Book Review
Title: Lucky
Author: Alice Sebold
Genre: Memoir
Rating: *****
Review: Lucky is Alice Sebold’s journey through being raped and the long road to recovery she faced afterwards. Alice brings us into her life by explaining that after she was raped, she learned that a girl have been killed in the very same place it happened, so she was lucky, thus the title of the book. The first 20 pages of this novel are dedicated to the rape itself which is bloody graphic and leaves nothing out, Alice bares herself to the reader in a raw, honest manner that brings you to tears when you learn what she suffered through as a young woman. In the immediate aftermath of the rape, she doesn’t want to tell her mother who is already very fragile emotionally but has to because the evidence of the act can’t be hidden and the attack itself was brutal. Although some names have been changed for privacy reasons, Victor was someone whose reaction was interesting when he learns that Alice’s rapist was a black man like himself, he apologizes and even tries to comfort her although she is in shock at that moment. Alice also passionately believes that she is going to be fine as she has reported it to the police and followed all the official channels which isn’t going to be the case. As many of my readers will know I am a survivor myself and I have had several issues with books using rape and sexual abuse for dramatic effect and I say to all authors, if you are going to use these themes then do it honestly, like Alice when she speaks of her own experience, make it raw and gritty and bloody because that is what rape is in reality and don’t romanticise it in the slightest as it is an insult to survivors.
We learn more about Alice’s family dynamic which isn’t conventional or happy for the most part. Her mother had a drinking problem but in 1977 she had been sober for 10 years but she also dealt with severe anxiety to the point where she wouldn’t be able to function normally relying on Alice and her sister, Mary to help when their father was away on his annual trips to Spain. Physical affection wasn’t something common in her family either although she wasn’t anywhere near unloved by her parents, it just wasn’t something they did, so she unconsciously began to seek out who were most open and affectionate with her. Alice also had a complicated relationship with her sister when it came to their mother as Mary being older, found her mother’s anxiety a burden and often refused to help with her leaving Alice to shoulder it alone but there were times when Mary would help and Alice wouldn’t feel so alone anymore as loneliness was a feeling she was very familiar with in her early life. In the aftermath, Alice’s family is even more fractured than it was before, as her sister avoids her, her mother doesn’t know how to cope with the event and her father doesn’t understand how she was still raped even when the rapist didn’t have his knife anymore and Alice has to sit down and explain it to him. She also struggles in finding someone who will listen to what happened that night as her mother can’t do it nor can her sister or father, so her mother recommends a therapist and that is a disaster. Eventually she ends up telling a boy who seems to understand but she realises he is seeing something she can never be and has to move on from that. During this time Alice’s temper often gets the better of her and I completely understand why.
As Alice recovers physically from the attack, there is a massive debate over whether she should return to the same college, but Alice is of the opinion that this man has taken so much from her and she won’t allow him to take anything more from her. Although upon returning she has gained a twisted sort of fame and even the people who had been her friends the previous year see her differently. However, in her poetry class, her professor encourages her to express these feelings and she writes a poem called Conviction which is basically an open letter to her rapist about what she would do to him if he were ever caught. The professor tries to make the class respond to this as it deals with themes that she felt were important to talk about but the student can’t deal with the reality of the situation but Alice also realises that it is ok to hate her rapist, hate her peers for looking down on her. The most shocking revelation of the first half of the book is that Alice meets her rapist again on the street and learns his name; Gregory Madison and finally she has a name to put to the face that haunts her every second of every day. She doesn’t do anything when she comes face to face with him again and he even talks to her but upon returning back to the school she writes down everything she remembers about him and phones the police and by luck one of the policemen knows him and brings him in. However, Alice’s rape does heighten the racial spark surrounding the white and black communities – not the act itself but the racial implication can’t be denied as the police among other lash out at the black community.
After Gregory Madison is arrested, Alice has to face the ordeal of a hearing and possibly a trial. Old nightmares resurface for Alice as the façade she had crafted around her to make it seems like she is ok begins to shatter. Before the trial Alice learns that Gregory has waived his right to appear at the hearing meaning they aren’t challenging to identity only the motive behind the crime. On the stand Alice has to defend herself to an insane extent as they try to make out that she couldn’t see because her glasses had been knocked off, but she doesn’t need them to see up close. They tried to spin the story to make her seem like she might have been drinking or taken drugs, but we know Alice isn’t that kind of person and eventually after an exhausting day the case is to be put before a grand jury on November 4th. As the trial begins, Alice has to identify Gregory in a line up but fails because he deliberately asked a friend to be there who looked just like him and made sure Alice felt intimidated enough to choose the wrong man although Gregory’s pubic hair matches the one found on Alice, so he is indicted but there are foul ups, major ones. Gregory is given bail when he shouldn’t have but Alice is beginning to fall apart as she develops a crush on Jamie, and he introduces her to drinking until she passes out and quickly becomes a fan of it. She also decides that Jamie is going to be the first man she is going to sleep with after the rape but she lies about it knowing he wouldn’t do it if he knew but the experience is completely tainted for Alice as she needed someone with a far gentler hand for that task and her drinking continues.
A large portion of this book is taken up by the actual trial which was harrowing and emotionally exhausting to read for me because I have been through this experience and felt everything Alice felt which really hit home for me and not in a bad way. It was liberating to hear someone else talking about similar events to what I had been through and felt the anger and frustration she felt as if it was my own. After the trial is done and Madison is found guilty on all counts bar the weapons charge and given the maximum sentence available a weight is lifted off Alice as she can truly try to move forward with her life now but it will forever remain a part of her that never goes away. We see Alice later in life in therapy, being diagnosed with PTSD, drug addiction, recovery and trying to move on with her life for real. For me the part that sticks out the most is the final pages where Alice takes about having sex with a male friend and afterwards, they talked about the experience for the both of them and agreed it was almost virginal which was both true and impossible. Alice says that in those moments you hold both hell and hope in your hands, that is true, but it is down to you which one you choose to believe. Alice is honest and open in this book and I would love for more people to read Lucky and absorb everything it has to offer. I would also like to see more author take an honest approach to rape in their book especially YA fiction as those were the kinds of books I was reading when it happened to me and not one portrayed my experience or emotions correctly as it was all glossed over and made romantic when it isn’t.
Buy it here:
Paperback/Hardcover: amazon.co.uk amazon.com
Kindle Edition: amazon.co.uk amazon.com
Comments