REMEMBRANCE OF THINGS PRESENT - Peter Maeck

 VIRTUAL AUTHOR'S BOOK TOURS

Proudly Presents

REMEMBRANCE OF THINGS PRESENT:
Making Peace With Dementia
by
Peter Maeck
 
ABOUT THE BOOK
Publisher: Shanti Arts LLC (April 18, 2017)
Category: Health, Alzheimer's Disease, Dementia, Photography, Memoir, Poetry
Tour dates: Aug-Oct, 2017
ISBN: 978-1941830802
Available in Print & ebook, 70 pages



Peter Maeck celebrates his father's brave, good-humored struggle with Alzheimer's Disease. With lyrical prose, rhyming verse, and his own photographs, Maeck traces his personal journey from resistance to acceptance of a loved one's dementia, and suggests how the affliction can draw patients and caregivers together instead of driving them apart.

Maeck says, "As if to compensate for my father's fading memory, my own memory became more acute. As Dad shed future considerations, I projected further ahead. Then I realized that all my forward and backward looking was pushing me away from my father; thus I had to meet him where he was increasingly living: in a constant present tense."

As the book reveals: Dad and I then moved from a prose relationship into one of poetry, less literal and more metaphorical, where we engaged more in rhyme than in reason, freezing time initially but then melting it and coming together in that lyrical realm between what had gone before and what was yet to be.

When presenting his story at TEDx events, Alzheimer's Association gatherings, and mental health conferences in the U.S. and abroad, Maeck hears caregivers, familial and professional, confess their frustration, regret, despair, and even rage when dementia is diagnosed. Clearly, caregivers need and deserve care giving as much as their patients do. "Remembrance of Things Present" aims to comfort, console, and inspire persons with Alzheimer's Disease and other forms of dementia, their loved ones, clinicians, researchers, and all whose lives dementia touches. As Maeck says, "If art can offer no more than symptomatic and palliative relief from the effects of Alzheimer’s Disease, that is no less than modern medicine has done to date. Ideally, art and science can work together to reduce dementia’s effects and ultimately reach a cure."

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Remembrance Of Things Present Tour Schedule

Teddy Rose Book Reviews Plus Aug 16 Review & Giveaway

Books Reviews Etc Aug 17 Guest Post

Books Reviews Etc Aug 18 Review

Caty Amazon Reviewer Aug 20 Review

Pat Samples Blog Sept 5 Review

Linda Amazon Reviewer Sept 7 Review

Cathryn Wellner Sept 12 Review, Guest Post & Giveaway

Between the Beats Sept 15 Review, Interview & Excerpt

Room Without Books is Empty Oct 30 Review

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Peter Maeck is a poet, playwright, and photographer whose work has been produced and exhibited both in the United States and internationally. He served as a U.S. State Department American Cultural Specialist in Tanzania and Morocco, and he has created training programs for major U.S. corporations. He holds a B.A. in English from Dartmouth College and an M.F.A. in Playwriting from Brandeis University. He has presented "Remembrance of Things Present" as a TEDx Talk in the U.S. and abroad.
 Website: http://www.petermaeck.com
Photography website: http://www.petermaeckphotography.com
Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/petermaeck/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/PeterMaeck
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/peter.maeck.1
Facebook- Photography Page: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Peter-Maeck-Photography/253144378061964?skip_nax_wizard=true
Facebook- Author Page: https://www.facebook.com/Peter-Maeck-Author-414391928926496/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/petermaeck/

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MY THOUGHTS
This is such a informative and also a true honest view of dementia.  The author approaches it in a different way using poetry, and his own photography.  It's far more than just a story.   The book isn't presented on just one level.  There are many with the prose, the pictures, some confessions and some questions.   I found the photography to be amazing. It captures the true person and you just want to sit and look at them and wonder about the innocence, the pain, the simple, yet very complicated lives of the people in the pictures. It's more than the author telling of his father's dementia.  It shows the approach to his father's devastating disease and how the author handles the anger, the love and the facing of what is at hand.  It saddens the heart at what this disease can do to a person, but the author takes that sadness and you feel a warmth in your heart for the love that is there.  It's a true, honest dealing with a subject that destroys.  The author makes a connection to the reader with the honesty and the human aspect of life.   This disease is a part of life, as awful as that is.   But the author has a very positive approach to aging and what goes with it.   This is a book that anyone who has an aging parent, relative or friend, should read. And re-read.  It may make it easier,even if just a bit, to take this in and deal with it, not only the disease, but the grief, anger, bits of joy and HOPE.  There is always HOPE and we must hold on to that, if nothing else, but to get through the hard times.  I recommend this. Don't think, Oh this wouldn't ever happen to someone close and dear to me, because it very well can.

I received this book from the author and Virtual Author Book Tours and voluntarily decided to review it.

I would give this book 5 STARS.

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Praise for Remembrance Of Things Present: Making Peace With Dementia by Peter Maeck

“I absolutely recommend this book. This book has touched me so much since my grandfather in his latter days suffered from dementia. The poems are so beautifully written and touching and I am so happy to see there is more awareness about this disease.”- Elizabeth M. Bokango, Amazon Reviewer

“I've had the privilege of attending Peter Maeck's TEDx Talk about his father and Alzheimers Disease. His book ‘Remembrance of Things Present’ complements and beautifully illustrates his spoken prose and poetry on a difficult subject. He takes us on a lyrical journey from a relationship with his father through the confusing and anger filled diagnosis to a new place of acceptance of a disease that separates, yet bonds the two of them ultimately on a spiritual level. I recommend this book for all who have loved ones who may be facing similar circumstances. 5 stars for sure!”-Kristen Makita, Amazon Reviewer

“What a great little book! Moving, insightful photos integrated with passionate and creative poetry create a unique telling of the experience Peter Maeck had with his father's journey through dementia. I had the opportunity to experience a live dramatic presentation of ‘Remembrance of Things Present’ by the author at a TEDx event. It was truly moving and entertaining. This book allows revisiting of that experience and creates a similar experience for others. Maeck demonstrates his unique combination of talents weaving photography and poetry into a book that everyone should read and reread.”-Amazon Reviewer

“Beautiful collection of photographs, poetry, and prose from an artist grappling with his changing relationship with his aging father, who has Alzeimer's disease. From the first page, the author reaches beyond easy narratives we sometimes hear about aging - that life becomes simpler, for example. Instead, the author delves bravely into the grief he feels about his father's dementia, and how their relationship changes as their memories take divergent paths. Ambivalence, hope, fear, confusion, anger, joy - Maeck approaches his feelings with extraordinary compassion, wisdom, and insight. Taught me to approach my own ambivalence about aging with more gentleness. The book, with its combination of text and images, is a moving and engaging read - highly recommended!! Will deepen your understanding of grief, aging, and dementia. A must read!”-Athena Torri, Amazon Reviewer

“I loved the all the layers in this book -- pictures, narratives, confessions and inquiry. The author’s father is pictured, here swathed in a scarf as in a monk’s cowl, there stepping lightly with a walker, there standing and inhaling a harmonica. There are photos of children lost in reverie, and of old people at play. Women and men are on trains and beaches and at amusement parks. The accompanying text is a rich conversational musing, the author’s response to other authors and ideas – on aging, on art and poetry and relationships, and on what it can mean to grow older. The conversation concludes with a long tribute in rhymed tetrameter couplets, remarkable for it’s genuineness and poignancy. I expect to be looking at this book again and again.”- Daniel Chodos, Amazon Reviewer