LIFE AND DEATH IN THE MIND

In Curtis’ novel, a troubled woman spends her life questioning God and the tragic events that have surrounded her.

Rose is a young woman whose entire life is described as a “process of trying to commit suicide.” Inclined toward self-sabotage and dangerous situations, Rose moves through her early life under the weight of abuse, neglect, and spiritual despair. In a mostly objective, slightly detached voice, the author relates one distressing event after another: Rose nearly drowns while her father barely reacts; young boys abuse her physically and sexually; no one helps her with her first menstruation. After her mother abruptly moves the family from Connecticut to Colorado, Rose also encounters a vile stepfather and an older stepbrother who becomes her primary molester. Everything reinforces Rose’s belief that “God certainly did not love her.” As Rose grows older and drifts across the country, from California to Boston and back to Colorado, the novel’s vignettes move from the distressing to the bizarre: Rose shoots a man and escapes consequences; perfectly healthy people die for no reason around her; God speaks to her directly through complete strangers. Even after a divine intervention, Rose remains convinced that she’s been singled out for suffering, an idea that follows her well into adulthood and even after she leaves the country for China, where her crises slowly begin to alter her perspective on faith and life. Curtis’ narration provides readers with a certain distance from Rose and her problems, and the dry, staccato prose injects some much-needed humor: “I hesitate to use the word culture,” she writes about Colorado, “for it has nothing to do with sophistication.” The novel’s stranger episodes can feel like poetic re-creations of disassociation, but the relentless accumulation of suffering becomes punishing. Each incident sounds the same refrain: “Misery defined her life.” Consequently, the novel’s emotional and religious conflicts feel like one-note affairs. Though Rose easily earns sympathy, the novel’s repetitive litany of despair may leave readers emotionally drained.

A portrait of trauma whose relentless misery dulls its sharper insights.