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4.4 AVERAGE
4.4 AVERAGE
Excellent and beautifully crafted essays. I remember Polley on The road to Avonlea, and her experience in that show, as well as her Stratford experiences reveal someone for whom theatre and acting became a real struggle. Her essay on Gomeshi is an excellent thread on what a woman might go through, in charging someone with sexual assault, and the conflicting points and advice on speaking up. And how that decision might haunt her. And her concussion essay is a lesson on treatment plans, and what worked for her.
This isn’t a memoir, but a collection of personal essays. I loved each one - these stories are going to stick with me for a long time. Her experience of being a child actor was so interesting and heartbreaking, but her commitment to advocating for children now is beautiful.
Her journey to motherhood was so relatable and beautifully told. One of my favorite passages was from the story of getting diagnosed with gestational diabetes and being put on a strict diet. The pain of pregnancy blends with the pain of being forced to eat food she doesn’t want and mixes with the pain of losing her mother. It so beautifully shows how our grief is never just about one thing.
And her accident that lead to a concussion with long-term symptoms was heartwrenching! I’m so glad she was able to find the care that she needed!
Each essay was unique, but a thread also weaves through them all. I think the thread is her courage, resilience, and curiosity.
Highly recommend this book.
Her journey to motherhood was so relatable and beautifully told. One of my favorite passages was from the story of getting diagnosed with gestational diabetes and being put on a strict diet. The pain of pregnancy blends with the pain of being forced to eat food she doesn’t want and mixes with the pain of losing her mother. It so beautifully shows how our grief is never just about one thing.
And her accident that lead to a concussion with long-term symptoms was heartwrenching! I’m so glad she was able to find the care that she needed!
Each essay was unique, but a thread also weaves through them all. I think the thread is her courage, resilience, and curiosity.
Highly recommend this book.
Finished this on a lazy Saturday as I couldn't bring myself to put it down once I was in the middle of it. Thoughtful, reflective, jarring. Had me thinking about my own life (not that there is much in the way of obvious similarities) and how I can learn from hers.
emotional
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
I am close in age to Sarah and grew up watching her on TV. This book brought so much insight into what was really happening behind the scenes. Her piece written about her concussion is something that I think about often. This is a beautifully honest book.
emotional
inspiring
reflective
sad
medium-paced
We watched Road to Avonlea regularly when I was a kid, and Sara Stanley (played by Sarah Polley) was my favourite character. This collection of essays really peels back the curtain on what was going on behind the scenes for Sarah in her child acting days (with Road to Avonlea as well as other productions), and how she was forced to grow up too quickly and take on adult responsibilities while she was still a child. From forcing her to be in chilly water for hours at a time to using her emotions surrounding her mother's death for the purposes of the TV show, the way she was treated on set as a child actor is sickening. Despite our very different upbringings, there was a lot that I related to in Sarah's stories from her life -- her scoliosis (much more severe than mine), her concussion (again, more severe than mine, but the symptoms were very familiar), her dislike of crowds and attention, and more generally, her thoughtful, introspective approach to life, be it reflecting on the nature of memory or calling out prejudice and injustice. I feel like I got to know the real Sarah Polley in these essays, and while she is nothing like the character of Sara Stanley that she played (what actor ever is like their character?), I'm very glad to get a glimpse of who Sarah Polley truly is.
challenging
emotional
inspiring