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Book Review: A Dowry of Blood by S.T. Gibson
Summary:
You saved my life when I was on the brink of death, and I became your vampire bride. But we’ve lived many centuries past those days in Romania. I think your way of loving might be more than I can bear.
Review:
I picked this up because I heard that in spite of the husband/wife part of the summary that there’s a significant sapphic subplot. I’m not sure I’d call it significant so much as being one of the three parts of the book.
It’s written as a letter from the vampire bride Constanta to her vampire husband. In the first part, we learn how Constanta became a vampire and her early years with him. In the second, he adds a second wife, Magdalena. But this is true polyamory in that everyone sleeps with everyone. In the third part, he adds a husband, Alexi. Again, everyone has sex with everyone, although this is not the amicable threesome (and sometimes twosomes in both combinations) it once was. It’s clear that while the sire is fine with Magdalena and Alexi sleeping together, he’s less ok with Constanta and Alexi.
But what is the plot of the book? It’s basically Constanta realizing over time just how cruel her husband is and trying to decide if she should try to escape. The most unique part of this was the second part where Magdalena and Constanta both feel an immediate attraction to each other and then proceed to form a romantic bond as their husband perpetually abandons them for his research. I don’t say this just because it’s sapphic but rather because I think polyamory as opposed to polygamy has less representation in literature. Not that either have a lot.
I want to be clear this is not erotica. If it wasn’t for all the vampire feeding blood, I’d say it could probably pull off a PG13 rating for the sexual content. A lot occurs off-screen or is only vaguely described. There’s really only one scene that I think might warrant an R rating for the sex. This in fact is not a story about sex but one about many centuries of abuse and how the persons being victimized finally break free. The thing is…I was here for romance. And I wouldn’t say that’s what this is.
The language is overwrought in a self-aware way. Constanta is old world. These are her words. She sounds like an 1800s teenager who takes everything far too seriously and has some hilarious turns of phrase. I’m sure some readers would read this as gorgeous as opposed to silly. When I say overwrought 1800s language, I’m sure you can tell how well that will work for you.
While the book engaged me enough to finish it, here wasn’t enough unique about it to make me rate it above average. I wanted more of what makes this vampire bride different and less of the usual tropes. But if you’re a person who loves Old Europe style vampires and wants a dash of f/f love and polyamory in there, then this will likely work quite well for you.
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3 out of 5 stars
Length: 248 pages – average but on the shorter side
Source: Library
Buy It (Amazon or Bookshop.org)
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Book Review: Made in China: A Memoir of Love and Labor by Anna Qu
Summary:
When Anna Qu was in high school, she had her guidance counselor call child protective services because her mother was making her work without pay in the family sweatshop. Her memoir uses this moment as the way into telling her life story. Of what happens when a family member is seemingly randomly selected as the one to ostracize.
Review:
I was immediately intrigued by this book because I thought – wow, what kind of mother brings her child to the US only to turn around and force her to work in a sweatshop? I could wrap my head around a mother owning and running a sweatshop. I could even imagine having your child work in a sweatshop in a different cultural context (due to need, due to cultural expectations, etc…). But the usual immigration story is a desire for your child to have a better life than your own. How does that compute if your own life is owning the sweatshop? I had to find out.
Anna’s mother immigrated to the US from China, leaving her in the care of her grandparents. She felt loved, but that changed when she joined her mother, new stepfather, and two new half-siblings in the US. An early warning sign of what is to come is seen at her arrival party thrown to celebrate her family’s ability to bring her over from China. How that party went awry and how the relationship with her mother started to fall apart is one of the most painful and eloquent scenes in the book.
Of course because this is a memoir we never get to know Anna’s mother’s motivations. But we do see some of her perspective revealed through the case worker, case documents, and what Anna’s grandmother had to say about it. A strength of this book is how the author is able to explore her mother’s own trauma without excusing her actions.
I was a ghost haunting a family that wanted nothing to do with me, and the loneliness left a tightness in my chest.
location 392
But Anna’s family wasn’t the only one to other her. Society did as well. Classmates perceived her as different and distanced themselves from her. When she went away to college, she did so without any familial support and found nothing at college was set up for people like her. She struggled to find places to stay on winter breaks, had to advocate to be declared independent from her family so she could get financial aid, and more. Thus we see the pain of noninclusive societies. How societal inclusion is even more important for people being denied by their own families.
The author also examines the two-pronged issue of sweatshop labor and workaholism. She views this as having started out as a necessity to make it in the US that then became a way of being. Although the author acknowledges the exploitation of her own experience, she takes the time to point out how much worse it is for other people. For example, undocumented workers with no legal recourse.
Thus, the book explores what makes family, society, and workplaces abuse some and not others. It provides no easy answers but is a memorable call for greater inclusivity and empathy. Recommended for readers of memoirs with an interest in intergenerational trauma and/or immigration and labor issues.
4 out of 5 stars
Length: 224 pages – average but on the shorter side
Source: Netgalley
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Book Review: Grown by Tiffany D. Jackson
Summary:
17-year-old Enchanted Jones has been making it work at her new highschool in the suburbs where she’s the only Black girl. She has a good reputation on the swim team, and she takes care of her little siblings after school while her mom and dad work to afford their kids’ private schooling and their new house. But what Enchanted really wants to do is sing – an idea her parents aren’t too fond of. When she goes to a reality tv show audition, she meets R&B singer Korey Fields. He takes a shine to her, but that might not be the good thing she thinks it is.
Review:
I read this book in less than 24 hours because I simply could not stop thinking about Enchanted and needed to find out what happened in her world. This book both manages to be about important issues but also doesn’t feel like it’s an “issues” book. It’s Enchanted’s story, and that happens to involve today’s issues because today’s issues are real.
This book is about a lot of things, but many of the things it’s about come right back around to how society treats Black girls. How we treat them like they are grown up, when they are still children. This book beautifully depicts how truly adolescent Enchanted is – something that many of our adolescents are not allowed to be but Black girls especially. Enchanted is interested in boys and has feelings about them but she also loves Disney movie night with her little siblings. She has big dreams of stardom but she also just misses seeing her grandmother and swimming with her in the ocean. She has typical adolescent breakthrough moments of realizing what you saw and thought was beautiful as a child might actually be something else. This book asks us to believe girls, but to believe Black girls especially, because so many others will just look at them and say “oh they knew what they were doing, they were grown.”
The book is also about how wealthy abusers groom girls and take advantage of their wealth and power to separate girls from their families. The abuse depicted in this book is realistic and depicts emotional, sexual, and physical abuse and could be a trigger, so please do note that. That said, the author depicts just enough abuse for us to know what’s going on, but it never feels gratuitous or unnecessary.
While this is YA, it has important content for adults too, especially if you regularly come into contact with adolescents. Highly recommended.
5 out of 5 stars
Length: 384 pages – average but on the longer side
Source: Library
Buy It (Amazon or Bookshop.org)
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Book Review: It Ain’t Me, Babe by Tillie Cole (Series, #1)
Summary:
River “Styx” Nash was born into the Hades Hangmen motorcycle club. He always knew he was set to inherit running it, in spite of his speech impediment, but he never expected to be running it at the young age of twenty-six. When a young woman shows up at their doorstep, bleeding and unconscious, he’s reminded of a girl he met at a fence in the woods when he was a boy….a girl who has haunted him ever since.
Salome grew up under Prophet David’s rule in the commune that’s the only home she’s ever known. When her sister dies, she finds the strength to run and somehow ends up in the arms of the man who was once a boy she met at the fence of the commune.
Review:
I’m being a bit charitable with my rating of this read because the juxtaposition of commune and motorcycle club (gang) is one I haven’t seen before, and I do think it’s interesting. Additionally, I do realize that these types of romances are basically fantasy so I try to cut them some leeway. That said, this book is not executed as well as it could have been for its genre. There are some jarring elements that take the reader out of the read, thus leading it to be less enjoyable.
First, it’s poorly edited. There are many clear mistakes such as saying things like “gotta to.” It reads like a first copy, not a final draft. Better editing would have really helped this book.
Second, you have to imagine that the reader who might pick up a romance featuring motorcycles might know a thing or two about them. While everything else surrounding the motorcycles can be pure fantasy, the motorcycles themselves should function like the real world (unless it’s scifi). Motorcycles, though, are treated in the book as basically cars with two wheels, and anyone who’s ridden one can tell you that’s not so, and a motorcycle gang definitely would know better than to treat them that way. One glaring instance of being unrealistic about bikes is when Salome first rides on one. The book sets it up that she has no idea what a motorcycle is. She’s never seen one before, she has zero idea how they work. In spite of this, the only riding instruction she’s given is to “hold on.” Even someone giving the most bare of instructions to a new passenger will tell them to follow the lead of the rider — to lean when they lean and not to counter-lean against the rider. This is basic safety and even a motorcycle gang would give those basic instructions because a passenger who is startled could easily cause the bike to crash and riders love their bikes. Similarly, in spite of Salome not knowing anything about motorcycles, she puts on the helmet with zero instructions. I have never seen anyone who’s never worn a motorcycle helmet before be able to put it on with zero instructions. The strap is complicated and almost always takes guidance. Additionally, we are to believe Salome is riding with someone who cares about her, yet he doesn’t check on her helmet at all. This is not something a rider who cares about his passenger would ever do.
The final thing I found jarring was descriptions of the abuse in the cult. I fully expected there to be cult abuse, but there are repeated flashbacks to the rape of 8 year olds whose legs are being held apart by bear traps. I personally find it extremely difficult to get into a romance that repeatedly flashes back to the graphic underage and violent rape of the main character. It made the book feel like it was at war with itself. Did it want to be a contemporary book about the horrors of cults or did it want to be a romance? You can be both, but that is a difficult book to write, and it’s important to either put all of the abuse in one area of the book (usually where the heroine informs the hero about it) or to make the abuse more minimal (ie maybe the heroine grew up in a cult that restricted her knowledge and movement but that didn’t rape her physically).
Ultimately, while I appreciate the interesting combination of main characters (leader of a motorcycle club and escapee from a cult), I found the execution to not live up to the unique premise. Primarily recommended to those interested in the fantasy of motorcycles with little personal knowledge of them. They will be more able to get fully into the fantasy.
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3 out of 5 stars
Length: 466 pages – chunkster
Source: Library
On Josh and Anna Duggar and the Fundamentalist Christian Culture of Forgiving Molesters and Abusers
I don’t often write non book reviews anymore, but something has come into the news that hits close to my heart and my own personal experience, and I felt it necessary to put my perspective out there.
Probably most people by now have heard that Josh Duggar of the famous Quiverfull family the Duggars has admitted that he molested young girls when he was a teenager (source). Perhaps what may be more shocking to most people is the knowledge that his wife, Anna, knew about this before they were married and married him anyway and is having children with him. (They currently have three young children, with a fourth on the way).
If you read Anna’s and Josh’s official statements, you will notice a theme among them.
Anna says, “He continued to do what he was taught. [I know] who Josh really is – someone who had gone down a wrong path and had humbled himself before God and those whom he had offended. Someone who had received the help needed to change the direction of his life and do what is right.” source, bold emphasis added by me.
Josh says, “I would do anything to go back to those teen years and take different actions. I sought forgiveness from those I had wronged and asked Christ to forgive me and come into my life. In my life today, I am so very thankful for God’s grace, mercy and redemption.” source, bold emphasis added by me.
In the fundamentalist Christian community, there is this idea that only those who were not truly saved are capable of abuse or molestation. I know this, because I was raised in a fundamentalist Christian community and heard this rhetoric over and over again. If Christianity was a ladder with fundamentalism at the top and the most liberal church you can think of at the bottom, my church growing up was one rung below the Quiverfulls. (If you are not familiar with what Quiverfull is, I highly recommend reading this expose on it).
Even in my slightly less fundamentalist fundamentalist Christian community growing up this idea existed. If someone has molested or abused people, they are clearly not saved, because no one with Jesus living in their heart would be capable of such heinous acts. Thus, if a person who has committed these acts “comes to Jesus” aka gets saved aka simply states that they now have faith in Jesus, the community believes that they are now incapable of molesting or abusing anyone. What this means is that all a molester or abuser has to do when caught is state how truly sorry they are, that they have seen their wrongs, that they have asked Christ to come into their lives and save them, that they have now repented and are turning 180 degrees from what they were.
You can see this same rhetoric in what Anna and Josh say above. While I seriously doubt that Josh is actually the changed person he claims to be (once a molester, always a molester, in my opinion), I do believe that his wife, Anna, truly believes that it’s ok to have children with him, because Josh is different now. He’s got Jesus. He didn’t have Jesus before, and that was bad, but he does now, so it’s ok. You can see how these ideas would lead to the harboring of abusers and molesters within the community. The molester and/or abuser knows exactly what rhetoric to say to get out of it. EVEN IF they had previously claimed they were saved, they can simply state that they thought they had been saved, but they must not have truly been one with Jesus or Satan wouldn’t have been able to entice them to commit these heinous acts. It’s irrelevant if the molester actually believes this or not, they simply know the rhetoric to say to get a clean slate in the community. While forgiveness is admirable, there are just situations and circumstances where that forgiveness should not go hand-in-hand with trusting the person to be around vulnerable people or with not punishing them at all or holding them accountable at all.
I personally know of at least two scenarios in my own community I grew up in where similar abusers and/or molesters have been given a free pass to be around children because they have “repented and come to Jesus now” so they “couldn’t possibly be capable of it anymore.” This culture fundamentalist Christianity has of sweeping these situations under the rug and protecting the abusers and molesters simply because they have come to Jesus is inexcusable. Yet it is so deeply ingrained in the culture, that I doubt it will ever change. So why am I bothering to write this? I want anyone who comes into contact with people from that community to be aware of the fact that just because they claim someone is a man of God or an upstanding citizen or a woman after God’s own heart that that does NOT mean that they have done nothing heinous in their past. They may have, and the community may even know of it and still speak of them that way. If you are in contact with children from this community please listen to what they say closely. If they say something like “so-and-so used to be very bad but then they came to Jesus so it’s ok now,” that is most likely a situation that warrants closer attention. These children need us to pay attention and try to protect them because God knows their own community will not.
Book Review: Will I Ever Be Good Enough?: Healing the Daughters of Narcissistic Mothers by Karyl McBride
Summary:
A guidebook for adult women raised by a mother with Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD). Dr. McBride is a therapist with many years of experience treating daughters of NPD mothers and also with treating people with NPD. Additionally, she herself is the daughter of a woman with NPD. The book is divided into three sections to help the daughters of mothers with NPD to heal and take charge of their lives. The first section “Recognizing the Problem,” explains what maternal NPD looks like. The second section, “How Narcissistic Mothering Affects Your Entire Life,” explains the impact NPD mothers have on their daughters, both as children and as adults. The third section, “Ending the Legacy” is all about healing from the NPD mothering and breaking the cycle of Narcissism. Dr. McBride offers clinical examples from her practice as well as detailed, clearly explained exercises to aid with healing.
Review:
It’s not easy to find a book addressing healing from abuse that manages to walk the fine line of understanding for all involved and absolute condemnation of the abusive actions and that simultaneously encourages agency and healing without making the survivor become stuck in a victim’s mentality. Dr. McBride strikes this balance eloquently.
The three sections of the book work perfectly for guiding the reader through understanding precisely what happened in her childhood, how it impacts her adulthood, and how to regain agency of herself and her life. NPD is not a mental illness that is well-understood or recognized. The first section thus must explain NPD and how NPD leads to abusive mothering without demonizing the mother suffering from NPD. It is incredibly difficult not to demonize people with NPD. People with NPD tend to be self-centered, manipulative, and resistant to treatment. McBride manages to simultaneously describe the person with NPD in a sympathetic light and condemn their behavior. This section also serves to provide an aha moment for the reader. It will immediately be clear if your mother has/had NPD or not, and if she does/did, it will shine a light on the daughter’s childhood, proving she is not crazy or ungrateful. Some of the signs of a mother with NPD include: the mother demanding praise for everything she’s ever done for the daughter, a lack of compassion or empathy for the daughter, approval for who the mother wants the daughter to be instead of who she is, the mother perceives of the daughter as a threat, the mother is jealous of the daughter for various reasons, the mother is overly critical or judgmental, the mother uses the daughter as a scapegoat for her bad feelings, the mother treats the daughter like a friend, no boundaries or privacy, the mother involves the daughter prematurely in the adult world, and more.
This section also explains why the book is only about daughters of mothers with NPD and not for her sons as well.
A mother, however, is her daughter’s primary role model for developing as an individual, lover, wife, mother, and friend, and aspects of maternal narcissism tend to damage daughters in particularly insidious ways. Because the mother-daughter dynamic is distinctive, the daughter of a narcissistic mother faces unique struggles that her brothers don’t share….A narcissistic mother sees her daughter, more than her son, as a reflection and extension of herself rather than as a separate person with her own identity. She puts pressure on her daughter to act and react to the world and her surroundings in the exact manner that Mom would, rather than in a way that feels right for the daughter. (6-7)
The next section looks at what impact being raised by a mother with NPD has on the daughter’s adult life. McBride factually explains where some of the daughter’s less healthy behaviors and thought processes may come from without falling into the trap many childhood healing books fall into of repeatedly directing negative energy toward the parent. Some of the issues that may be present in an adult daughter raised by a mother with NPD include: high-achieving or self-sabotaging or waffling between the two, difficulty understanding and processing feelings, inappropriate love relationships that are dependent or codependent or giving up on relationships entirely, fear of becoming a mother herself, unconsciously mimicking her mother’s parenting with her own children or doing the exact opposite of what her mother did.
The final section is all about the daughter healing, overcoming, and taking agency for herself. McBride encourages therapy, but also offers at-home tips and exercises for those who cannot afford it. An example of one of these is the “internal mother” exercise. This exercise involves many steps, but it essentially seeks to replace the internal negative messages the daughter has from her own mother with more positive messages that are the type the daughter wanted from her real mother. The daughter grieves the mother she never got to have and learns to parent herself. Much of the work in this section involves grieving the mother and childhood the daughter never got to have, accepting it for what it is, giving herself the encouragement and mothering she needs, learning to set boundaries, and the daughter coming to be in charge of her own life. The exercises are not simple and may seem a bit overwhelming to the reader at first, but they do serve to mimic the real therapy process, encouraging introspection, journaling, grieving, and behavioral changes.
One thing I really appreciate about McBride’s approach is how she handles the adult relationship between daughter and mother. She 100% encourages the daughter to make the choice that is right for her own emotional health and that simultaneously does not expect miracles from her mother. Since most people with NPD don’t receive successful treatment, McBride carefully admonishes the daughter to base her decision based on her mother’s proven behavior. She encourages setting clear boundaries, and individuating oneself from mother. But she also acknowledges that having a relationship at all with a mother with severe NPD might not be possible.
We have to acknowledge that a narcissistic mother may be too toxic to be around. In many situations, daughters have to make the choice to disconnect completely from their mothers because the toxicity damages their emotional well-being. While others around you may not understand it, this is a decision that you get to make for your own mental health. (184)
Refusing to give one-size-fits-all advice on the relationship between a narcissistic mother and her adult daughter is just one example of the many positives of this book. McBride offers insight, advice, and isn’t afraid to say what might be painful to hear. She has done an excellent job putting the therapy process into book format, as much as possible.
Overall, this book tackles an incredibly difficult topic in an even-handed, clear manner. Its focus on just daughters of mothers with NPD allows Dr. McBride to give targeted examples and advice to the reader. It never excuses the mother’s behavior, firmly condemning it, but still exhibits compassion for the mother suffering from NPD. Any woman who thinks she may have been raised by a woman with NPD should read this book and see if any of it rings true for her. Additionally recommended to anyone interested in how NPD impacts parenting and the next generation.
5 out of 5 stars
Source: Amazon
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Book Review: The Stoning of Soraya M.: A Story of Injustice in Iran by Freidoune Sahebjam (Bottom of TBR Pile Challenge)
Summary:
Sahebjam, a French-Iranian journalist, was traveling through Iran in the 1980s when he had to stop in a small village. An elderly woman, Zahra, asked him for tea so she could tell him the story of what happened to her niece, Soraya, mere weeks before. Sahebjam grants narrative to her tale to get the story of injustice out.
Soraya was a typical rural Iranian woman. Married to a villager at a young age. Her husband, Ghorban-Ali, became less and less invested in his family and more and more likely to beat them. He also became increasingly interested in young women in the city. When a criminal posing as a mullah comes to town, Ghorban-Ali sees the perfect opportunity to be rid of his wife without any costs of divorce. He, the mullah, and an easily swayed widower friend corroborate to falsely accuse Soraya of adultery and sentence her to death by stoning.
Review:
Things can easily go awry when the powers of justice are held in the hands of a select few. A lot rests on whether or not those few are good people. This book tells that tale, and it tells it movingly, regardless of whether or not all the facts of the story are precisely correct. The biggest facts are accurate, and that is what matters.
Sahebjam is a French-Iranian journalist. He thus has both the perspective of insider and outsider, which is the ideal one for a story like this. He understands the people and the village but he also knows how to present and explain things to the non-Iranian reader. Sahebjam clearly and honestly states from the beginning that he got this tale from one eyewitness. Some might argue that this story thus isn’t researched well enough or thoroughly vetted. It is indeed one eyewitness account passed through an author (and for English speakers, a translator). But the core of the injustice is verifiable: the handling of adultery in Islam. Combine this with religion and state being one and the same, and it’s easy to see how if this story didn’t indeed already happen how it could easily come to be.
The first half of the book introduces us to Sahebjam, Zahra (the aunt), and Soraya, as well as the organization of the small town and the adultery laws as followed by fundamentalist Islam. Sahebjam does a good job introducing all the people and explaining the context of the injustice without overwhelming the reader with info dumping.
Essentially, in Islam, when it comes to adultery, the woman has to do all the proving.
When a man accuses his wife [of adultery], she has to prove her innocence [in Islam]. This is the law. On the other hand, if a woman makes an accusation against her husband, she has to produce proof. (location 1079)
If the woman is wealthy, she can pay off the mullah (think of it as paying a penance in Catholicism). But:
In most cases the woman [accused of adultery in Iran] is poor—which means she is a virtual slave to her husband. She has no rights, except for the meager right to remain silent. All the husband needs to win his case of infidelity is two eyewitnesses, who are generally friends and accomplices. As for the accused woman, she has to prove her innocence and that is impossible: no one will come to her aid; no one will bear witness on her behalf. (location 129)
Regardless of whether or not Soraya was a real person (and I do believe she was), these are problematic laws that leave the door wide open for abuse by a few corrupt people. This book demonstrates that danger eloquently.
Sahebjam clearly made a choice to make the tale flow better by giving it some narrative qualities. He inserts dialogue he clearly wasn’t there to hear, and he even talks about what was going on inside people’s heads. I didn’t like that he did the latter, especially. I understand dialogue can help make a nonfiction book flow a bit, and I’m ok with that. But claiming to know what was going on inside people’s minds turned me off the narrative a bit. It leaves the door open for criticism of a story that needs to be taken seriously, and I wish he had made other narrative choices.
At first, it is easy to be irritated by Soraya’s choice to remain silent when accused. She gives up so quickly, one wonder why she never advocates for herself. But in retrospect, it’s a clear, yet subtle, depiction of what can happen to a victim of abuse over time. Eventually their spirit is just beaten out of them. Soraya demonstrates what happens when abused people are left to deal with the abuse and abuser on their own.
Overall, this book highlights the inequality innate is Muslim adultery laws, as well as the dangers of leaving justice to the hands of a few. The narrative structure doesn’t precisely suit a nonfiction account of an event, but the bones at the core of the injustice are still verifiably true. Readers who prefer a dry, precise nonfiction might not be able to look past the narrative structure. Those who can will find a moving tale of how easy it is for injustice to take over a community.
4 out of 5 stars
Source: Amazon
Book Review: The Sum of My Parts: A Survivor’s Story of Dissociative Identity Disorder by Olga Trujillo, JD
Summary:
Olga was a young, successful lawyer in DC when she suddenly started having inexplicable panic attacks and episodes of blank stares or rapidly moving eyes. She sees a psychiatrist and is diagnosed with a moderate case on DID. On the spectrum, she has multiple parts but not exclusive personalities and still has a central core. These parts have kept the memories of her extraordinarily violent, abusive childhood from her consciousness thereby allowing her to function, but just barely. In her memoir, Olga tells what she has now remembered of her childhood and how she has now discovered she managed to function and be surprisingly resilient. She then delves into her long-term therapy and how she has come together into mostly one part and usually no longer dissociates.
Review:
I always find memoirs by those with DID or dissociation completely fascinating. Even just the ability to write the book and explain the disorder from the insider’s perspective is a remarkable achievement. I previously read When Rabbit Howls
Olga offers up a very precise trigger warning of which chapters could be dangerous for fellow trauma survivors. That said, I found her reporting of what occurred to her to be respectful of herself as a person. She never shirks from what happened to her, but is sure to couch it in concise, clinical language. I respect this decision on her part, and again believe it will make her book more accessible to a wider audience. People can see the results of the trauma without finding themselves witnesses to the trauma itself.
The book right up through about halfway through her therapy is clear and detailed, but then starts to feel rushed and more vague. Perhaps this is out of respect for the people currently in her life, but personally I wanted to know more. For instance, how was she able to make a drastic move from DC to the middle of the country without upsetting her healing process? How do the phone sessions with her therapist work? I think many advocates of those with mental illness would appreciate more detail on how she is able to have a healthy, happy relationship now, especially since we witness the dissolution of her first marriage. Similarly, I wanted to know more about her coming out process. She states that she knew at 12 she was a lesbian, but pretty much leaves it at that. I’m sure it was easier to embrace her sexuality the more integrated her parts became, but I am still interested in the process. She was so brave recounting her early life that I wonder at the exclusion of these details.
Overall this is a well-written memoir of both childhood abuse, therapy for DID, and living with DID. Olga is an inspirational person, overcoming so much to achieve both acclaim in her career and a happy home life. I recommend it to a wide range of people from those interested in the immigrant experience to those interested in living with a mental illness.
4 out of 5 stars
Length: 258 pages – average but on the shorter side
Source: NetGalley
Buy It (Amazon or Bookshop.org)
If you found this review helpful, please consider tipping me on ko-fi, checking out my digital items available in my ko-fi shop, buying one of my publications, or using one of my referral/coupon codes. Thank you for your support!
Book Review: Mommie Dearest by Christina Crawford
Summary:
In the early days of Hollywood, Joan Crawford became one of the first celebrities to adopt children. From the outside, it looked like her children had it all–presents, inherent fame, an apparently adoring mother. However, in Christina’s tell-all memoir, she reveals the truth behind the image. A mother obsessed with cleanliness and rigid rules. A mother who demanded her children worship her like her fans did in order to receive her love. A mother so desperate to cling to her days of fame that she attempted to beat down any glimmer of success in her children. A mother who Christina still desperately loved to the bitter end.
Review:
This memoir is a must read for anyone who thinks that having money and being a celebrity automatically makes for a good parent. Joan Crawford expected her four adopted children to be exactly what she wanted them to be instead of loving them for their uniqueness and human imperfections. Christina’s situation gradually worsens as she becomes older and starts to show glimmers of being her own person. The scenes of abuse in Christina’s childhood are the best written in the book. It is clear that she remembers them vividly and can still identify with the emotions that went through her as a child and young teenager.
*spoiler warning*
That said, Christina never manages to disentangle herself from her mother. In spite of everything her mother has done, Christina still attempts anything and everything to reconcile with her, apparently ignoring or forgetting the fact that she never did anything wrong to cause her mother’s behavior in the first place. Joan Crawford is a cruel, spiteful, evil person, and Christina naively continues to seek her love even in her 30s. This makes it more sad than most memoirs about abuse as it seems that Christina never truly overcame her abuser.
*end spoiler*
The writing, beyond the scenes of abuse, is sub-par. Christina has a tendency to ramble a bit in an uninteresting way. She also seems to not understand which parts of her life to skim over a bit. I mean, did we really need to know exactly when in a funeral her husband hands her a paper cup of water? No. Additionally, she obviously had a bad editor, as there are quite a few spelling and grammar mistakes, which is odd for a mass market paperback.
Overall, it’s worth a read if you’re into memoirs or the inside Hollywood scoop. All others should probably give it a pass though.
3 out of 5 stars
Source: Swaptree
Book Review: The Year of the Flood By Margaret Atwood
Summary:
Toby, a spa-worker, and Ren, an exotic dancer and prostitute, have both survived the waterless flood–a global pandemic that has killed almost all of humanity. They also both used to live with The Gardeners, a vegetarian cult that constantly warned of the impending apocalypse. A series of flashbacks tells how they survived the pandemic while the question of what to do now that the pandemic is mostly over looms large in their lives.
Review:
Margaret Atwood is one of my favorite authors. I love dystopian books, and she has an incredible talent for taking the current worries and news items and turning them into a near-future dystopia. Toby’s and Ren’s world prior to the waterless flood isn’t anything to be happy about. Slums dominate. Gangs run rampant. The world is now run by a giant evil corporation (which is somehow worse than a giant evil government? *shrugs*). It’s really the little things that makes this future world believable. Kids wear bracelets that have live mini jellyfish in them. Species have been spliced together to make new, more usable ones, such as the Mo’Hair–a sheep whose wool makes perfect fake hair for women. The people who don’t live in slums live in corporation-run compounds where everything they do is monitored. What makes this dystopia wonderful is how plausible it all seems.
Really, though, all of these dystopian features are just a back-drop for the real stories. Toby spends years hiding with The Gardeners and running because one man, Blanco, decided he owned her upon having slept with her. When Toby defied him, he vowed to kill her. He haunts her life for years on end. Similarly, Ren falls in love with a boy in highschool who breaks her heart yet somehow keeps coming back into her life and repeating the damage.
This is a book about mistakes. About how thinking we own the Earth and its creatures could cause our own demise. About how sleeping with the wrong man just once can haunt you for years. About how loving the wrong man can hurt you for years.
This is what I love about Atwood. She has such wonderful insight into what it is to be a woman. Insight into what haunts women’s dreams. When women talk about what scares them, it isn’t nuclear war–it’s the man in the dark alley who will grab her and rape her and never leave her alone. Toby’s Blanco is the embodiment of this fear. She sees him around every corner. She’s afraid to go visit a neighbor because he might find her on the street walking there. Setting this fear in an other world makes it easier for female readers to take a step back and really see the situation for what it is. Yes, he’s a strong, frightening man, but Toby let him disempower her by simply fearing him for years. This is what Atwood does well.
The pandemic, however, is not done so well. Too many questions are left. Where did the pandemic come from? Does it work quickly or slowly? Some characters seem to explode blood immediately upon infection, whereas others wander around with just a fever infecting others.
Similarly, the reader is left with no clear idea as to how long it has been since the pandemic started. On the one hand it seems like a month or two. On the other hand, the stockpiles of food The Gardeners made run out quite early, and that just doesn’t mesh given how much attention they gave to them prior to the pandemic.
I also found the end of the book extremely dissatisfying. It leaves the reader with way too many unanswered questions. In fact, it feels completely abrupt. Almost like Atwood was running out of time for her book deadline so just decided “ok, we’ll end there.” I know dystopian novels like to leave a few unanswered questions, but I don’t think it’s appropriate to leave this many unanswered.
The Year of the Flood sets up a believable dystopia that sucks the reader in and has her reconsidering all of her life perceptions. Unfortunately, the ending lets the reader down. I think it’s still worth the read, because it is enjoyable for the majority of the book, and I am still pondering issues it raised days later. If you’re into the environmental movement or women’s issues, you will enjoy this book–just don’t say I didn’t warn you when the ending leaves you throwing the book across the room. 😉
4 out of 5 stars
Source: Library
This work by Amanda Nevius is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
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