Annie O'Sullivan has a bit of a messed up past. Her dad and adored older sister will killed when Annie was a pre-teen, by a driver running a stop sign. Her mom, who lived life through the lens of a vodka bottle, remarried a nice man who was generally a failure at his schemes to make money. But Annie was doing OK. She is a Vancouver Island realtor, had her own house, a dog, and an open house that Sunday. She had 3 things on his list that day - the open house, don't get into an argument with her mother, and dinner with her ever-patient boyfriend/chef Luke. He was supposed to meet her at the end of her open house, but was late. She's taking down the open house when one more looker drops in . . . he seems nice enough, nice smile, well dressed, but he is kind of in her space just a bit, and when she opens the patio door, he pushes a gun into her back, escorts her to his van and injects something into her leg causing her to pass out.What follows is one of the most harrowing and shocking books I've ever read and I won't reveal anymore of the plot only to say that Annie is held captive inside a mountain cabin for a year by The Freak, repeatedly raped, and controlled on virtually every level - what and how much she eats, when she sleeps, what she wears, when she pees, everything. He impregnates her and she gives birth to a daughter.
This is the debut novel by Canadian Chevy Stevens and has been getting universally high praise (People Magazine, Entertainment Weekly, O [that's Oprah's magazine for you in a testosterone-induced haze] NY Times, USAToday, Publisher's Weekly, Kirkus Reviews, etc.). The worst review I read was 3 out of 5 stars by some citizen. Stevens deftly describes not only Annie's life on the mountain (about 60% of the book), but also the important and her sadly empty aftermath as how she deals with the abduction, the police, her mother, the press, her friends, Hollywood, and . . .
. . . her shrink. And that's the setting of this deeply disturbing tale. Stevens leads us on a not too gentle path of discovery through Annie's sessions with her psychiatrist. You see, the reader is the proverbial fly-on-the-wall, eavesdropping in on only what Annie chooses to reveal during each session (the book doesn't have 'chapters', it has 'sessions'). These sessions have only one rule (set by Annie) and that rule is that the shrink listens; the first utterance of 'how did you feel?' will end the doctor-patient relationship. So we watch and listen as Annie slowly reveals (in terrifyingly graphic detail) what happened during and after the abduction (and Good Lord, I hope writing this story wasn't cathartic on some level for the author).
I read a short blub about this book in an Entertainment Weekly last week when I was dog-sitting for my daughter and was stunned to learn that I didn't have to wait for it from the local library. EW (and most other reviews) used all the typical trite summer beach read adjectives; to wit, "riveting", "page turner", "couldn't put it down", "disturbing", "thought provoking" et al. And none of that does this book one bit of justice. The reviews offer extraordinary praise, and not one of the reviews comes within a inch of relating just how good this book really is. This is an irresistible psychological thriller (although I not sure 'thriller' is the right word. How about 'family drama'?) that, at least for 2010, is in a class by itself. Really - a master class with an enrollment of one.
Yes, this story (and author) are a bit out of the norm for Men Reading Books. And we don't do something as common as a 'top 10' list cuz we don't focus only on current titles. But if we did do something like that, based on what I've read with a 2010 copyright so far this year, the first 10 items on my list would be Still Missing.
East Coast Don
available on Kindle.
p.s. WCD, if you haven't read this within the month, I'm gonna have you banned from every golf course on the planet, get your passport revoked, and chain you in your office until you've read it. If this ain't 'up your alley' then something untoward has blocked its entrance.
p.p.s. And to the Knuckmeister, don't read this on the subway - you'll miss your stop.
This is a three-part comment, so read on:
ReplyDeleteEC Don had two questions for me as a practicing psychiatrist. One question was about the entertainment value of this book about kidnapping and rape, and the emotional affect effects of that. The other question had to do with my reaction to the psychiatric aspects given that the psychiatrist, who played such a key role, never had any lines.
2nd comment:
ReplyDeleteI’ll take the second question first. Stevens did a good job with two important diagnoses, posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and narcissistic personality disorder (as in Annie’s mother, Lorraine). I thought he portrayed realistically what it is like to be a victim in the midst of the kidnapping and rapes, and then the psychic trauma that one needed to work through. I thought the pathologic narcissism was a bit over the top at the end of the book, but there are such characters in real life. Working with narcissists of this degree is impossible, but it is possible to do a great deal with patients with PTSD. The therapy is an art in terms of how hard to push and how to push, if one should push at all, and it is different for everyone. I’ve worked, literally, with hundreds of patients with PTSD, and this psychiatrist has developed a sort of mini-PTSD from delving into all of those very real tragedies. Regarding the therapy that Stevens portrays and those in real life, ultimately it is the victim’s story that must be told. It is entirely believable that Annie had to be in complete control of the psychotherapy sessions for her healing to progress. Although the psychiatrist did not have any lines, and I read into it that the psychiatrist was doing what needed to be done to let the healing evolve. Stevens obviously has some inside knowledge of trauma and treatment – the writing was nicely done on her part. I thought the writing itself was a bit course, not elegant, not great literature, but then the character of Annie was not an elegant woman, so that fit.
third comment:
ReplyDeleteNow to the first question. From an entertainment value, personally, it had no value for me. I typically read to escape, and it is not entertaining to read a fiction of the real life stuff that I see during my work day. If it wasn’t for ECD’s challenge to get through this book quickly, I would have put it down after 10 pages, never to finish it. It was a quick, one-day read, but I find it easier to find my own escape in Stella’s mafioso material or the havoc that Flynn’s Mitch Rapp does to fictionalized bad guys. This one was very real to me, and at times I forgot that it was a novel and not a real life accounting of a bad crime, at least until the unexpected plot twists at the end reminded me that it was fiction.
i certainly can understand not wanting to read books that are too close to your everyday life. Fiction should be an escape, not a reminder. Not many novels written about exercise physiology, so i'm safe. I'm sure there are other authors whose protagonist is a psychiatrist, but guessing you probably steer clear of them. Your comments on the 'accuracy' of the portrayal were fascinating. Like I said, sure hope that writing that book wasn't cathartic for the author.
ReplyDeleteThis was a great read. Now i gotta read all the comments by WCD.
ReplyDeleteone more thing: it's nice to read a book with a shrink in it that does not involve having sex with a patient - try to think of another novel with a psychiatrist that does not. It's good to get positive publicity, even it happens in a book where the therapist has no lines. Go figure.
ReplyDeletei can only imagine the auditions for the psychiatrist when the inevitable goes into production.
ReplyDelete