This book review was written by Eugene Kernes
This book was provided by the author
“Yes, I am a secret keeper from a long line of secret
keepers. The girl who knew how to keep quiet grew into a woman petrified of
what was buried so far down that it was barely a memory — simply a ghost that
never gave up its haunting. My family was wrong in their belief that altering
the truth heals and allows the hideous to disappear into the ether as if it
never existed.” – Kathleen Hoy Foley, Prologue, Page 11
“I am flawless: a perfect victim, primed under John J.
Allen’s tutelage of no complaining, ever. What rapist wouldn’t love me? I make
no sounds. I lie still, my limbs pliant. I am patient. Polite to a fault,
taught so well. I display outward grace. Poise in rape. Dignity while being
degraded. Its oddness is lost to me. It is all I have, so it’s what I use to
distract myself from the truth: that I am filthy, like a debased princess
pretending her gown is not ripped to shreds, pretending she doesn’t stink. Pretending
I am not a slut. But the stench is devouring me; sweat and the gummy insides of
him cling to my skin. Stink that will never wash off.” – Kathleen Hoy Foley,
Chapter 7: Evil Deeds, Page 112
”Trauma had changed me, whether I liked it or not. Despite my outgoing, happy appearance and my ability to make friends quickly, no one saw the heart full of pain I lugged around those school halls — dread over what was creeping toward me like an invasion of cancer waiting to strike once again. But if I allowed myself to collapse into the fear that outlined me with its trembling silhouette, despair would devour me whole and there would be no way back, ever. I would be gone, completely, trapped forever on those filthy mattresses, enduring over and over the violation of his greasy hands and the rape of more than just my body. He, all he had done to me, would destroy the rest of my life.” Kathleen Hoy Foley, Chapter 11: The Darkest Secret and More Evil Deeds, Page 161
Excerpts provided with permission from the author
Is This An Overview?
Silencing the past, silencing the
tragedy, silencing the emotional wounds does not lead to healing. Pretending that traumatic events did not
happen, does not change the fact of what happened. This is a story about a lifetime of silence,
of being a secret keeper. This is a
story about sharing those secrets.
Secrets of physical harassment, emotional harassment, sexually
harassment. Harassment of the vulnerable
paves the way for trauma, to misery. In
response to the pain caused to them, to escape their pain, they develop
behaviors that lead to more misery.
Behaviors such as taking out their rage on those even more vulnerable
than them. Situational awareness changes
for the traumatized, as they see danger everywhere. The support for victims of harassment is
often denied by society, which does not recognize the harassment, which allows
the perpetrators to continue their inappropriate behavior.
Caveats?
This is a story about tragic events,
that the reader needs to be emotionally prepared to engage with. As an autobiography, there is always a concern
for how the events are remembered.
Tragic as the events were, there is uncertainty about the actual
thoughts the author had as a child or later.
As the book is consistent of personal thoughts, they sometimes read like
poetry, sometimes poorly written comments in need of organization. The perspective on events is singular. An understanding of the events would have
been enhanced by what others thought of the situations. Representing a lifetime of events means that
many events, interactions, and details are missing.
