I’ve mentioned before how much I enjoy Laura Lippman’s smart thrillers, so any book that she recommends with a blurb is naturally going to catch my eye. Even better when that book is delivered to BookPage inside an over-sized milk carton (read this blog post to see what I mean).
I stated reading Alison Gaylin’s And She Was with high expectations, and I was not disappointed. First of all, the thriller has an interesting hook: Missing persons investigator Brenna Spector has Hyperthymestic Syndrome, a rare, real-life condition that causes a person to have a perfect autobiographical memory. In other words: She can remember every moment from her life.
For example, you probably went to the dentist, oh, 10 years ago. Do you remember exactly what the receptionist said to you, exactly what the waiting room sounded and smelled like, exactly what you wore? Well, Brenna can remember details like that from her life, no matter how insignificant, important or tragic. It’s a helpful quality for an investigator, but also a hindrance. Would you really like to have every memory from your life automatically playing on loop in your mind?
Alison Gaylin
Brenna’s sister disappeared when she was a child, and that’s what triggered the disorder to kick in. As an adult, she is called to investigate the disappearance of a woman named Carol, and that case is connected with the disappearance of another young girl that happened years before, and to Brenna’s past.
I interviewed Gaylin for BookPage.com and asked her whether a perfect memory would be a blessing or a curse. Here’s what she said:
Having a pretty good memory myself, my first response was, “That must be awful!” I honestly think that the ability to forget—to let the past fade into soft focus and recede in your mind—is one of the great tools of survival. How can you forgive and forget if you can’t forget? How can you move on at all, if the past is just as clear and visceral as the present? How can you truly be with the people around you, if your mind is full of everyone who is no longer in your life?
Read more on BookPage.com, and let us know: Do YOU think a perfect memory is a blessing or a curse? Will you check out And She Was? It went on sale this week.
AND SHE WAS. Having read your synopsis of this new novel, yes, it is one I shall check out, and make a point of looking in the store for it. As for having such a perfect memory, no, I would not want that. , – `I find now sometimes things just slip my mind` can be like an own best friend.
Sounds very interesting. I agree with the comment about Laura Lippman. If she makes a
recommendation, I would listen.
Do we not watch this on tv every week? I mean is this book being published now? Did she write the script for the television program? This is almost verbatim what the program is about …I find it interesting that no one has mentioned this. This isn’t even a program that I really watch that often! Did I miss something?