Before I Forget

Name: Before I Forget
Rating: 4.317 (1272 reviews)
ISBN: 9781250276803

By Tory Henwood Hoen

Publisher Description

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • "A tender, funny portrait of love in its myriad forms." —Mikki Brammer, bestselling author of The Collected Regrets of Clover

A funny, heartfelt, late coming-of-age story that examines the role of memory in holding us back—and in moving us forward—for fans of The Collected Regrets of Clover and Maame.

Call it inertia. Call it a quarter-life crisis. Whatever you call it, Cricket Campbell is stuck. Despite working at a zeitgeisty wellness company, the 26-year-old feels anything but well. Still adrift after a tragedy that upended her world a decade ago, she has entered early adulthood under the weight of a new burden: her father’s Alzheimer’s diagnosis.

When Cricket’s older sister Nina announces it is time to move Arthur from his beloved Adirondack lake house into a memory-care facility, Cricket has a better idea. In returning home to become her father’s caretaker, she hopes to repair their strained relationship and shake herself out of her perma-funk. But even deeply familiar places can hold surprises.

As Cricket settles back into the family house at Catwood Pond—a place she once loved, but hasn’t visited since she was a teenager—she discovers that her father possesses a rare gift: as he loses his grasp of the past, he is increasingly able to predict the future. Before long, Arthur cements his reputation as an unlikely oracle, but for Cricket, believing in her father’s prophecies might also mean facing the most painful parts of her history. As she begins to remember who she once was, she uncovers a vital truth: the path forward often starts by going back.

With laugh-out-loud humor and profound grace, Before I Forget explores the nuances of family, the complexities of memory, and how sometimes, the people we know the best are the ones who surprise us the most.

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Before I Forget Reviews

4.0

Liv Vallee

Created about 10 hours ago

Katie

Created about 13 hours ago

“🫖“The tea is hot, the pond is cold, and the oracle knows his shit.” Before I Forget is a beautiful novel of strength, personal growth, loss, and love in all its many forms. Tory Henwood Hoen is a gift, just like this book. This book is so beautifully written; I saved tons of gorgeous quotes that are so good for the soul. Cricket’s coming-of-age was late but profound, and witnessing her confidence grow was a wonderful journey to be part of. Her relationship with her father and the other characters around town was so wholesome. There was a great blend of emotion and humor, with enough wit and one-liners to balance the sadness well. Before I Forget is genuinely moving, and is a great lesson for us all in facing the shame and guilt of our past, lest it haunt us forever. It’s also an important reminder that finding ourselves is a unique and sometimes trying journey, but we all get there in the end. As Cricket said, “Maybe I’ve been holding on too tightly to the version of myself that’s a failure. I wonder what it would be like to give myself a fresh start.” Quotes I saved: ⏳“His reality has always been an abstract work of art; and perhaps that’s true for all of us.” ⏳“Alzheimer’s is not funny, except when it is, which is often. It has the capacity to be both devastating and hilarious, and those who witness it learn to live in limbo, because there’s nowhere else to live.” ⏳“Maybe after a certain point, we get to decide how old we are. Or maybe there comes a moment when time starts sliding in all directions, revealing itself as an illusion, rendering age irrelevant.” ⏳“Maybe the intellect gets in the way of the heart, until little by little, it doesn’t.” ⏳“There’s no pressure. I’m already hooked.” ⏳“After all, I was supposed to be the heroine of this love story. So why did I feel like the villain?” ⏳“An oracle doesn’t just hand you the answer; she nudges you toward finding your own meaning.” ⏳“Well, sometimes a shadow is just a shadow. They come and go. It’s best not to take them too seriously.” ⏳“What I didn’t know then: coming of age isn’t something you can choreograph, and it doesn’t happen all at once. You start the process; you stall; you regress; and then comes another growth spurt. Eventually, your path looks like a series of paw prints in the snow—layered, as if compelled by confusion or curiosity—that double back before veering off in the direction of destiny.” ⏳“There was no end to the “if onlys,” and I played them relentlessly, backward and forward, until they wore a deep groove in my mind.” ⏳“Just because we don’t have an explanation for something doesn’t mean it’s not real.” ⏳“It feels good to be needed in two places, but I am most needed here.” ⏳“From a young age, she always had a seriousness about her. I’m glad she is finally learning to frolic.” ⏳“I want you to experience happiness, of course, but sadness is part of the equation, too, as you well know. What I want is for you to have a rich, full life that is uniquely yours. What I want is for you to chart your own course. It’s all I ever wanted, even when you were little. I think every child deserves that—the space to mine her own thoughts, hear her own voice, be her own person.” ⏳“But in holding parts of my life back from my friends, I ended up disconnecting from myself.” ⏳“It feels as though we are part of the landscape, just like any other element: the water, the trees, the sky, and the girls on the dock. I feel more than reassured. I feel rooted.” ⏳“The only thing we ever have is the present, and we do the best we can with it.” ⏳“I don’t miss my old life or my old self, but I realize that my new existence might look a bit strange, from the outside.” ⏳“That’s sort of why I left New York—I was exhausted by the compulsion to monetize everything; to convert every glimmer of authenticity into a product; to scale small joys until they are so bloated that they wither and droop.” ⏳“It’s definitely a lot … but you have been through a lot, and you’ve taken on a lot, and you’ve created a lot.” ⏳“Mostly, I love having someone to care about—and maybe even something to hope for.” ⏳“Maybe I’ve been holding on too tightly to the version of myself that’s a failure. I wonder what it would be like to give myself a fresh start.” ⏳“I’ve been there. So have you. It’s just that, here, in this human form, we forget all the things we inherently know. I am just now starting to remember.” ⏳“It’s not too late. And I’d be saying that if you were thirty-seven or forty-seven or fifty-seven. Do not ever give up on yourself.” ⏳“In taking things one day at a time, I somehow fumbled my way from one life into another—one that’s smaller yet fuller, less flashy but infinitely more meaningful.” ⏳“But this is love in action. You’re a good daughter.” ⏳“I never knew heartbreak and healing could be so intertwined.” ⏳“As I now know, we are always between selves. It doesn’t mean we are lost—it means we are growing.” ⏳“But up here, in the quiet, the truth has infinite patience. It waits until we have run ourselves ragged and are finally ready to come home, to remember who we have always been.””

Hannah

Created about 14 hours ago

“WOW. I adored this book. Had me in tears multiple times. Heart warming and life affirming. What a read.”

Change and grow Death Grief

marylin

Created about 15 hours ago

Kathleen Smith

Created about 16 hours ago

About Tory Henwood Hoen

Tory Henwood Hoen is the author of The Arc. Her writing has appeared in New York Magazine, Vogue, Condé Nast Traveler, and Bon Appétit, among other publications. She attended Brown University, and she currently lives in New England.