Joelle has been interviewed about her book on television, radio and in newspapers. Please use the contact page if you would like to interview the author.

Joelle wins international writing award
April 1 (no joke), 2014

At a luncheon this week, Joelle was honored for winning the top award for a travel feature story she wrote about whale migration. The story ran in the Mendo-Lake and Sonoma Family Life Magazines in spring 2013.

The gold is the highest award offered in each division of the annual competition hosted by the International Parenting Media Association that represents more than 100 magazines across the United States, Canada and overseas.

According to the judge’s notes, “Children could be intimidated by the gargantuan size of whales, but this writer describes the experience in a way that makes it accessible even to the smallest explorer. This article provides an informative mix of travel details and the behavioral science that will help readers better understand what they’re seeing.”

Click here to see the magazine’s announcement of the award.

Sara’s Organized Chaos book review
May 27, 2013

Sara Strand has hundreds of followers who read and rely on her book reviews. Here’s what she had to say about Cancer Time Bomb:

“This book is hilarious, sad, terrifying, and completely informative. I learned more about breast cancer, treatments, and basically what it’s like from this one book than I have from anything else.”

She goes on to say, “If you are a woman who is curious about the BRCA Gene or even breast/ovarian cancer- read this book. If you are someone facing this yourself and considering which route to go- Joelle gives you some really great, very relevant, and totally honest information about her decision, why she chose it, and the aftermath…So I invite you to READ HER BOOK, like her Facebook page, visit her website, and then buy extra copies of her book and surprise your friends with a great read.”

Read the entire review at Sara’s Organized Chaos.

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KSRO Radio Interview
May 16, 2013

Joelle was interviewed by Radio Host Michelle Marques about Cancer Time Bomb and her reaction to Angelina Jolie’s announcement that she chose preventative surgery to remove her breasts after testing positive for the BRCA genetic mutation.

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KRCB Radio Interview
May 15, 2013

Joelle was interviewed by News Reporter Danielle Venton about Cancer Time Bomb and her reaction to Angelina Jolie’s announcement that she chose preventative surgery to remove her breasts after testing positive for the BRCA genetic mutation. Listen to the interview below:

RP Woman Applauds Jolie

DANIELLE VENTON
KRCB News Reporter

Actress Angelina Jolie made headlines yesterday with her announcement that she had proactively undergone a double mastectomy, after testing positive for a gene that carries high risks for breast and ovarian cancers.

It was a story that hit home for Rohnert Park resident Joelle Burnette, who has the same BRCA gene, and likewise had the protective surgery four years ago. Burnette detailed her experiences in the memoirCancer Time Bomb, published last year, and talked about them with KRCB reporter Danielle Venton last October. Today they met again in our studio, to discuss Burnette’s reactions to seeing this issue get some abrupt national attention. Here is that conversation.

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KGO TV – Channel 7 News
May 14, 2014

Joelle was interviewed about her prophylactic surgeries and Cancer Time Bomb after Angelina Jolie announced she had preventative surgery to remove her breasts after testing positive for the BRCA genetic mutation.

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KTVU TV – Channel 2 News
May 14, 2014

Joelle was interviewed about her prophylactic surgeries and Cancer Time Bomb after Angelina Jolie announced she had preventative surgery to remove her breasts after testing positive for the BRCA genetic mutation.

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KRON TV – Channel 4 News
May 14, 2014

Joelle was interviewed about her prophylactic surgeries and Cancer Time Bomb after Angelina Jolie announced she had preventative surgery to remove her breasts after testing positive for the BRCA genetic mutation.

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Bohemian
April 3-9, 2013 (print and online)

GABE MELINE
Bohemian Editor

Joelle Burnette had already seen cancer disrupt or take the lives of several family members when she was tested for and diagnosed with the BRCA genetic mutation. In other words, Burnette was likely to get cancer herself, and for the sake of her children, she began the preemptive process of removing perfectly healthy parts of her body most prone.‘Cancer Time Bomb: How the BRCA Gene Stole My Tits and Eggs’ ($14.99) is just as frank as its title implies, and though the specific subject matter is the BRCA gene and Burnette’s resultant oophorectomy and masectomy, the themes of anxiety, courage and family are universal. Burnette, who covered Rohnert Park for the Press Democrat’s Towns section from 2010 to 2012, chronicles her three-year journey in great detail, with what seems like nearly every step, conversation and thought along the way presented on the page. The story of meeting with the doctor to discover the results of her initial test takes up 24 pages, including such passages as an argument with her daughter about what to wear in the morning and an idle musing on the exterior colors chosen for Port-a-Potties. In the midst of all this, deeper philosophical truths emerge in blunt fashion. After telling her mother she needs to get laid, Burnette writes, “I’ve had one sister who has already died, and that’s when most people start echoing the well-established mantra to appreciate every day and live life as if it’s your last. Fuck that. I was 12 when my best friend in the world was yanked out of my life. The horrible experience didn’t turn me into a cheery person. Yes, life is precious, Yes, life is short. And blah, blah, fucking blah . . .”—G.M.

(Check out the full story and read about more books by Bay Area authors online)

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Press Democrat story
Dec. 7, 2012 (print and online)

NICOLE R. ZIMMERMAN
Rohnert Park/Cotati Correspondent

As a Jewish mom, Joelle Burnette knows about the limited selection of Hanukkah books available each holiday season.

She also knows what it’s like to be one of the few Jewish kids in a school that only acknowledges Christmas.

“I remember what it felt like to be out of place,” she says. “When I’d tell other kids that I celebrated Hanukkah they’d reply, ‘But you believe in Santa, don’t you?’ ”

To prevent her son and daughter from experiencing the same alienation, Burnette began hosting Hanukkah parties in her children’s classes from the time they were in preschool, and continued through the fifth grade.

(read more)

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J. Weekly Story
Dec. 6, 2012 (print and online)

Author, author: new books by Bay Area authors
​By Liz Harris, editor

​(Hanukkah book first featured book in list)

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KRCB Radio Interview

Aired Oct. 23, 2012

With News Reporter Danielle Venton

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KSRO Radio Interview
July 13, 2012

With Radio Anchor Michelle Marques

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J. Weekly Story
July 13, 2012 (print and online)

​By Emma Silvers, j. staff

​When Joelle Burnette learned she was likely to develop breast cancer, it took her a matter of weeks to make a huge decision. The journalist was 42 when she tested positive for the BRCA genetic mutation — a hereditary pre-indicator of cancer that Ashkenazi Jews are more likely to have than any other ethnic group — and her primary concern was staying alive for her two young children.

“I just said ‘Take it all, take my breasts and ovaries and fallopian tubes,’ ” remembers Burnette, four years later. The reality of cancer was made all the more stark by her sister’s ongoing battle with the disease; her grandmother and aunt had both died from it years before.
(read more)

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Press Democrat Story
May 4, 2012 (print and online)

MARIE THOMAS McNAUGHTON / Rohnert Park Correspondent

The challenge of reading put-it-out-there blogger Joelle Burnette’s self-published, tell-all book is knowing that she is going to bare all: her dilemma, her choices, her consequences.

Titled “Cancer Time Bomb, How the BRCA Gene Stole My Tits and Eggs” and carrying a graphic cover illustration by Burnette, the 300-page volume asks the soul-searing question, should one cut out healthy parts of one’s body to forestall a potentially early death?
(read more)

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KRON TV
Sunday Morning News

Henry Tenenbaum interviewed Joelle on the morning news at the San Francisco television news station on June 3, 2012.

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And posted soon…articles from newspapers in Philadelphia, New York City and D.C.!