Remember: The Science of Memory and the Art of Forgetting by Lisa Genova
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
“If we want to remember something, above all else, we need to notice what is going on. Noticing requires two things: perception (seeing, hearing, smelling, feeling) and attention.”
When I first picked up this book, I thought it would be slow-moving as most of the non-fictions are for me, so I geared myself up to “slog” through it.
I couldn’t have been more wrong.
From the first page onward, I was completely hooked. I read the whole book in one sitting and underlined passage after passage. I also told my colleagues about this book and quoted passages from it, shared ideas from it and would not stop talking about the endless ways in which the content fascinated me.
“What we remember about the past is also influenced by how we feel in the present. Our opinions and emotional state now color what we remember from what happened last year. And so, in revisiting episodic memories, we often reshape them.”
I’d read Genova’s fiction before so I knew she was a good writer. I also knew she was a neuroscientist and had studied memory. I’ve read about memory and brain in several books and I’ve taken classes so while much of what was in this book wasn’t completely new to me, I loved the simple, relatable and practical way in which Genova laid it out. I loved her practical tips.
If you’re interested in memory and how we remember (and how we forget) I promise you will be glad you read this book.
with gratitude to netgalley and Rodale for the early copy in exchange for an honest review.
