Exercise Your Mind and Help Power Brain Research

As frequent visitors to this blog would know I am heavily involved in raising funds for charity, in fact ALL the commission I earn from this blog goes to a featured charity each time I receive a payment. For the next 12 months (yep ALL year) I will donate all income from this blog and my sister charity blog, at messcharityrun.blogspot.com to Neuroscience Research Australia,  an independent, not-for-profit research institute based in Sydney, Australia. As a leader in brain and nervous system research, their goal is to prevent, treat and cure brain and nervous system diseases, disorders and injuries through medical research. In fact if you follow my sister blog you will soon find out what ridiculous endurance challenge I am going to set myself to raise funds for this worthy charity.

But onto the reading side of things, Neuroscience Research Australia have announced a different approach to fundraising, by asking book clubs to learn about and support their work of while sharing the joys, friendship, mental stimulus and new reading horizons offered by the book club experience.

They ask that in October this year you read and discuss their preferred book The Brain That Changes Itself, by Norman Doidge or a book from their featured list:

My Stroke of Insight, Jill Bolte Taylor 

Tell Me I’m Here: One Family’s Experience of Schizophrenia, Anne Deveson

Still Alice, Lisa Genova

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, Mark Haddon

An Unquiet Mind: A Memoir of Moods and Madness, Kay Redfield Jamison

Turn of Mind, Alice LaPlante

The Boy Who Fell to Earth, Kathy Lette

Sane New World, Ruby Wax

I'll participate by reading one of the novels on the list, "Turn of Mind", a thriller about about a retired orthopedic surgeon suffering from dementia and accused of killing her best friend, and simply ask that if you run or participate in a book club you think about doing the same (obviously choose a book you'd like!!!). 

I'll post my review here on my blog and hope you can read the same novel and past your thoughts here too - I'll plan on publishing my review on 1 October for the start of the "challenge".

You can see more details about the initiative at http://www.neura.edu.au/booksforbrains 

Remember if you use Book Depository then click through from this blog as the price will cost you no more but I receive 5% of your expenditure which goes fully to charity - in this case Neuroscience Research Australia.