Counting Backwards - Hardcover

by Binnie Kirshenbaum (Author)

A middle-aged couple struggles with the husband's descent into early onset Lewy Body dementia in this profound and deeply moving novel shot through with Kirshenbaum's lacerating humor.

It begins with hallucinations. From their living room window, Leo sees a man on stilts, an acting troupe, a pair of swans paddling on the Manhattan streets below. Then he's unable to perform simple tasks and experiences a host of other erratic disturbances, none of which his doctors can explain. Leo, 53, a research scientist, and Addie, a collage artist, have a loving and happy marriage. They'd planned on many more years of work and travel, dinner with friends, quiet evenings at home with the cat. But as Leo's periods of lucidity become rarer, those dreams fall away, and Addie finds herself less and less able to cope with an increasingly unbearable present.

Author Biography

Binnie Kirshenbaum is the author of the story collection History on a Personal Note and seven novels, including Rabbits for Food, On Mermaid Avenue, Hester Among the Ruins, An Almost Perfect Moment, and The Scenic Route. Her novels have been chosen as Notable Books of the Year by The New York Times, the Chicago Tribune, NPR, TIME, the San Francisco Chronicle, and The Washington Post. Her work has been translated into seven languages.