A review by livdil
The House of My Mother by Shari Franke

dark emotional hopeful reflective medium-paced

5.0

A very well written and introspective piece. Clearly a young voice new to writing, but one who has done so much work to see her past clearly. Her analysis of Jodi and Ruby was very different from any TV special because she had such an intimate look at them. There were some reflections of hers where it felt like she wasn’t quite done figuring out the situation, which is to be expected from someone fresh off years of trauma. I feel like ten years later Shari will have a lot of new reflections about these events. 

I appreciated her insistence on maintaining her younger siblings privacy as much as possible, though I wish she had written about their reunion. With such a build up of wanting to see them again and make sure they were okay, it was anticlimactic that there was no mention of them being reunited.

One TW for a new reader - while we expect family abuse reading this, I was caught off guard by the abusive relationship Shari describes in her later years. I won’t give any details away but that was shockingly the darkest part of the book for me - an older man taking advantage of a much younger woman. 

I’m so glad she and her family made it out of this nightmare! Shari continues to fight for children’s rights in media, and I hope this book will serve as a testament to why she is so passionate about her work.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Emotional abuse, Toxic relationship, Stalking, Gaslighting