A frank, perceptive, and insightful remembrance.
A mother describes raising a child with special needs in this debut memoir.
On April 11, 1982, on Easter Sunday in Buffalo, New York, Rubin gave birth to her daughter, Jess, while suffering from chicken pox herself. She was forced to isolate from her newborn child until her illness had passed. At first, pediatricians assured Rubin and her husband, Mitch, that their daughter was developing normally, but the author notes that Jess had “unusual facial features and other anomalies.” Jess was later found to have multiple developmental disabilities resulting from a chromosomal disorder, although Rubin struggled for years to receive an accurate diagnosis. The author describes her initial drive to understand and “fix” Jess’ condition; she records key moments, such as her daughter’s bat mitzvah and her entry into the special education process. Rubin also relates her own career path, which led to her becoming the director of the Early Childhood Direction Center at Buffalo Children’s Hospital in 1998. The memoir concludes with Rubin and her husband visiting Jess, now in her 30s, in her group-home community during the Covid-19 pandemic and the heartache they felt when they had to distance from their daughter. Rubin is a forthright author who addresses topics that other parents of children with multiple disabilities will find stimulating, as when she explores the significance of getting Jess’ diagnosis: “The revelation did not change therapies or even medical care, but it gave a name and identity to the various symptoms and beauty that describe Jessica.” The author’s approach is also courageously exploratory, as when she investigates how Jess’ siblings were shaped by growing up with her. Throughout, Rubin shares a wide range of material, including family photographs and even the invitation to Jess’ bat mitzvah. Some readers may feel that some of this is unnecessary and makes for an overly cluttered memoir, but others will think it makes Jess’ story feel all the more personal. Overall, Rubin writes with clarity and thoughtful introspection, making for a truly enlightening read.
A frank, perceptive, and insightful remembrance.Pub Date: Aug. 30, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-66246-052-4
Page Count: 250
Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
Review Posted Online: Feb. 18, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
The heartbreaking story of an emotionally battered child delivered with captivating candor and grace.
The former iCarly star reflects on her difficult childhood.
In her debut memoir, titled after her 2020 one-woman show, singer and actor McCurdy (b. 1992) reveals the raw details of what she describes as years of emotional abuse at the hands of her demanding, emotionally unstable stage mom, Debra. Born in Los Angeles, the author, along with three older brothers, grew up in a home controlled by her mother. When McCurdy was 3, her mother was diagnosed with breast cancer. Though she initially survived, the disease’s recurrence would ultimately take her life when the author was 21. McCurdy candidly reconstructs those in-between years, showing how “my mom emotionally, mentally, and physically abused me in ways that will forever impact me.” Insistent on molding her only daughter into “Mommy’s little actress,” Debra shuffled her to auditions beginning at age 6. As she matured and starting booking acting gigs, McCurdy remained “desperate to impress Mom,” while Debra became increasingly obsessive about her daughter’s physical appearance. She tinted her daughter’s eyelashes, whitened her teeth, enforced a tightly monitored regimen of “calorie restriction,” and performed regular genital exams on her as a teenager. Eventually, the author grew understandably resentful and tried to distance herself from her mother. As a young celebrity, however, McCurdy became vulnerable to eating disorders, alcohol addiction, self-loathing, and unstable relationships. Throughout the book, she honestly portrays Debra’s cruel perfectionist personality and abusive behavior patterns, showing a woman who could get enraged by everything from crooked eyeliner to spilled milk. At the same time, McCurdy exhibits compassion for her deeply flawed mother. Late in the book, she shares a crushing secret her father revealed to her as an adult. While McCurdy didn’t emerge from her childhood unscathed, she’s managed to spin her harrowing experience into a sold-out stage act and achieve a form of catharsis that puts her mind, body, and acting career at peace.
The heartbreaking story of an emotionally battered child delivered with captivating candor and grace.Pub Date: Aug. 9, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-982185-82-4
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 30, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2022
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
The author's youthfulness helps to assure the inevitable comparison with the Anne Frank diary although over and above the...
Elie Wiesel spent his early years in a small Transylvanian town as one of four children.
He was the only one of the family to survive what Francois Maurois, in his introduction, calls the "human holocaust" of the persecution of the Jews, which began with the restrictions, the singularization of the yellow star, the enclosure within the ghetto, and went on to the mass deportations to the ovens of Auschwitz and Buchenwald. There are unforgettable and horrifying scenes here in this spare and sombre memoir of this experience of the hanging of a child, of his first farewell with his father who leaves him an inheritance of a knife and a spoon, and of his last goodbye at Buchenwald his father's corpse is already cold let alone the long months of survival under unconscionable conditions.
Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2006
ISBN: 0374500010
Page Count: 120
Publisher: Hill & Wang
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2006
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