What readers think of The Half-Life of Everything, plus links to write your own review.

Have you ever been in the position of judging someone else’s lifestyle? Saying to yourself I Would Never Do That, No Matter What!

This is a novel which may give you pause.

Husband, David, is married to wife, Kate, who has Alzheimer’s. They have been married 25 years and the last five of which, Kate has been sick -- kept at home for three years and moved to a facility two years ago.

During the course of one visit, David runs into complications with the insurance coverage and receives the help of Jane, the social worker who handles this kind of issue at the facility. She helps him unwind the spool of disorder and he is relieved.

David is exhausted with caring for his wife, lonely for companionship, sad at her sickness, and angry that life has treated her, and them, this way.

He and Jane meet for coffee, for dinner, and the inevitable happens. They fall in love.

David assures Jane that he cannot divorce his wife; that would be cruel and it would affect the insurance coverage. He does not believe he is cheating on Kate because she isn’t really there; only her physical body is there. Jane, a woman I thought would be much smarter, buys this and they begin a relationship.

As people discover what is going on, neighbors, friends, the couple explain themselves, people are shocked, but they understand.

Meanwhile, Kate is enrolled in a trial which, like all medical trials, may or may not be successful.

I can go no further without spoilers, so I will stop here.

From this point on, you are on the fence, no matter which character you root for. Does Kate get better? Does Kate get worse? Stay the same? What about Jane? How does David live with the situation? How do his college aged boys deal with it?

Interestingly enough, People magazine, February 18, 2019, page 55 – 57, features an article about this subject. The wife has dementia, the husband falls in love with another woman, and change occurs. What kind of change and for whom, I leave you to discover.

The only problem I had with this book is that there were no bad guys. No one to blame, no one to condemn, no one to hate. I would have liked to point a finger in shame at someone, but I couldn’t do it.

Read it and see what you would do.

I wasn't sure what to expect with this book. I was drawn to reading it after the shock of seeing an older person I know develop dementia recently. Parts of Ms. Gang's novel I liked, and other parts I did not. That is how I ended up with an overall rating of 3 stars. It is difficult to explain without some slight spoiler alerts past this point of my review.

As I read the book, I found myself thinking several times that the threesome situation just was not realistic. However, (spoiler alert) while flipping through a February 18, 2019 issue of People magazine in an airport, I was shocked to read a true story about a husband/father who "Can Still Find Some Joy" while caring for his wife with Alzheimer's - for the same reason as husband/father David. A big difference between this true magazine article and the book, however, is the condition of the wife. Something else I struggled with in the book were the detailed scenes of intimacy between David and his partners. I think alluding to the lovemaking would've been enough, not because I'm against books with descriptions of intimate actions but because it just did not seem to be a smooth integral part of the overall story.

I look forward to the guided discussion of this book with others who received an ARC. I always appreciate an opportunity to read a book that I otherwise might not have chosen.

I read this book because I have a brother whose wife has Alzheimer's. I thought it might be a book for him to read and find something to which he could relate. I was so wrong. I found this book almost insulting. The situations in this book are simply unbelievable. Things would never play out in real life the way it did in this book. I don't understand how the author could distort and treat a tragic affliction the way she did.