Love Anthony (2012)

I loved this gentle, insightful story sprinkled with a little magic. It's a book written in two voices, those of Anita who is grieving for her lost but treasured autistic son, and of Beth whose husband has left her and their three girls for a friend at the bar where they both work. Anita and Beth have much in common, they are both incomer residents of Nantucket Island, they are near neighbours and both live without husbands, as David and Anita separated in the wake of their son's death. Reading a draft of a previously envisaged story she once wrote, Beth feels inspiration and begins to write a book. She is overwhelmed with creativity and purpose. Meanwhile Anita is rereading her journals, remembering her beautiful son and trying to find the answer to her heartbreaking questions. Why? What is the point? Her faith is severely shaken and when she receives a letter to tell her that her husband has found love again, her sorrow escalates. This is a beautifully written and moving story about friendship and support, love and loss and of grief and the power of healing. (JH)

Left Neglected (2011)

Sarah has it all - a good job, a great house and three beautiful children. A moment of lapsed concentration while driving the car changes her life forever. She has to adjust to a new way of life after her accident leaves her with a brain condition called 'left neglect', where her brain does not process anything on her left side. Sarah re-evalutes her life and renews her relationship with her mother, which had been under strain for years following the death of her brother. Sarah realises, as she tries to rebuild her life, that her relationships with her husband and children also were suffering from neglect before her accident. I enjoyed this book, although I found it slightly repetitive in the middle. Lisa Genova, a neuroscientist, writes in a similar style to Jodi Picoult and will definitely be an author I will be watching out for in the future. (BS)

Still Alice (2007)

Alice Howland is a 50-year-old psychology professor at Harvard and mother of three grown-up children. When Alice finds herself lost in her neighbourhood she knows there is something very wrong. Alice is diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer's disease and finds herself living a very different life. The story is told in the third person, as Alice details her mental decline and how she is an observer of her own life. It is a very emotional subject which has been approached by the author with great sensitivity and is a must-read for anyone with a family member suffering from this terrible disease. (BS)

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