Reviews

The Memory Keeper's Daughter by Kim Edwards

wombat_88's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

susie_m's review against another edition

4.0

The story of how a family copes when there is an important secret in the middle of it - a baby given away at birth and the mother believing it died. A tale of grief and family relationships. And a shocking look at how babies and young people with disabilities (Down’s syndrome in this case) were treated in 1960s America. I felt empathy or sympathy for all the characters in this story regardless of the choices they had made.

jena_stl's review against another edition

emotional slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

aly_sue's review against another edition

4.0

Beautiful language, well-written, but unexpectedly melancholy.

katiedurham's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

ndfan19's review against another edition

1964 delivers twins one down syndrom & gives to institution w/o telling wife

darbyart's review against another edition

2.0

This is going to sound horrible but I was so happy to get through this book because it I kept waiting for it to engage me in the way other books do and it just didn't. I was sick of Norah and David's distant relationship. I didn't like the long drawn out paragraphs that didn't seem to add anything to the story. I marked it as okay because the concept of the story I thought was good. I just didn't enjoy the story how it was written.

frogqueen's review against another edition

• dnf'ed at around 1/3 through
• idk i just got to a point where i was like why am i reading this?
• the path of the plot was just totally obvious. like husband does something reprehensible and lies to his wife about it which rips their relationship apart. ok got it i don't need to read like 350 more pages of just ok prose about it
• in what i did get through too there was basically no plot development. just scene after scene of norah being unable to sufficiently grieve or communicate her grief adequately and her husband being an asshole about it over a span of years
• and on that subject:
• i did not give even a tenth of a shit about any of the characters. actually scratch that, i think caroline was interesting but there was so much of norah and david to slog through that it wasn't worth it. the book should've been 100% focused on caroline and phoebe, would've been much much more interesting
• the author tries very hard to get us to be sympathetic to david and his decision to get rid of phoebe but it's just totally ineffective
• especially because the rationale was that he watched his mother suffer over the decline death of his sister who also had down syndrome and wants to spare norah that same fate but then he just tells norah that phoebe died anyway??? and then he basically never talks to her about it again??? and also his plan was just to dump phoebe in some ghastly home for the disabled where they're basically abused??? like i'm sorry but i do not see this as the difficult, lose/lose decision that the author wants me to
• norah is a terribly boring, uncompelling character herself. she isn't given a personality besides being the safe, boring counterpart to her fun and exciting sister and grieving her supposedly dead daughter. 

mccanizales's review against another edition

4.0

The premise of this book is so sad and so fascinating, it had me feeling a whole range of emotions! I loved following the lives of these two families and how drastically different their lives became. And Phoebe stole my heart!

anjumstar's review against another edition

3.0

I started reading this book, and hated it so I got rid of it. But then it just kept on popping up in the back of my mind; I hate not finishing books. So, I'm ready to give this book another try.

She said five years ago. At least, lol. Back then, I repurchased it from the same secondhand book event that I'd initially bought it from and re-donated it to.

Okay, I've finally read it. And you know what? It was fine. I don't think that past me was entirely wrong for quitting this book and letting it go, but now that I have a library audiobook app, it certainly wasn't a waste of my time to read either. I think what I was struck by in my initial DNF of the book was the unpleasantness of it. The initiating event in the novel is atrocious and it continues to have atrocious ripples all throughout the whole novel and, well, it certainly keeps this book from being pleasure reading. But it is an interesting take on people. How this lie unwinds a family and fuels their actions for decades to come. It's a rather interesting thought exercise, and I think it plays out in a believable way.

And then there's the disability representation. I'm no expert in that field, so I'll keep my thoughts brief. Obviously some of the language used hasn't aged well from the time setting, but aside from that it seemed somewhat fair? Phoebe, to me, is depicted quite positively. She's lovely and happy and pretty much thriving, and, if others agree with that assessment, I think it's great to see. She's not some tragedy. She's loved and she loves. There's a lot of nuance.

So it's a decent book. It definitely makes me think that I need to find more nonfiction about disability, or perhaps some Own Voices novels. Then perhaps my take on this book will be a little more nuanced as well.

That said. I'm so glad to finally, finally be rid of this book XD