Last updated on October 6, 2020
What Alice Forgot is a book by Liane Moriarty. While the book is primarily about Alice, there are three distinct storylines: Alice Love, Elisabeth, and Frannie. Alice and Elisabeth are sisters; Frannie is their grandmother.
Alice is a mother of three who is going through a divorce, but when she falls off her bike during spin class, she has a concussion and doesn’t remember any of this. She thinks it is 1998, ten years earlier when she was pregnant with her first child.
As the story goes on, Alice discovers all the changes in her life since 2008. She tries to reconcile what she remembers with her new experiences but struggles to do so. Her relationships are all different than she remembers. She goes through the process of discovering herself and the people that she loves. When she regains her memories, she’s using a different filter to make sense of them. Being the old Alice from 1998 gave her a chance to gain some new perspective on her life. Not only did she get a chance to access old memories that she may have forgotten, she also lives her life differently and gets a chance to build a different perspective of the people in her life.
When Alice regains her memory, she’s not the Alice from 1998 or the previous one from 2008. She is a new Alice, one that has time travelled to develop a different perspective.
In What Alice Forgot, Frannie and Elisabeth also get their own storylines which continue to explore themes from Alice’s story, those of love, children and family.
Final Verdict
I don’t know how realistic What Alice Forgot is in terms of concussions and memory loss. I recently read a study that showed that people with Alzheimer’s would have muscle memory sometimes even when they couldn’t access that memory. This lends some credulity to that aspect of the story. What I found more difficult to believe was Alice’s reaction in some instances, like her initial refusal to accept her memory loss.
I found the story to be an interesting one, as any kind of time travel intrigues me. This was a great device to explore how people become disconnected over time, and how change happens over time. It shows the importance of paying attention to your relationships, that they take work, communication, and generosity. Forgiveness and self-compassion also factor in.
What Alice Forgot explores many themes including friendships, family, adoption, dating. I think that this would be a fun story to read in a book club or on your own. It is easy to read, but also provides some great points for discussion. Perhaps it can encourage is to stop and think about the person who we were ten years ago and who we are now. What have we lost? What have we gained? Are we living our life authentically? What are we letting go when it would benefit us to hold on and what are we holding on to that it would be healthier to let go?
The quotes on the book cover made me think this book would be funny. While I was engaged in the story, I didn’t find it funny. No tears, no laughter, not that a book needs to have either of those elements. I felt the curiosity to see how the author would end the story. Would the nuclear family stay intact or would the parents build new lives? The ending makes me think that the focus of the book is on emphasizing the importance of love and family, particularly children, whether they are biological or adopted.
I give What Alice Forgot 4 stars. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Want to know more details about the story, or trying to remember how the story ends? Visit this post instead.
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