THE TINCTURE OF TIME: A Memoir of (Medical) Uncertainty
Publisher's Weekly Buzz Book for the Spring
Kveller's Ten Awesome Books to Read on Spring Break
Growing up as the daughter of a dedicated surgeon, Elizabeth L. Silver felt an unquestioned faith in medicine. When her six-week-old daughter, Abby, was rushed to the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit with sudden seizures, and scans revealed a serious brain bleed, her relationship to medicine began to change.The Tincture of Time is Silver’s gorgeous and haunting chronicle of Abby’s first year. It’s a year of unending tests, doctors’ opinions, sleepless nights, promising signs and steps backward, and above all, uncertainty: The mysterious circumstances of Abby’s hospitalization attract dozens of specialists, none of whom can offer a conclusive answer about what went wrong or what the future holds. As Silver explores what it means to cope with uncertainty as a patient and parent and seeks peace in the reality that Abby’s injury may never be fully understood, she looks beyond her own story for comfort, probing literature and religion, examining the practice of medicine throughout history, and reporting the experiences of doctors, patients, and fellow caretakers.The result is a brilliant blend of personal narrative and cultural analysis, at once a poignant snapshot of a parent’s struggle and a wise meditation on the reality of uncertainty, in and out of medicine, and the hard-won truth that time is often its only cure.Heart-wrenching, unflinchingly honest, and beautifully written, The Tincture of Time is a powerful story of parenthood, an astute investigation of the boundaries of medicine, and an inspiring reminder of life’s precariousness.
Praise & Reviews
“A delicate weave of cultural analysis, personal history, and religious teachings in a meditation on the limits of science and the boundless capacity of the human heart.”—O, The Oprah Magazine
"Silver... brings to this moving personal account a novelist's pacing, a poet's lyricism and a researcher's meticulousness for fact."—The Dallas Morning News
"A meditation on “not knowing” that traces the harrowing months after the author’s infant daughter had an unexplained, and terrifying medical ordeal."—Kveller,Ten Awesome Books to Read on Spring Break and Beyond
"Tincture will resonate for any parent who has had a desperately sick, hospitalized child—its ultimate message of hope providing a healing balm."-Jewish Book Council
“Smartly conceived and well written. . . . An excellent book.”—Publishers Weekly
"A mother's uncertainty about her baby daughter's medical care pervades this unsettling memoir....Readers will share Silver's unease with uncertainty. This will resonate with anyone who has experienced diagnostic difficulties."—Kirkus
“In Elizabeth Silver’s masterful hands, suffering creates poetry. She draws upon MRI scans, Greek mythology, and the history of medicine to tell the story of her infant daughter’s brain bleed, and the resulting meditation on trauma, memory, and time is one of the most riveting stories of illness that I’ve ever read. This is an unforgettable book.”-Susannah Cahalan, New York Times bestselling author of Brain on Fire
“The Tincture of Time is just the kind of memoir this world desperately needs. In precise and powerful language, Elizabeth Silver uses her deeply singular experience to shed light on universal issues of wellness, health, the body, healing, and trust. She shines her bright, generous intellect into the deepest reaches of her own heart, and into the heart of every reader. This book will change you, teach you, move you. Read it.”—Emily Rapp, New York Times bestsellingauthor of The Still Point of the Turning World
“The Tincture of Time delivers two remarkable books for the price of one: an honest, raw, exquisitely written narrative and an astute yet deeply compassionate investigation of the practice of medicine. It’s a book for anyone who’s ever grappled with the inescapable uncertainty of life—that is to say, it’s a book for everyone. Simply put, I was blown away.”—Darin Strauss, National Book Critics Circle award-winning authorof Half a Life
"Elizabeth L. Silver’s brilliant memoir of her infant daughter’s sudden illness is a stunning meditation on the limits of medicine, the infinite responsibility of parenthood, and the terror of having the two converge. It’s nearly impossible to put The Tincture of Time down. This medical mystery burns from page-to-page, teaching the reader as much about the fragility of life as it does the power of love."—Christa Parravani, author of Her
“The Tincture of Time is at once a medical mystery and an affecting meditation on how to live without certainty. Elizabeth L. Silver has written a compelling account of a mother’s worst nightmare with grace, intelligence, and love.”—Jill Bialosky, New York Times bestselling author of History of a Suicide