Nose in a Book

Left Neglected by Lisa Genova

After reading Still Alice (Genova’s first novel) for book club last April, I was pretty excited when I was contacted by the publisher and offered a review copy of Left Neglected.

Sarah Nickerson, mother to three, has a high stress life and she loves it.  She spends most of her spare time working at her extremely demanding job, even her commute.  One morning, while multitasking in the car her attention is turned from the road for just a second and she crashes.  The accident leaves her with a condition called Left Neglect as a result of an injury to the right side of her brain.  Sarah no longer perceives information from the left.  She is also unaware of her left side.  She knows she has a left side but she just can’t find it.  And for the most part she isn’t even aware of her missing left side.  The rest of the story is about her struggle to rehabilitate her brain and basically her life.

I have to admit, the book started out slow and I didn’t love the writing style but it grew on me and the story definitely picked up after the accident.  I think partly the reason I didn’t like the book at the beginning is because I just didn’t understand her lifestyle.  She worked so much and spent so much time stressing about her job and I just couldn’t relate to that.  (I used to work as a high school science teacher and with two kids that was too much for me so I quit. Sarah did have a full time nanny but still.)  Anyway, after the accident, Sarah was forced to give all that up and rely on her family and therapists to her her get dressed and walk down a short hallway – a huge change for her.  Her estranged mother shows up out of nowhere and insists on helping Sarah and ends up becoming a huge part of her life.  I really liked that part of the book.  I know there are lots of people out there that don’t talk with their mothers but my mom is one of my best friends and it made me happy that Sarah was able to reconnect with her mother.

I liked the characters in this book, they were all so real.  There were times when I thought Sarah’s husband, Bob,  was being kind of a jerk and it bothered me, but then I realized that that was probably pretty realistic.  He actually was a really great guy and dealt with the huge change to his life quite well.  Sarah herself was also a good character.  For the most part she was pretty determined to overcome her condition but she got discouraged and cried just like most people would. But she was always able to get herself back on track, usually with the help of her mother.

It was also interesting to read about her recovery.  This is a little spoiler but she doesn’t ever fully recover by the end of the book. She is able to come to terms with it and make a new life for herself.  I like that although at the end she wasn’t back to normal, she was happy with where she was and what she was doing with herself and her family.

Probably the most interesting thing about this novel was reading about Left Neglect.  I’d never heard of this condition before (although I believe my great-grandmother may have had it after she had a stroke when I was much younger).  I can’t imagine what it must be like to live life without left.  And to not even be aware that it’s missing until you try to walk or something.  That’s what I like about Genova’s books.  She tells a good story but she also opens up my eyes to a condition that I’d never really thought about too much before (or even heard of).

I do have one tiny little complaint though.  I really don’t like Genova’s writing style.  It’s not bad, it’s just not for me.  It kind of feels more like she’s writing a report or something rather than a novel.  But it wasn’t cold or unemotional just maybe a little too technical feeling.  Anyway, I got used to it and I liked the book and I will definitely read another one if she writes one!

Still Alice by Lisa Genova

Read for: Book Club

I wasn’t sure about this book when I first found out we were going to be reading it for book club – I wondered why I’d be interested in reading about Alzheimer’s.  But I really enjoyed it.

Alice is a super smart, famous Harvard professor of linguistics when at 50 she is diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s disease.  The book is really just about her struggle with her declining memory.  It shows a little bit about her family’s struggle as well but what I liked most about the book was that is was told from Alice’s point of view.  It was really interesting to see inside her mind and hear her thoughts as the disease progressed.

I’ve never had any experience with Alzheimer’s.  My family has a strong cancer history but I’ve never had any family member with Alzheimer’s.  It was quite an eye-opener for me to read this book and really understand how frustrating and depressing this disease would be to have or watch a family member struggle with.  In the book, right after her diagnosis, Alice states that she would rather have cancer than Alzheimer’s.  I had actually thought that myself before she even said that.  The thing about Alzheimer’s is that there is no fighting it…and there aren’t really any amazing treatments either.  The other thing that would be tough is that if you have the particular gene that Alice has, you have a 100% chance of getting the disease.  The gene that is inherent in my family only carries an 80% chance of developing the disease (which isn’t great statistically but I’ll take it over 100%!).

At first I had a couple of complaints but I think I’ve resolved them.  First, the book became increasingly choppy and less detailed toward the end and it seemed almost like Genova had just gotten bored and just wanted to get it over with, but then I realized that because the story was told from Alice’s point of view, it totally made sense.  Of course things would be more choppy and less detailed because her life probably seemed like a series of small moments – she was basically living entirely in the present with really hardly any memories of the past.  The second complaint I had is that is seemed like there was a lot of technical stuff.  Normally, I don’t think this would have bothered me but I was trying to read the book quickly (I forgot about book club and didn’t start reading the book until the morning of – oops!) and I just didn’t need all that extra.  But it wasn’t overly complicated or in depth so I don’t think it would bother most people.

The other thing about reading this book is that it’s made me oversensitive to lapses in my own memory.  I’ve been very sleep deprived lately so there are a lot of gaps in my memory and after reading this book I started to realize just how many things I was forgetting but I also noticed where the strengths are in my mind.  I’m really good at remembering dates and appointments (I have a calendar but hardly ever look at it) but I’m terrible with names (which as a teacher is a terrible thing!) and my vocabulary is definitely suffering lately.  It also reminded me of a migraine I had once.  I get regular migraines with no memory loss but once I had one and I couldn’t remember people’s names, including my cousin, a colleague, Tylenol and my own son!  It was really scary not being able to remember my own son’s name, I can’t imagine going through that on a regular basis.

Overall it was a great book – I learned a lot.  The book club discussion was great.  There was a lot to talk about.  There are several people in my club who have family members with Alzheimer’s and they all thought it was very realistic.  I can’t wait to read her next book, Left Neglected, about a woman who suffers a brain injury and no longer perceives information coming from the left.