Left Neglected

Sarah Nickerson is like any other career-driven supermom in Welmont, the affluent Boston suburb where she leads a hectic but charmed life with her husband Bob, faithful nanny, and three children - Lucy, Charlie, and nine-month-old Linus.

Between recruiting the best and brightest minds as the vice president of human resources at Berkley Consulting; shuttling the kids to soccer, day care, and piano lessons; convincing her son’s teacher that he may not, in fact, have ADD; and making it home in time for dinner, it’s a wonder this over-scheduled, over-achieving Harvard graduate has time to breathe.

Sarah, who admits she is a balloon on the verge of popping, nevertheless handles every second of her life like an air traffic controller. Until one fateful day, while driving to work and trying to make a phone call, she looks away from the road for one second too long. All of the fast-moving components of her hectic existence abruptly stop in their tracks.

After suffering a severe brain injury that erases everything on the left side of her universe, Sarah finally gives up control to everybody around her, including her mother who had previously been gone. She can't even floss her own teeth, therefore she finds it difficult to find closure on her past and uncertainty about the future.

Sarah must now come to terms with the possibility that her true destiny—her new, authentic life—may not be found in the world of spreadsheets and conference calls as she struggles to recover and reclaim her independence. And that, if she just stops down long enough to realize, happiness and tranquility greater than all the success in the world are just around the corner.