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Book Salon
Turn of Mind

  • This month we're reading Turn of Mind by Alice LaPlante. Our faculty host is Alice LaPlante.

    Listen to an interview with our Book Salon host.

    "Turn of Mind is full of suspense, black humor, and insights into the intricacies of love and friendship - as well as the resilience of the human spirit. Alzheimer's patients reshape those around them in ways that transcend anguish and frustration, and the disease opens us to the very things that make us human."

    Alice LaPlante, lecturer in the Mastery in Communication Initiative at the Graduate School of Business

How to Participate

About this quarter's book selection

This literary page-turner follows a retired orthopedic surgeon suffering from dementia and accused of killing her best friend. A New York Times hardcover bestseller and named a Best Book of the Year by Newsday, Chicago Tribune, The Washington Post, The Guardian, and Kirkus Reviews, this is Alice LaPlante’s first novel.

The story begins when Dr. Jennifer White's best friend, Amanda, is found dead with four of her fingers surgically removed in a precise manner. The prime suspect, she herself doesn't know whether she did it. LaPlante tells the story in Dr. White's own voice, fractured and eloquent. She captures a disintegrating mind clinging to bits of reality through anger, frustration, shame, and unspeakable loss.

A remarkable debut, the novel portrays a complex relationship between life-long friends. Alice LaPlante examines how memory defines our very existence, and we are left guessing if Dr. White’s memory lapses prevent her from revealing the truth or help her to hide it. 

The Stanford Book Salon [Seriously Unstuffy]