There is a line in the book where Alice’s doctor tells her, “…you may not be the most reliable source of what’s been going on.” Yet you chose to tell the story from Alice’s point of view. Doesn’t that get difficult to do as Alice’s disease worsens and her perceptions indeed get less reliable?

It sure does, but I thought it was the most powerful choice. In telling the story through Alice’s lens, I sit the reader right up against her Alzheimer’s. It should feel uncomfortably close at times. You should feel her confusions and frustrations and terror right along with her. And yes, this choice forces us to lose what’s going on inside the thoughts of her husband and the other characters, but we get an insider’s perspective into the mind of someone slipping further and further into Alzheimer’s. Most people without Alzheimer’s never get to sit in that seat.

What is your favorite scene in the book?

There are probably two. One is a small scene with Alice and her three children. The kids are all arguing over whether their mother should be trying to remember something or not. Alice asks what time they’ll be going to a play the next day. Her son tells her not to worry about it, she doesn’t need to try to remember something she doesn’t have to because they’re not going to go without her. Her oldest daughter thinks she should be exercising her memory whenever possible, the sort of “use it or lose it” philosophy. The youngest thinks they should just let their mom know the information, and she can do with it what she wants. This is pretty common in families where someone has Alzheimer’s. There’s disagreement and people dig in their heels and take things personally. It’s rife with conflict. In this scene, they argue and hurt one another’s feelings and never agree, all in front of Alice. People talk about people with Alzheimer’s all the time right in front of them, as if they’re not there.

The other is the first paragraph. I just love everything about it. It still gives me the chills, and I’ve probably read it a hundred times.

What has the response been to Still Alice from the Alzheimer’s community? How about from the non-Alzheimer’s community, from people who have no connection to this disease?

Overwhelmingly positive. I can’t tell you how much this means to me. For someone with Alzheimer’s, or a caregiver of a loved one with this, to tell me that I got it right, that it’s uncanny how true it all was, that they saw themselves all over the book, well, that’s the highest compliment I can get. That I told the truth about this disease. This really became an important goal of mine while I was doing the research for the book and I came to know more and more people living with Alzheimer’s. And it became a careful line to walk, to not overdramatize or romanticize this disease, yet not minimize it either.

And the National Alzheimer’s Association has endorsed it. Of all the books out there on the topic of Alzheimer’s, mine is the only one, to my knowledge, to have this stamp from them.

There are people who’ve read the book who have no personal connection to Alzheimer’s and who’ve given me feedback. It’s a moving story, and I think it works because it’s about so much more than Alzheimer’s. It doesn’t lecture or preach or get too clinical. It’s about identity and living a life that matters and about what a crisis does to relationships. And it’s been incredibly rewarding to know that the book has given these readers a new awareness and sensitivity to the realities of living with Alzheimer’s.