I wonder if any of you have read The Memory Keeper´s Daughter by Kim Edwards? What did you think of it?
I came across it last year after looking in a list of best sellers on the Waterstones website and I’m glad I did. This book is beautiful. Heartbreaking. Powerful. Wonderful. Sad. It’s an actual storm of emotions.
The book tells the story of David and Norah Henry. On a heavily snowy night in 1964 David gives birth to his own twins in his clinic. One healthy boy and an unexpected twin, a girl with Down syndrome.
On that night Dr.Henry, knowing in the 60´s that imperfect children were sent away to institutions where they died young and their families spoke of them in whispers, had also had a sister who died young due to heart failure causing pain to all those who loved her. Considering these reasons and trying to spare Norah the pain, Dr.Henry made a haste decision. He told his wife the child had died at birth and gave orders to his nurse to take the child to an institution and never tell anybody what had happened.
The nurse, Caroline after seeing the conditions at the institution is appalled and decides to bring up Phoebe on her own.
Over the next 25 years we see how David’s decision affects all, Norah mourns her baby that nobody wants to talk about, David who regrets giving her away and has to live with his decision driving the family distant, Paul who thinks he can’t live up to his father’s expectations whilst growing up in the secrets that tear his parents apart.
Meanwhile Caroline faces discrimination as she tries to get medical help for her daughter, taking us through various events that might seem outrageous to us today, but were widely held at the time the book is set.
This book is an engaging story written beautifully, making all of us feel Caroline’s pain as a mother when anybody looked at Phoebe differently. Each chapter is told from a different perspective making us understand each person’s motives, feelings and lies.
Would you have done the same as David? I think this story helps us understand David’s decision, even though we don’t agree with it. Throughout the book we begin to love this unwanted child who was denied love by those who should have loved her. Phoebe is an ordinary child with just slower abilities that people should comprehend. It helps us realise how difficult it was for a parent to bring up a child with Down syndrome in those days because they were denied education and medical help being considered mentally retarded and that they would overwhelm the education system.
Post in your opinion…
Oscar winner Marion Cotillard , unlike other French actresses she’s sexy and known for having that je ne sais quoi about her so it’s easy to understand how she earned her reputation. But now she’s in trouble and has been called big mouthed and having a few screws missing after saying that the 9/11 was staged and never happened. Ups. Her lawyer has already tried to soothe her comments because they’re causing a huge fuss in the cinema industry. But families who still endure those they lost are really upset with her statements. After being questioned about her comments in an American program Marion tried to take back what she had said. "At no point did I intend to contest the horrific attacks of September 11, 2001, one of the most tragic days in all of history".
