Remembering the Music, Forgetting the Words

The blurb and cover for Kate Whouley's forthcoming memoir, Remembering the Music, Forgetting the Words, are out! Beacon Press will publish the book this fall. Visit Kate's website to keep up with the latest news. Congratulations, Kate!

When her mother began to exhibit the symptoms of dementia, Kate Whouley did what her English-teacher mom would want her to do: read up on the subject. She found lots of tips for preventing mental decline-too late for that-and a fair amount of practical advice for caregivers-moderately helpful, uniformly grim. Kate craved a compassionate companion with an appreciation for irony-and that's what she gives us in Remembering the Music, Forgetting the Words. With honesty and good humor, Kate shares the tough, the tender, the heart wrenching and the laugh-or-you'll-cry experiences of an Alzheimer's caregiver. 

As her mother falls into forgetting, Kate remembers for us. In her mother, we meet a strong-minded, accidental feminist with a weakness for unreliable men. We meet a daughter who learned early to fend for herself. We encounter their shared passions: books, words, and music. When the books are forgotten, and the words begin to fade, it is the music that matters most to Kate's mother. Holding hands after a concert, a flute-case slung over Kate's shoulder, and a shared joke between them, their relationship is healed-even in the face of a dreaded, and deadly diagnosis.

Remembering the Music is the story of two women, mother and daughter, who journey to a place where they are free from their not-uncomplicated past. Here, they meet each other in the present, sharing the only moment the mother knows, and one of many moments the daughter-and her readers-will remember.