Interesting in its own right, is Jennifer’s path towards becoming an artist; she is a talented painter, and her work graces the cover of the book. As Jon Krakauer wrote in the book's introduction, "Forget Me Not is more than a biography of one of the world's most talented climbers. A few times, particularly when she was falling in love with Conrad after the death of Alex, she almost got the narration to a place where she was reflecting on the “why,” but never quite did. Jennifer Lowe-Anker achieves what she sets out to do - painting a portrait of her late first husband, Alex Lowe, in a way that ensures who he was is captured and never forgotten. Maybe this is expected, though: it's easier to speak candidly about the distant past, less so about what's closer.

Jennifer Lowe-Anker has also inherited the pioneer strain, and there is a clarity, a lucidity, sometimes even a toughness to her writing that gives this book the balance it needs. The story, while objectively sad – Alex Lowe, much-loved hero of the climbing world, husband, and father, dies in an avalanche and his family must find a way to continue without him – is narrated in a pretty emotionally bland way.It is her story of love with the late, great climber Alex Lowe, their journeys in climbing and raising a family, and his tragic death in an avalanche in the Himalaya. Jennifer got together and married Conrad (Alex's best friend and survivor of that fateful climb) less than a year after the accident and married him shortly after that. To calculate the overall star rating and percentage breakdown by star, we don’t use a simple average. I was simply overwhelmed (in a good way) by Jennifer's captivating voice, her beautifully descriptive passages of the beauty in her surroundings, her meticulous record-keeping to reconstruct the past, and her frank, introspective view of the meaning of it all. She clearly draws on carefully kept journals and letters, and this allows her to provide some really precise, immediate memories and descriptions of events.

In the end, I feel she is the biggest hero here, even though she somehow manages to take a backseat and paint everyone else as larger than life.I see the film as a way of showing that, even after hardships, you can appreciate what you do have and turn it into something good. i was saddened she didn't mention Alex in her acknowledgements although I suppose their love was apparent. It is just that he left so much for his wife to do, not to mention all of the things he missed with his children, and of course leaving her a widow at too young of an age. I picked up this book by chance - I love mountaineering and so had heard of Jenni, and Alex, and Conrad, but didn't realize Jenni had written a book until I happened across an interview with Conrad where he mentioned it.

Having suddenly lost her husband, Alex Lowe, in a tragic mountaineering accident, Jennifer Lowe struggled to hold her family together and deal with her grief.I really wanted to give this book 4 stars, but I just couldn't learn to care much for Alex although I appreciated what the author has tried to do and what she herself has been through. Or, perhaps, it would be a regrettable story of an obsessed, stupid, unloving climber who finally got out of the way of his family's happiness.