Donna Hylton

I'm not one to sit in judgement of someone else's life, nor am I qualified to assess the truthfulness of another person's story. And, yet, it's impossible to review this book without, in some way, judging both the person and the facts she shares.

My truth is that I found this story difficult, if not impossible, to believe. Donna Hylton claims to have been abused emotionally, physically, and sexually by every single person who crossed her path during her childhood and young adult years. It was simply too much. The abuse began with her birth mother. In fact, Hylton shares vivid memories from as far back as the age of 3. A stretch for me, but I wanted to believe her story. Then she comes to the US, where she is emotionally abused by her adoptive mother and sexually abused by her adoptive father. From there, her sexual abusers include: a female babysitter, her male teacher, a neighborhood man who impregnates her, an older man who kidnapped her, a minister, and a police detective she went to for help.

We are repeatedly told how beautiful she was, as if that in itself is the reason every single person in her life wanted to rape her. No one, at any time, attempted to help this child. The school counselor even ignored her pleas. It's as if pedophiles and rapists surrounded her at every turn. Then, when she escapes all her abusers and has the baby daughter she claims to want to protect no matter what, she takes that baby and begs her abusive adoptive parents to take her and the baby in. Why would she subject her child to the same torment she'd endured?

We are also repeatedly told, over and over and over, how brilliant she is. And, yes, she probably was a brilliant child. In fact, she supposedly won a full scholarship to a prestigious boarding school, which she didn't use because she ran away with the young man who abused her. I couldn't put together how a girl who ranked third overall in the nation could so easily slip from everyone's radar, with not one teacher or counselor taking an interest - unless it was to rape her.

The sexual violence is graphic. For a book intended to offer hope, we have an abundance of extremely dark, detailed violence.

Then we get to the part referencing her crime, for which she downplays and avoids responsibility. As with everything else in her life, she is the victim here. Her crime was not one of passion. She did not kill her abuser(s). Her claim, I think, is that past trauma made her vulnerable and led to her part in torture and murder. And, yes, I can understand how that could happen in certain circumstances. Abuse victims sometimes go on to abuse others. The culmination of everything, though, was too much for me.

In prison, of course, she finds God and was saved. God seems to hang out a lot in prison, absolving sins and responsibility.… (mais)