A review by bookishgoob
Enjoy Me among My Ruins by Juniper Fitzgerald

challenging dark emotional informative inspiring sad tense fast-paced

4.0

by 32 pages in, i’ve already gone through a handful of emotions. terror, horror, sickness, nausea, sadness, happiness, and so on. the fact that i, and many other women have had similar experiences is something i will never get over. it shakes me to my core even now knowing that there are people out there who have experienced this type of abuse and horror and that we shame ourselves for these things instead of shaming the people who did it to us. 
her letter to her child was so intimate and heartbreaking, i resonate with both juniper and her child in more way than one while reading that letter. The way that she gaslights herself as a teenager by telling herself it wasn’t dirty what the dad she babysits for did, or that she needs to stop “playing the victim” is so hard to read and yet so prevalent in young teenagers minds. i remember being that age and younger and trying to convince myself that what older men were doing and saying and how they were looking at me was just me in my head, when in actuality there was disgusting and malicious intent. the ending of this book was so beautifully written and full circle in a way. watching her child in the way that she wishes she could have been watched. not with a lustful gaze but with a loving one. to see a child as just that, a child. i could hardly make it through this read at some points but i’m so glad that i did. it’s an experience that i haven’t fully been through, but a lot of the parts i have.  make sure you pick it up on the release date. 
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