I heard about Still Alice throughout Julianne Moore’s Academy Awards campaign. I’ve always liked to read the books movies (particularly critcally acclaimed movies) are based on- even if I never get around to watching the final film. Still Alice is the story of Alice Howland: a happily married, mother of three. She is a professor at Harvard University whose story is told as her memory declines following an Early Onset Alzheimer’s diagnosis. As her memory fades the narration becomes less focused, the passages shorter and […]
Beautiful and one of the saddest books I’ve read this year
I read Still Alice based on a recommendation from a few friends. An incredibly powerful and moving novel, it impacted me immediately and has stuck with me since. Still Alice is the story of a Harvard psychology professor who finds that she is losing pieces of herself. It’s a sad and moving portrayal of a woman losing the things that defined her. When Alice can’t find her way home on a run through Harvard Square, she knows something is very wrong. Initially, she wonders if it’s menopause or […]
What It’s Like to Forget
I was listening to the radio earlier this week and heard them discussing the movie version of Still Alice, starring Julianne Moore. It sounded interesting, so I started reading it on Thursday, and finished it while at the gym today. The writing was fantastic, the story was interesting and moving, and the small world Ms. Genova created took me in from the first page. Still Alice tells the story of a cognitive psychology Harvard professor who, at age 51, is diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s. She […]