I Choose Elena
Lucia Osborne-Crowley
Lucia Osborne-Crowley was on track to be an Olympic gymnast. She knew her body intimately and knew where she was going. On a night out age 15 she was violently raped, setting off a chain of events that lead to a life of chronic illness.
This memoir almost moved me to tears with the hopelessness and frustration that leaked out of its pages. How could no-one help Lucia when she was obviously in so much pain? Surely bleeding from the vagina should always be treated as serious. I guess that this was some years ago, when endometriosis and Crohn’s Disease were poorly understood, and even more poorly treated.
The statistics that Osborne-Crowley provides the reader with are unsurprising. Men tend to get help/pain relief faster than women, and their complaints tend to be taken more seriously. Yet which gender is it that goes through childbirth? Women are more resilient in my opinion, and Osborne-Crowley has done a fantastic job of making her story accessible and increasing awareness about trauma recovery.
Unlike Foul is Fair, this memoir deals with the subject of rape gracefully and sensitively. Rape is a triggering subject, but this book doesn’t dwell on the rape, instead depicting This reads so smoothly it could almost be fiction – yet I only wish that this was fiction because then Lucia would not have had to go through such hell.
I’d recommend this book both for people who have experienced similar trauma, and those that haven’t. It is a relatively gentle and pleasurable read that highlights both the importance of coming to terms with trauma through counselling and reading literature. Fantastic non-fiction.
Allen & Unwin | 18th February 2020| AU$16.99 | paperback
This book left me with an incredibly bad mouth feel. I felt violated and unsatisfied, and frankly a bit offended! This is a vague retelling of Macbeth, but Macbeth was time-appropriate, and Shakespeare! Death and madness are no longer ‘normal’ (and therapy will help with avoiding both of those things).
This has what could be called a ‘slow burn’. There’s no real action, and no real climax to it. There are hints at the Orzone behind the Emperor Mage but that’s about it. It’s like the first Harry Potter books where the focus was on learning, and let’s face it, those books were my favorites for that reason!
I’m not really sure how old these kids are. Teenagers? I thought that I read somewhere that they are in junior high, but they certainly seem to have a lot of freedom in school for that. I’m a great believer in the power of education, and they don’t seem to spend much time at school! The only class they seem to do is art, and while I think it’s really important for expression, it’s not the only way to express yourself.
This book begins quite slowly and takes a few chapters to really become immersive. The aspects of the book set in the ‘current time’ never really interested me, and I gave up on the book once before being able to reach the more exciting parts. This was a theme throughout my reading of the book; the events set in the present didn’t seem as engaging as those set in the past. Even when dramatic events appeared to be occurring, I never managed to find myself excited in them. I believe the main reason for this was that most of the book is set in the past. This meant that there were only a few pages of present time every few chapters, which was not enough to get to know the characters or immerse myself in the storyline. I also found myself forgetting the events occurring in the present, which often left me confused.
I read this trilogy in very short order – so short that I’m not going to bother reviewing the individual novels. That being said ,the first novel was a standout in my mind, while the other two novels dropped off in quality and consistency.
I’m sorry. I tried to love this novel because someone I knew recommended it as superior to a Sanderson novel. My problem was that the protagonist just wasn’t very smart and the story not that gripping. It’s a pretty typical male-focused fantasy with only a token female or two. I’m used to variety in my fantasy now, so this was unlikely to meet my expectations.
This is more like a teaser rather than a collection of stories. Although the chapter headings lead me to believe that each chapter would be its own little narrative, instead the narrative seemed to jump around a lot. There’s too much packed in, and not enough details.