The Possibility of Everything: A Memoir by Hope Edelman

I was overall intrigued, but oftentimes annoyed by this memoir. It got way too New-Agey in many parts and there were a couple times I felt like the author's insecurity of what reviewers thought of her came through in her writing...and that annoyed me. After all, she is a New York Times bestselling author, so why is she sharing moments of insecurity like that with the reader, which not to mention has nothing to do with the actual story?

Anyway, the parts about dealing with "Dodo", her daughter's imaginary friend and how it affected their day-to-day life, their marriage and their relationships was extremely interesting. But the random tangents and pages of information on the Mayan's beliefs of the moons and stars and blah, blah, blah....Lord help me, I was like - ok, get on with it already.

So I guess my impression of this book is - meh, half and half. It was interesting enough to keep me turning the pages, but not interesting enough to recommend it to anyone.

Thank you to Shelf Awareness and Random House Publishing for the Advanced Review Copy!

Description: From the bestselling author of Motherless Daughters, here is the real-life story of one woman's search for a cure to her family's escalating troubles, and the leap of faith that took her on a journey to an exotic place and a new state of mind.In the autumn of 2000, Hope Edelman was a woman adrift, questioning her marriage, her profession, and her place in the larger world. Feeling vulnerable and isolated, she was primed for change. Into her stagnant routine dropped Dodo, her three-year-old daughter Maya's curiously disruptive imaginary friend. Confused and worried about how to handle Dodo's apparent hold on their daughter, Edelman and her husband made the unlikely choice to take her to Maya healers in Belize, hoping that a shaman might help them banish Dodo–and, as they came to understand, all he represented–from their lives.An account of how an otherwise mainstream mother and wife finds herself making an extremely unorthodox choice, The Possibility of Everything chronicles the magical week in Central America that transformed Edelman from a person whose past had led her to believe only in the visible and the "proven" to someone open to the idea of larger, unseen forces. This deeply affecting, beautifully written memoir of a family' s emotional journey explores what Edelman and her husband went looking for in the jungle and what they ultimately discovered–as parents, as spouses, and as ordinary people–about the things that possess and destroy, or that can heal us all.From the Hardcover edition.

Rating: ***

Recommend: nah.