Before my Reading Week break this year I ordered a stack of Chuck Palahniuk books in print and on tape. At least what I thought was a stack of Palahniuk books.
Turns out, one of the books only came up in my library search because he wrote the forward for it.
Dora: A Headcase by Lidia Yuknavitch had a place on my bed stand for a couple weeks before I decided to open it. Palahniuk gave it a good review. I love his books. Must be good. Right?
At the beginning, this spunky chick who shaved her head just for the hell of it drew me right in. She is such a different character. She has an edge many teenage girls in real life have that rarely comes out in books. She was molested by the husband of the woman who her dad is sleeping with, but instead of being crushed she lashes out. Her sharp, but cruel, wit and odd ball group of friends are highly amusing.
But as she became more outrageous, drugging her doctor, sneaking around hospitals in disguise, and intentionally making her father's mistress' children get violently ill, she started to remind me of myself at that age. Not that I did any of those things. I wasn't as loud and rebellious, although I certainly had friends who were. It reminded me of how I used to think I knew it all and couldn't learn anything from adults in my life. It reminded me of how naive and silly and mean I was. Reading the book became painful. I hated "Dora". I hated her friends. I just wanted them to stop acting so juvenile while thinking they were grown-up and stop being so damn mean to everyone. I put the book down.
But then, I started to wonder what happened? Did her doctor find out what she'd done to him and send her to prison? Did her parents discover what she'd done to her room? Did she finish her piece of art or was she somehow blackmailed or paid off to not complete it?
As much as I hated Dora, I am still glad I read the novel. It's refreshing to have a teenage girl in a novel with the same amount of anger, hurt and confusion of real life girls.
Yuknavitch, like Palahniuk, was able to provoke emotions so strong out of me I almost wanted to throw the book out the bus window. But then I'd have to pay the library back and never get to find out what happened.
No comments:
Post a Comment