Born with normal hearing, Arlene Romoff began to gradually lose it throughout her teens. Over the course of the next twenty-five years she slowly descended into total deafness. At the time, there was no hearing aid or device that could help her until the technology of cochlear implants was created and allowed her the miracle of being able to once again hear. But ten years later, that implant failed and Arlene was forced to have another procedure done with new state-of-the-art technology.

For starters, Romoff’s book Listening Closely does not chronicle her deafness and subsequent restored hearing in any detail. That is covered in her earlier book, Hear Again. Listening Closely describes in excruciating detail the failure of her first device and its replacement with a newer kind of device that is surgically implanted in both ears. I say excruciating because Romoff’s writing reads like a medical logbook or stereo instructions rather than any sort of personal journal. Her writing is devoid of any real emotional content. It is really nothing more than one technical journal entry after another that I could have read about in Wikipedia just as easily.

Romoff wants the reader to be impressed with what she went through, using the terms “miracle” and “breakthrough” so many times and explanation points so often that it wears the reader out and makes her struggle sound cliché. Frankly, there really is no story here at all. While I’m sure it was an amazing experience for her to regain her hearing and the technological innovations have been amazing, Romoff simply fails to convey any of this to the reader to make them care about her journey. There may be in interesting story to be told, but it doesn’t exist in the form of Listening Closely.

My copy of Listening Closely was provided by the publisher through the LibraryThing Early Reviewer program. ( )

Listening Closely is a bit of a disappointment. The description sounded intriguing. To read about someone's loss of hearing from their perspective, written as she experienced it, should have been quite interesting. Some of it is. For the most part, it's either boring or annoying.

The author spends a great deal of the opening sections of the book telling us that she was destined to write the book, that it is part of some grand design, and that a hearing person could not possibly understand the experience of being deaf and/or the miraculous nature of a cochlear implant. She believes that she was destined to write the book. Okay. She believes that her experience was part of some grand design. (She says that it is up to the reader to decide whether they agree with this, and that it is of little importance if they agree with her or not. Then she repeates the "grand design" and "miracle" assertions over and over again.) Fine. It is her repeated statement that hearing persons cannot understand the experience she is writing about that I find insulting. It is her job as the author of this book to make them understand, or at least to attempt it. She utterly fails to do so. In the beginning of the book, she mentions several incidents that would be interesting or amusing to read about. She doesn't describe them. It is not enough to tell us that hearing loss is difficult to cope with and then barely talk about the experience. She barely describes any of her experiences with more than a few sentences, if that. She tells us that social interactions are difficult, but fails to include any anecdotes.

The subject is interesting. Listening Closely: A Journey to Bilateral Hearing is not. ( )

An original account of Arlene Romoff''s abrupt transition from monaural hearing to complete deafness and then onward to bilateral hearing through the amazing technology of cochlear implants. What she describes as a miracle, is realistically portrayed as a process involving surgery, recovery time, audiological mapping appointments, follow up physician and audiology visits, and ongoing aural rehabilitation needed to maximize the miracle.

Yet through this journey, Arlene's shares her insights and reveals the tremendous impact of hearing on day-to-day communication and social interactions. From the amazement of hearing her husband call her name from a long distance to the joyful tears when experiencing the intensity and brilliance created by the music of the 60-bell carillon, she relates the amazing wonder of sound and hearing. Listening Closely offers a unique perspective about the invisible sense of hearing that speaks volumes about how we connect to the world if we Listen Closely. ( )

I was interested in reading Arlene Romoff's story because I have a good friend who works closely with the deaf community. Although most of those she works with have always been deaf, they have strong opinions (not always positive) about cochlear implants and I wanted to get more information from someone who had direct experience.

There were several parts in Arlene's story where she pointed out things that I (having been hearing my whole life) never thought about: the stress of lipreading, the social isolation for those that struggle with hearing loss/deafness, the impact on their loved ones and the trauma of going through cochlear implantation and, (in Arlene's case) failure. Arlene was very forthright and sincere which made me very interested. I also suspect it takes a lot of courage to share this type of experience in a book not knowing who will read it and what their response will be and I admire her for doing it twice.

The only disappointment I had was the reiteration that it is impossible for a hearing person to truly understand what a person in her situation goes through. Coming into this very much wanting to understand and empathize, I'm sure she is 100% correct that a hearing person can't really understand. But, it left me sad that after a period in the book where I really felt I was making a connection, I was reminded that I was not really on the right track at all. I let go of that feeling as much as possible and the last few chapters at the end were really lovely and left me on a good note.

I think this is a good read. Not only to get a 'first-person' account of what hearing loss is like, but to share in her thankfulness for having hearing and being reminded that we need to be grateful every day for what we have. ( )

This book may have a narrow audience but for those with single sided deafness, it will spark a desire to pursue bilateral hearing. Arlene Romoff articulates very well the panic and isolation experienced when you suddenly loose the hearing in both ears. She also describes very well the fatigue, stress and miscommunication involved when you normally only have one ear that works.

I was surprised by her description of hearing with only one cochlear implant (the new model); her hearing was so much better than what I now experience with my one working ear! When Mrs. Romoff moved to bilateral CIs, her enjoyment of music returned and she reports that her whole demeanor changed when she was in crowds.

Since reading this book I’ve done some online research and plan on making an appointment with my audiologist to discuss the possibility regaining the hearing on my deaf side. ( )