What Alice Forgot by Liane Moriarty

Alice is twenty-nine. She is whimsical, optimistic and adores sleep, chocolate, her ramshackle new house and her wonderful husband Nick. What's more, she's looking forward to the birth of the 'Sultana' - her first baby.

But now Alice has slipped and hit her head in her step-aerobics class and everyone's telling her she's misplaced the last ten years of her life.

In fact, it would seem that Alice is actually thirty-nine and now she loves schedules, expensive lingerie, caffeine and manicures. She has three children and the honeymoon is well and truly over for her and Nick. In fact, he looks at her like she's his worst enemy. What's more, her beloved sister Elisabeth isn't speaking to her either. And who is this 'Gina'everyone is so carefully trying not to mention?

Alice isn't sure that she likes life ten years on. Every photo is another memory she doesn't have and nothing makes sense. Just how much can happen in a decade? Has she really lost her lovely husband for ever?

(from goodreads.com)

I rate this book 4 out of 5 stars.

This is one of those books that has been sitting on my kindle for a while, just waiting patiently for me to remember I ever downloaded it.  I was initially intrigued by the mystery that surrounds amnesia.  I thought this book would be a good foray into the "what-if"'s of the world.  What if I lost large chunks (or, for that matter small chunks) of time?  What if I woke up one day and didn't recognize the people who are living in my house with me?  What if, in the future, I find that I'm a completely different person than the one I am today?  What if my mistakes are so irreparable that they damage myself and my entire family for many years to come? 

This story isn't so much about changing one's past as it is about the importance of constant self-reflection.  The Alice that the readers get to know and love is the one from the past.  She thinks she's still twenty-something years old.  She wakes up in her almost-forty-year-old body and finds that her future self is a bit of a pain.  There are things she's told she does on a regular basis that she never would have dreamed she would be capable of.  The reader joins Alice as the rediscovers herself. 

I was immediately caught up in Alice's amazement.  She learned that relationships fade if you don't make a conscious effort.  She found that it's not as easy to forgive past hurts once they have a chance to fester and boil up inside.  She discovers that being a mother is as much about consistency and schedules as it is about listening to your children and treating each of them as a special human being. 

I thought this book was easy to read, hard to put down, and very charming.  It wasn't a change-your-life kind of book, but it was very heart-warming.  I finished this book in about 2 days.  During that time I didn't laugh out loud, I didn't cry, and I didn't want to put it down.  While I'm sure there are more thought-provoking books out there, I enjoyed this one for the simplistic writing style and easy to follow storyline. 

The characters were portrayed realistically.  Memory is a funny thing; when a big event happens, each person who is present may have a different memory of it.  One person may remember the sounds of the cars passing on the street, another may remember the color of the decor in hospital room, yet another may remember the kindness of a stranger.  There is no omniscient third party voice who narrates real life.  That's what I loved about this book.  Each segment is told from another person's perspective.  You see the same events from different eyes and you find yourself not wondering who's perspective is the "right" one but rather what each person will do with the situation, given their perspective of it.  I strongly believe that each person does the best that he can with the situation that he's in.  It may not be the "right" or the "wrong" course of action, but it is the best that he can think of at the time.