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Reviewed by Jamie Michele for Readers' Favorite
What Really Happened to Marion and Candace by Cynthia Cook is the true story of the collapse of a sister bond after dementia enters a family. Marion Horsell, an aging artist living in Park City, depends on her adult son, Shane, and his partner, Sunshine, for care and decision-making as her memory falters. Candace Horsell visits to help with practical matters and to settle a long-running family business. During the visit, Marion appears to consent to Candace taking a framed pair of inherited buckskin gloves. After Candace leaves, a hat belonging to Sunshine, which has fur saved from a beloved dog that had died years earlier, is damaged. When blame turns toward Candace, the accusation becomes the catalyst that redraws the family’s lines.
What Really Happened to Marion and Candace by Cynthia Cook is a story that, sadly, many people who have been touched by dementia will be able to relate to. As someone who has personally witnessed the tearing apart of family over heirlooms and money when a matriarch passes, and where manipulation is not difficult with the hallucination aspect of Lewy body dementia, this hit really hard. Cook writes her memoir in a way that reads as comfortably as fiction, and it is a spectacular choice of style that completely changes a reader's ability to connect with it. I love that even the gloves and a quilt have a first-person point of view, and each person, Shane, Candace, Marion, and even Candace's daughter, Rhiannon, among others, shares their perspectives. Ultimately, we learn what really happened, and overall this is a brilliant account in an art-imitating-life format that can't be missed.
