In con­nect­ed essays, The Mem­o­ry Eaters uses nos­tal­gia and Kadet­sky’s per­son­al Jew­ish and French-Cana­di­an fam­i­ly back­ground to explore epi­ge­net­ics, grief, what a name and an iden­ti­ty mean in the con­text of fam­i­ly and inher­i­tance, her own trau­mat­ic assault, yoga, Bud­dhism, and more. Cov­er­ing her bat­tles with her moth­er’s Alzheimer’s — a for­mer Puc­ci and run­way mod­el — her sis­ter’s addic­tion, and fam­i­ly secrets with radi­ant insights and gor­geous writ­ing, Kadet­sky answers the ques­tion inher­ent in this mem­oir: Can we remake the past using the wis­dom of the present? Her nuanced essays explore the com­pli­cat­ed con­tra­dic­tions inher­ent to mem­o­ry, how mem­o­ry holds us cap­tive to our famil­ial wounds, while at the same time help­ing us pre­serve the sto­ries, and pres­ences, of those we love. The author’s pre­cise eye for detail, the lush­ness of her prose, her relent­less and unflinch­ing deter­mi­na­tion to com­pre­hend a fam­i­ly’s incal­cu­la­ble mys­ter­ies, shape a vivid­ly unfor­get­table mem­oir of long­ing and discovery.