Blind Man's Bluff

An intimate and elegantly written memoir on coming to terms with blindness, James Tate Hill's memoir is captivating, Switching between 1st and 2nd person, Hill's prose is often as funny as it is insightful. He writes about the lifespans of relationships and manuscripts, reminding us that "The problem with wanting to be an artist is that wanting to be one doesn't mean you get to be one." Yet, his love of writing and words shines through in lines such as, "And in the end, it's because you don't know why you keep writing that makes it seem like you should keep writing."

The narrator expands into vulnerability, something particularly resonant this year. He writes, "Its' hard to trust that people like you when so much of yourself reminds hidden."

This is a story of overcoming our own self-sabotaging habits, fears, and insecurities, highly relatable and uplifting while honest and entertaining.

A great memoir gives the reader not captures some part of the writer's life but also offers a fresh perspective on the world. James Tate Hill's beautifully written BLIND MAN'S BLUFF does both. Its story begins when, at sixteen, Hill loses virtually all of his vision to a rare disease called Leber’s hereditary optic neuropathy. While his parents unsuccessfully attempt to find a cure, Hill himself concentrates on hiding his condition from his peers. The constant deceptions this involves give others the impression that his "bad eyes" are a minor problem and allow Hill to avoid feeling that he is burdening others. Yet they are also endlessly exhausting, occasionally dangerous (as for example when he crosses busy streets without a guide or a cane), and ultimately unsustainable. As he moves through college and graduate school, teaching and writing projects, friendships and marriage, it becomes increasingly clear that the strategies he devised to help him fit in socially actually isolate him as much or more than his blindness. Rich with telling details and moments, Hill's memoir reminds the sighted among us just how much we take for granted—how much our movement through both the physical and social world depends on visual cues and how hard it is to navigate without them. Just as powerfully, BLIND MAN'S BLUFF explores questions that affect all of us, sighted or not. What does it mean to be "normal," and when does the cost of seeming to be like everyone else rise too high? Is the willingness to ask for help a burden or a gift? Above all, perhaps, what happens to our relationships when we don't let others see us fully? James Tate Hill is a wry, skillful and soulful guide to these and other mysteries at the heart of human life; in BLIND MAN'S BLUFF, he allows us to see not only himself but also ourselves with new clarity.