The novel Still Alice by Lisa Genova is about a successful psychology professor, Alice Howland, who is beginning to experience memory issues. Given her background, she's aware of many potential causes for occasional memory lapses, but these gaps are out of the ordinary, so she begins to explore potential medical causes. Interwoven with these new memory challenges, Alice, is dealing with on-going family dynamics. The author did research into psychology, faculty life, dementia and Alzeihmers's. She has a Ph.D. in neuroscience from Harvard University (the school used in the novel).