A fascinating deep dive into psychiatry and mental illness. I particularly loved the case studies but the background information about neuroscience was really interesting too. Meticulously referenced and very readable.

A fascinating look at memory & how memories are made. I particularly enjoyed the real world examples as they gave a real insight into what the author tells us.

I received the ARC from Netgally in exchange for an honest review.

Ever since my mother in law got diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease I got interested in memory and how that affects our state of mind. The more I read about it the more and more intricate the subject becomes.

I found this book very thorough and easily explained, which is an art on its self, as most medical terms and books can get very confusing for non native speakers. Love the quotes at the beginning and the end.

There’s loads of information so this is the kind of book that requieres a second or third read. While reading the book a song from the Spanish band Mecano came to mind “¡Ay! Qué pesado” as the song talks about memory my fave line is “los recuerdos son mentiras que inundan la razón” (memories are lies that flood our reasoning) that’s all the things we remember from good to bad. It’s ever so interesting learning about the human ability to dip and and out our minds changing ever so slightly our own memories.

Fascinating stuff

Due to a sudden, unexpected passing in the family a few years ago and another more recently and my subsequent (mental) health issues stemming from that, I was unable to download this book in time to review it before it was archived as I did not visit this site for several years after the bereavements. This means I can't leave an accurate reflection of my feelings towards the book as I am unable to read it now and so I am leaving a message of explanation instead.

I am now back to reading and reviewing full time as once considerable time had passed I have found that books have been helping me significantly in terms of my mindset and mental health - this was after having no interest in anything for quite a number of years after the passings.

Anything requested and approved will be read and a decent quality review written and posted to Amazon (where I am a Hall of Famer & Top Reviewer), Goodreads (where I have several thousand friends and the same amount who follow my reviews) and Waterstones (or Barnes & Noble if the publisher is American based). Thank you for the opportunity and apologies for the inconvenience.

I'm so sorry but this just wasn't for me. The writing is beautiful but I just couldn't quite take to it :(

an insightful book into how memory works. Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for the chance to read and review.

It's hard to review an anthology as there's not one author. Yet as a collective whole an anthology can be larger than the sum of its parts- the way they combine adds a different quality.

I was perplexed why these poems were titled 'for men' but it is explained in the introduction that this is not meant to exclude women and there are poems by female poets. In fact, the sub-title refers to how the poems used at various men's workshops. So just to note that these poems are relatable for all no matter your gender and I ( a female) really enjoyed reading them.

I liked how the poems are arranged by various themes depending on personal circumstance including relationships, parenting, suffering and death. It covers poems from other cultures and in other languages translated into English and spans many centuries with poems from Ancient Greece to more contemporary English poets.

A wonderful anthology that transcends time.

This was fascinating - well written and informative.

Many thanks to NetGalley and to the publisher for allowing me to read this in exchange for an honest review.

Interesting read, which makes the topic approachable and 'easy' to understand. However, the many descriptions of psychosis gave me the chills and made for really disturbing reading at times - be warned the examples the author uses (usually the episodes in italics) can be very triggering and upsetting throughout.
Not one for the faint of heart, I would say

Memories. They make us and they break us. Deep, taut and an immersive read. This book is an absolute treat and a homage to memories that humans makes and the memories that makes a human. Absolutely mesmerizing, philosophical and beautiful.

I found this to be informative yet haunting exploration of memory, the reality of our memories and how our memories shape us. It’s not an easy read, however the vignettes are sensitively covered with care shown to the individuals concerned.

O'Keane is a practising psychiatrist who begins on the journey to explore the topic of memory through the touching experiences of her patients, literature, genetics, fairytales and neuro scientific research. Her aim is to attempt to understand more about the human brain on its journey from birth through to old age.

This was a very interesting read. As a mental health nurse with very limited experiences of working with Dementia and Alzheimer's inparticularly, I feel as though I not just learnt from this book, but also felt as though it has sparked some very interesting topics for further reading for me! The inclusion of individual case studies was very important to me as I feel this is the only way that we will ever be understand the complexities of memory loss.

Overall this was a very fascinating and thought-provoking read that I am sure I will refer back to at some point in soon!

Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Press UK for an ARC of this in exchange for an honest review!

An exploration of memory and mental health, O'Keane explores neuroscientific research to ask huge questions about memory: why it feels so real, how our perceptions and assumptions connect to memory, whether memories are 'true' or not— and how memory can be disrupted by mental illness. In places this was a tough read, it's hard not to feel overwhelmingly sad for the people whose stories are drawn on here. That said, O'Keane's work is compassionate to the core— it teaches with care, which is exactly what a book like this should do.

Divided into two parts, the first centred around explaining "how we make memories" and the second around "how memories make us", Veronica O'Keane's attempt to demystify memory takes from several domains to tackle her subject matter.
Mostly drawing from established and recent neurological discoveries, she also integrates case studies and literary insights to further illuminate her explanation of the cognitive processes involved in memory.

O'Keane being a psychiatrist with decades of experience across the British Isles, she provided me with a deepened knowledge of how phenomena such as psychosis and stress are experienced and how memory works (or doesn't more like) when experiencing these. It was also a good refresher in terms of brain anatomy and processes, though frankly some of it did go over my head after a while.

While the literary references were nice in some respect (i.e. a bit of a solace from the dry science), I am not convinced that it was a successful integration that ultimately created a sum larger than its parts.

I would say that for me this book is more of a 3.5 stars. I did take quite a lot from it, but in fairness it wasn't exactly a page turner due to the nature of its content and, while engaged and interested, I didn't fly away with it.

Let's hope now I can remember at least the most salient parts from it.


Many thanks to Penguin Press UK and NetGalley for sending me a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

A fascinating book that I think is extremely accessible, I read this as a medical student and I learnt so much and it really challenged me to consider what memories are on a deeper level. It is a very scientific book so not for everyone but I enjoyed it!

A book that is what it says on the jacket. A rag and bone shop full of items, all of which will be useful to someone, but the shelves are piled so high you may never discover what you’re looking for. More curation and presenting complementary items together might make a visit to the shop a far more engaging experience.

“Come away, O human child!” Memory is a fascinating subject and ‘The Rag and Bone Shop: How We Make Memories and Memories Make Us’ by Prof. Veronica O’Keane tells us how she re-visited her learnings about memory after treating a patient with post-partum psychosis.

The only other books I had read written by a psychiatrist were by the great Oliver Sacks. There is definitely something fascinating about reading about cases of patients “at odds with the world as experienced by others around them.”

O’Keane’s book opens with the heart-wrenching story of extreme post-partum psychosis in a newly delivered mother. We learn that this is the result of rapidly changing hormones affecting the brain, but O’Keane realises from this that memory is a powerful present lived experience that can hit us “with an emotional punch all over again.”

A link to fairy tales comes in O’Keane’s conclusion to this fascinating book and in particular Irish fairy stories and Yeats poem ‘The Stolen Child’ and the motif of the changeling child. It’s a really interesting book with a comfortable meld of science and literature making it a delight to read.

This one took me a while to read, great to dip in and out of, and I found it extremely well written by a practising psychiatrist, Veronica O'Keane. What a fascinating subject the human brain is.

I loved this book, though the topic of memory is something I find endlessly fascinating. I liked the writer's style and felt her references to literature gave the book a life, a poetry, that otherwise would have been missing. Throughout, she blends neuroscience and psychology to give a rich, wide-ranging view of how our brains function and how this effects are whole experience of the world. An excellent piece of writing, I hope I get to read more from the writer in the future.

Very enlightening and enjoyable book by a psychiatrist.who deals with mental health and explains how something might trigger a patient. Fascinating insight into the brain