The Memory Keeper’s Daughter by Kim Edwards
Book Description
Award-winning writer Kim Edwards’s The Memory Keeper’s Daughter is a brilliantly crafted family drama that explores every mother’s silent fear: what would happen if you lost your child and she grew up without you?
On a winter night in 1964, Dr. David Henry is forced by a blizzard to deliver his own twins. His son, born first, is perfectly healthy. Yet when his daughter is born, he sees immediately that she has Down’s syndrome. Rationalizing it as a need to protect Norah, his wife, he makes a split second decision that will alter all of their lives forever. He asks his nurse to take the baby away to an institution and never to reveal the secret. But Caroline, the nurse, cannot leave the infant. Instead, she disappears into another city to raise the child herself. So begins this beautifully told story that unfolds over a quarter of a century in which these two families, ignorant of each other, are yet bound by David Henry’s fateful decision that long-ago winter night.
A rich and deeply moving page-turner, The Memory Keeper’s Daughter captures the way life takes unexpected turns and how the mysterious ties that hold a family together help us survive the heartache that occurs when long-buried secrets burst into the open. It is an astonishing tale of redemptive love. Published in 2005; 401 pages.
Description from book jacket
Research the author and the book using library resources
Information on the author’s life and works is available through our library’s online resources. Recommended online resources for The Memory Keeper’s Daughter by Kim Edwards include Literature Resource Center. Enter your library barcode and then use the author’s name or the book title to search for full-text encyclopedia or magazine articles.
Discussion questions
The Memory Keeper’s Daughter discussion questions from readingroupguides.com
The Memory Keeper’s Daughter discussion questions from the publisher
Additional information
“About Kim Edwards” appears on the author’s website.
“The Memory Keeper’s Daughter” Reviewed by Marie Hashima Lofton. Bookreporter.com
“The Memory Keeper’s Daughter” Reviews. Powells.com
Links to many reviews of The Memory Keeper’s Daughter from the author’s website.
Questions and Answers with Kim Edwards on the author’s website
Readalikes
Matters of Chance by Jeanette Haien
Jewel by Brett Lott
The Bonesetter’s Daughter by Amy Tan

