Reviews

Things We Didn't Talk about When I Was a Girl by Jeannie Vanasco

dainaphile's review

4.0

"Is it possible for a good person, a really good person to be a rapist?"

[a: Jeannie Vanasco|4078726|Jeannie Vanasco|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1500179605p2/4078726.jpg], the author of '[b: Things We Didn’t Talk About When I Was a Girl|43811321|Things We Didn't Talk About When I Was a Girl A Memoir|Jeannie Vanasco|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1565080337l/43811321._SY75_.jpg|68173030]', was raped by a close friend when she was 19 years old. Ever since she has had the same nightmare and finds herself startles awake, saying his name. More than a decade after the trauma, Vanasco decides to confront her rapist to find out how that one night has affected her former friend Mark.

The idea of giving voice to a rapist is unsettling and yet critically important. Vanasco words her thoughts and feelings and explains why she didn’t report the crime, how she has been blaming herself all these years. She unravels a bitter truth that rapists are not strangers lurking in alleys. Often time rapists are usually someone the victim knows - they are friends, lovers, brothers, coworkers.

Throughout the book, Vanasco shows a sense of protection towards her perpetrator and she was unnecessarily kind to him. If anything, this shows us the depth of the problem. That how women are being taught to be likable by everyone, even by their rapist!

It was a heavy, powerful, and interesting read. The only thing that made this book less mentally exhausting and easily palatable is
Mark's honest confession "Nice guys are a total lie".

theyarelex's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional medium-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, and Toxic friendship

Minor: Pedophilia, Forced institutionalization, Grief, and Death of parent

jayqueuetee's review

5.0

My copy of this book is underlined, with exclamation points in the margins. My dog-eared pages are dog-eared in both recognition and awe and what Jeannie Vanasco has created. In exposing the difficult parts of her past, she’s written a book that is an act of bravery while also being a reckoning. Her exploration of her own rape shows how omnipresent sexual assault is for women, but she is unflinching and honest in showing how women have been trained to forgive and blame ourselves, and how embarrassing it is to hear yourself make excuses for those who have caused us the most personal pain. This is a book of nuance, one that in clean, careful writing circles and loops in order to find the linear text. In giving her rapist his own voice, Vanasco makes Mark more human, but in many ways he becomes more monstrous because of how banal and almost unconsciously manipulative he’s revealed to be in trying to control the narrative. In his decency, he’s more of a villain. This book is important and timely, but it’s also deeply personal and affecting.

rachelrosereads's review

5.0

Sexual assault. Rape.

Questions. Accountability.

This book is full of hurt and healing. It’s messy.

This is a book everyone should read, but I think it’s a book not everyone will connect as deeply with.

amymadd's review

3.0

This book made me look at sexual assault/rape in a totally different perspective. As a young woman, as I’m sure many of us can relate, it may have happened to us and we just brushed it aside. Hearing it from the perpetrator’s point of view was interesting. Just a very different, at times repetitive book.

sarahmreadsss's review

challenging emotional reflective sad fast-paced

5.0

askoda's review

5.0

Ok, this one is going to haunt me for a bit. I literally could not put this book down even though I so wanted to.

The way Vanasco portrays her story, or stories illustrates exactly why it’s important for victims to speak out. She calmly calls out the #metoo revelation and heavily lays on the complicated layers of such a fraught attempt of the social movement. Vanasco also relays the complicated, intricate, and oh so vulnerable layers that come with being turned into a victim. By doing this, she paints the picture of why so many victims do not come forward… and that these experiences are far more common than anyone would like to admit.

She even rehearses the scenes over and over again, convinced that she is neurotic or that she remembered something wrong. Vanasco brings her own mental illness into the story to question herself rather than strengthen her story. The way she confronts “him” is unique, brave, and once again, complicated. But I think that’s what I loved about this tale. Her honesty is what reeled me in. Her openness to all of those icky feelings that victims are told not to feel- that there is more than anger. There is more than rage, fear, and shame that can be felt and she highlights this well.

I highly suggest you read this, but beware, it just may envelope you like it did me.

chloejaye's review

3.0

This was very circular. She’d record an interview. And then give her thoughts on the interview. And her thoughts were always beating herself up for having sympathy for him. But perhaps that is the point. Perhaps the point is that we can still want to care about some really horrible people that leave us feeling…blah. I like the vulnerability a lot.

rebecca_hillary's review

5.0

I have such mixed feelings about this book; I do not give many fives in my reviews and I probably would have gone for 4.5 if it was an option. A great book is usually one that is a great story but also that evokes emotions. This book, evoked all of the emotions and left me feeling unsettled. It is a memoir about rape but I moved through the book really liking "Mark", the rapist. The writer experienced other sexual assaults and all of those people disgusted me as I read but "Mark", my emotions were positive. I can feel Jeannie's conflict as if it were my own, in fact, in the time of "me too" it is my own conflict. I am in the minority that I have not been sexually assaulted, yet as a feminist, of course, I support "me too". How can I have such positive emotions regarding "Mark" and Jeannies friendship? I gave this a five, not only because of those emotions, and not only because of the fact that this story is unique, but perhaps because it is not that unique after all. Sexual assaults are often by someone the victim is close to. Jeannie, just had the confidence to put it out there and explain how complicated it really is. Maybe this book opened my eyes to how complicated reporting and healing can be when the rapist is a friend.

camilleberedjick's review against another edition

5.0

astounding read — so smart, so vulnerable, so thoughtfully organized and nimbly told. I took notes.