So from yesterday's book which everyone read, to this one which I think might have been a case of Billy-No-Reading-Mates around the UK blogs at least (but correct me please) but The Story of Forgetting by Stefan Merrill Block published by Faber quite took my breath away. Not only the plot and what felt to me like an ultimately very comforting fictional way of explaining and coming to terms with early-onset Alzheimers, but also because it was written by a very perceptive young man of just twenty-six years old.
At the time I wrote,
'As fifteen year old Seth Waller begins to investigate his mother's
slowly disintegrating memory he unearths family connections and a fable
that has resonated through his own life and been handed down through
the generations. The land of Isidora, a 'fantastical land free from the
sorrows of memory' and a story that his mother has told him since
childhood.
Slowly Seth pieces together the jigsaw and makes sense of
what has gone before as themes of genetics, inheritance and memory
blend with the realities of people's lives in a book that eventually
raises the spirits and lifts the world of memory loss onto a new and
beautifully delineated plain. Somehow Stefan turns it into a far less
fearful place to be and gives renewed meaning to lives so often
discarded as spent once Alzheimer's has set in. In many ways it is a
book which removes the terror and replaces that with something
completely natural and acceptable. He writes with a heartfelt intuition
for his subject and with a sensitivity and depth of understanding that
somehow belies his age.'
I think that all means I was really impressed with this book and as I tried to choose my Top Ten list for the year I realised it wasn't going to happen. I've had no trouble choosing these prize draw books and could have added in plenty more from my 2008 lists, the number of great reads this year is well into the high double figures, in the end it seemed pointless to even try and whittle it down, just check 2008 over here for books I've read <<<<< and Book Thoughts 2008 over here >>>>>> for links to those I've posted about.
Stefan Merrill Block has a keen and mature eye for the foibles of human nature and a depth of understanding of emotions that makes him a young writer to watch in my book and I look forward to reading anything else he writes.
I'd love to know what others think about this one so again, not one but FOUR copies of The Story of Forgetting can go worldwide, names in comments as long as you are singing Jingle Bells very nicely.
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