Escape
Carolyn Jessop, 2007

During this spring's raid on the ranch, former polygamist wife Carolyn Jessop made the rounds of news shows, talking about a life of squabbling with sister-wives, constant pregnancy and arbitrary rules. I decided to check out her book because I'm incredibly nosy.

Even though she got out (I mean, consider the title if nothing else), I found myself incredibly disturbed and depressed by this book. Everything in their lives was such a mind-trick. Jessop believed it all because it's what she grew up with, but life got more and more extreme on the compound until schools were closed and women were on virtual lockdown with expired car registrations and empty gas tanks.

Jessop finally escaped the Yearning for Zion with all eight of her children, then won legal custody of them in the first court battle of its kind. The brainwashing runs deep, though -- her oldest daughter was never comfortable with life "on the outside" and returned to live on the compound on her 18th birthday.

Purchase on Amazon here.

"The Girls Who Went Away: The Hidden History of Women Who Surrendered Children for Adoption in the Decades Before Roe v. Wade"
Ann Fessler, 2006

This compilation of personal histories brings forward birth mothers of the 1950s and 1960s -- in other words, victims of the "unwed mother" homes of the time. This isn't something you'd want to stretch out by the pool to read. Each story is achingly sad; most women didn't want to give their babies up but were forced to by an army of doctors, nurses, social workers and angry parents. For many, the pain of that loss has never gone away.

Fessler herself was adopted. When the book opens, she's known her birth mother's name and location for years but has been afraid to go, instead opting to interview dozens of other birthmothers. Finally, near the end of her project, she seeks out her own birthmother, who got pregnant by one boy and engaged to another. Her fiancé offered to help raise the baby, but she felt it wouldn't be fair to him. After hearing so many legacies of loss, Fessler must have seen this as a stinging rejection by her birthmother.

I do wish Fessler have done more research and presented more of a factual history in addition to these women's personal stories. However, she is a photographer first and foremost, and I think it shows in the construction of the book. That's all right. This book has a place, especially because decades later and in a society where this sort of thing would never happen anymore, people still don't talk much about that time, the time before.

Purchase on Amazon here.

Blood and Guts in High School
Kathy Acker
1978; 165 pp.


I read this because it's on the list of 1001 Books to Read Before You Die (...Only 991 to go 'til I can, well, die!!! Ew.) and it sounded, well... just disturbing enough to be interesting.

In fact, I found it totally disturbing and violent and weird and obscene. Keep in mind, I don't use "obscene" meaning it should be banned, just that it's really, REALLY naughty. The book is supposed to be the journal of a punk girl living as a sex slave, cobbled together with thoughts, dreams, a long discussion on "The Scarlet Letter," pornographic drawings, you know, the usual.

It definitely has a punk/S&M bent going. The first half was a struggle to get through but later on there were some nice, though brief, pieces of writing. I've read that smart people love this book and dumb people hate it. I still don't know what to think of it, so I suppose that puts me somewhere in the middle.

In closing, I recommend AGAINST reading this in public because I just never knew when a drawing of huge genitalia would pop out at me.

Consider yourself warned.

Referred from Jezebel comes the uncomfortably named What to Expect When You're Aborting.


Recommended Reading: This Common Secret: My Journey as an Abortion Doctor by Susan Wicklund. I read it in May and could barely it down. I even cried once. I feel like everyone who's a human should read this, prolife, prochoice, everybody.

I look forward to reading about the above blogger's journey, who asks, Where's the Juno of the abortion world?

Kori: Have you read Breaking Dawn?

Me: Reading it now. You?

Kori: Yeah, reading it now.

Me: I skipped to the end though. I had to know.

Kori: It's a total soap opera.

Me: They always are!

Kori: Yeah ... I decided to put it down for the night when the pack was wanting to attack now that they knew Bella was preggers w/ a monster. What a ridiculous sentence.

Me: Hahaha, yeah the next whole part is really boring. Also, why is every character so emotionally constipated?

Kori: I get SO frustrated w/ Bella. She's literally the worst heroine ever. If you can even call her that.

Me: Sometimes the drama they manufacture among themselves doesn't even make SENSE. Yet, we read.

Kori: But I don't know if I'd ever want my teenage daughter reading about a girl who DEVOTES her life to a guy.

Me: You know what it is, it's porn for teenage girls. A guy who only holds them all night long and doesn't want sex.

Kori: What do the vampires do when Bella gets her period?

Me: Also, people are SO stupid in the book. There's a part when they use donor human blood to drink (not really a spoiler).
Edward: Don't worry, no one died for this.
Bella: But whatever do you possibly mean???
Edward: I'll explain later.
Me: Um, hello?!?!?! People don't need to DIE to bleed. It's donor blood? IDIOT.

Kori: Hmm, yeah, they should just sip on some donor blood for special occasions.

Me: Like in champagne flutes.