"Still Alice" is a heartbreaking exploration of life inside the mind of a dementia patient.

Alice is just fifty. She is a lecturer in cognitive psychology at Harvard. She has achieved a lot of academic success in her career, but she still has so much to lot do.

And then, she starts to get disorientated from time to time. She finds herself in in a place she recognises as Harvard Square. She knows where she is, but she just doesn't know how to get home from there. It's a frightening experience for her. She runs every day, but then she has the same ting happen again.

There are little things like an email from someone called Eric who she is sure she knows, but she's not sure what it is referring to, or which Eric it is from. She has a sticky note reminding her to do something, but she can't understand the short hand code she used when writing it. So she goes to her doctor.

Alice is scared she has a brain tumour, but an MRI scan shows nothing abnormal in her brain. So she goes to a memory doctor, and after extensive tests, she gets the diagnosis of early onset Alzheimers Disease.

The great thing about this book is it's written from Alice's point of view. So, to start with, we have this unreliable narrator. That's always interesting to read. But, Alice is more than just an unreliable narrator. She is a narrator whose mind is shutting down and betraying her.

I found it incredibly emotional. As a reader, I was almost as confused as Alice. Because I only knew whatever she knew. It's so powerful. We witness Alice getting further and further inside her illness. The important part, though, as the title suggests, is that she is still Alice. The author shows how frustrated she is and how she wants to maintain her independence as far as possible.

I really liked the way that, in a strange kind of way, Alice's diagnosis allowed her more freedom than she had before. Okay, so she would never be able to travel alone or write any more great intellectual papers, but she could do what she wanted. There were no restrictions or expectations. In a way, she was free.

People who want to learn what it's like to have any kind of dementia. People who enjoy compelling characters and unreliable narrators. People who read books that make them think and feel.

The thing that most struck me about this book was how I could relate it to a cousin of my Dad. This cousin had dementia, from when he was about fifty. It wasn't Alzheimers, but even so, I could relate a lot of his behaviour to that of Alice. The author has clearly done a lot of research for this. Either that, or she has some experience of it.

Cry. I wished Dad was still here, so I could tell him about it. It would have helped him understand his cousin. I wanted to eat chocolate after I finished reading. Comfort food as in order.

Sad. So sad. It also made me understand a little of the claustrophobia that comes with dementia. It's a frightening read. Very moving.

It's a great character driven story. It's an emotional read. It's also educational and can really help the reader to understand what it feels like to have dementia. It doesn't just list the symptoms, it puts you inside the head of the sufferer.

If you have experience of dealing with Alzheimers Disease or dementia, and you are not comfortable with dealing with it, don't read this book. It may upset you.

Interested in buying this? Support Writing.Com by making your purchase of Still Alice   from Amazon.Com!

Created Oct 09, 2017 at 7:52am • Submit your own review...