What?

I have no way of making sense of this book. But I'll try: Milton is a sixty-something year old. He is getting older, and is slowly losing his mind. He suffers dementia and hallucinations, there are days when he no longer remembers his dead wife. Other days, when he worries about her long absence, unaware that she has passed away.

All the while, he is obsessively fascinated by a Trinket Box, but not just any box. This box holds something over him. It is the missing piece to a memory, the sort of thing you cannot place so it plays in the back of your mind-forcing and pushing you to remember. I always find myself forgetting something or the other, so this was comforting. Milton's frustrations resonated well with me.

But he is one of those people who just can't let it go, the box eventually consumes him: he wants to solve the puzzle. So, he actively seeks it out, but he may not like what he finds....An ominous end, I'm uncertain of Milton's fate-what happened to the poor guy?

This book was written very intelligently: I fell in love with Milton, the old grump and I sympathised with him during his dementia-afflicted episodes. Yet, quite surprisingly, even after the revelation if the box' origins and the tale behind it, I felt moved. I wanted to hug the guy, in spite of his crime. Am I maybe losing my mind?

This book is so moving. It just goes to show that what we think we know, and what we care to remember, only skim the surface of who we really are. That, sometimes, what we deny and the secrets we have kept hidden, are more powerful in what they tell us.