Assault on a Bibliophile’s Brain
A rare condition attacks—but doesn’t defeat—a popular mystery writer December 2007
The plot in novelist Howard Engel’s new memoir involves the treatment of a rare neurological condition called alexia sine agraphia, which has whacked his ability to read but not his capacity to write. How on earth will he continue to write his detective fiction—leaving aside other stroke-induced problems such as remembering characters and subplots—when he can’t re-read the work in order to do basic…