© Jared Rodriguez / Truthout
I'm torn between the pleasure of having just read a brilliant and moving first-person stream-of-consciousness account of a true story of one woman's childhood, and the deep sadness that comes from learning about the absolutely horrific hell that this woman is extremely lucky to have survived - a hell that many others have known and will know, despite the ease with which it might be prevented.
Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote: "These novels will give way, by and by, to diaries or autobiographies - captivating books, if only a man knew how to choose among what he calls his experiences that which is really his experience, and how to record truth truly." Set aside the old-fashioned metaphysical vocabulary and the sexism. Factor in the world-changing force now developing called self-publishing. Emerson is being proved right, and there is no better example than This Girl's Life: Being the Child of a War Veteran, by Michelle Brown.
Brown begins her masterpiece thus:
"I lived a rough life with my dad. He abused us physically all the time. There were four of us who lived in our home, my brothers and sisters, along with my mom and dad. My older sister had already left home. She'd had enough. My dad took a lot of my life from me, and I still have nightmares about the things that went on in that home. We were afraid to tell anyone, afraid of what would happen to us. My dad was a war veteran and we really did not know how to treat someone like that."
