The Memory Keeper's Daughter, by Kim Edwards ***

This stunning novel begins on a winter night in 1964, when a blizzard forces Dr. David Henry to deliver his own twins.
His son, born first, is perfectly healthy, but the doctor immediately recognizes that his daughter has Down syndrome. For motives he tells himself are good, he makes a split-second decision that will haunt all their lives forever. He asks his nurse, Caroline, to take the baby away to an institution. Instead, she disappears into another city to raise the child as her own. Compulsively readable and deeply moving, The Memory Keeper's Daughter is a brilliantly crafted story of parallel lives, familial secrets, and the redemptive power of love.

My first mistake with the novel was to watch the movie before reading the book. I don't generally like reading books after I've seen the movie based off of them because the differences stand out too much to me. I think it distracts from the story when you're expecting one thing and read something else.

Starting out, having seen the movie (which wasn't very good)I had trouble getting into this book. It was slow reading, but I would say that I started enjoying it more at about the half way point, when it started to vary significantly from the story line in the movie. It was good for a little while, and then the end was really slow. Truth is, I felt like the story was over about 40 pages before the end of the book. Eventually, I ended up quitting about 10 pages before the last page. I don't think it was a bad story, just not great. And I really think my impression of it was hampered by the less than stellar movie.