I was reading this while I visited my daughter at Reed College, where she is studying psychology. I told her that I loved it, that I thought she'd like it too, because it was so good and because it was exploring memory, how our memories shape our identities and and how our memories get shaped by our identities, what happens with the ones we reject because we can't accept them as parts of ourselves.

Then I got to about page 200 and said, "I'm not recommending this anymore. It's still good, but I can't recommend that anyone feel the way I feel right now."

The only way I know how to live with the knowledge that such cruelty exists is mostly not to think about it. I agree with Fowler that it is morally wrong to know it exists and refuse to think about it, but what else can I do?