Heartfelt advice for how abuse victims can “live above the pain of the past.”
This wrenching memoir of child abuse provides a road map to emotional recovery.
Handy (The Gatehouse: Enhancing Resilience in Adults Manuals 1 to 3, 2003, etc.) grew up one of seven children in Ontario, Canada. Her father, “The King,” worked in a Ford plant before becoming an Anglican priest and ruled the household dictatorially. He hit the author and sexually abused her between ages 7 and 15. Handy herself was an Anglican priest for a time, but as a lesbian, she felt “there was no place for me.” She also believes that the church tacitly condoned the abuse she experienced. (Her father confessed while in a mental hospital, but doctors assumed he was reporting hallucinations.) Leaving the church placed Handy in “a mournful limbo of identity,” yet she was determined to maintain “spiritual fluidity…without the trappings of formal religion.” She refers to the divinity she first encountered in nature as a child and regained decades later by the lovely metaphor of “the god of the cherry tree hills.” Handy conveys the arc of her experience without dwelling on the details of her abuse. Her memories are brief and impressionistic, augmented by her striking woodcut-style black-and-white illustrations. Having worked with child abuse victims for 30 years, she recognizes patterns of behavior similar to her own and explicates them clearly in the almost academic format of numbered sections. Three essential survival skills, she writes, are a belief in something greater than oneself, humor, and intelligence; four markers of resilience are autonomy, self-care, community, and being one’s own advocate. Detaching from the body and keeping silent are common responses to abuse, but the author warns that these can lead to suicidal thoughts, lashing out at others, and emotional numbness. Instead, she offers steps in the direction of forgiveness. There are a handful of unfortunate typos (“Forward” not Foreword, “exits” for exists, and “lays bear” instead of bare), but the book as a whole is well-presented and will no doubt be a valuable resource.
Heartfelt advice for how abuse victims can “live above the pain of the past.”Pub Date: May 29, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5255-0883-7
Page Count: 162
Publisher: FriesenPress
Review Posted Online: July 13, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955
ISBN: 0670717797
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955
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