wellness, whose themes resonated profoundly with me and remained in my mind long after reading.”
“In Pacemaker, everything slows down. Time bends. You lose sight of where you are in the world as you feel your way through David Toms’ lens. This is beautiful, sparse prose – a memoir full of honesty. At times a painful and brutal tale on what it means for someone to make their imprint, the cost of a step, and how to set a new pace within their challenging world. But ultimately, it shows how important the heart is. A powerful book, I loved it.”