Kirjahaku

"Stunning . . . . This is an immensely courageous story that will break your heart, leave you in tears, and, finally, offer hope and redemption. Brava, Kelly Sundberg." —Rene Denfeld, author of The Child FinderIn this brave and beautiful memoir, written with the raw honesty and devastating openness of The Glass Castle and The Liar’s Club, a woman chronicles how her marriage devolved from a love story into a shocking tale of abuse—examining the tenderness and violence entwined in the relationship, why she endured years of physical and emotional pain, and how she eventually broke free."You made me hit you in the face," he said mournfully. "Now everyone is going to know." "I know," I said. "I’m sorry."Kelly Sundberg’s husband, Caleb, was a funny, warm, supportive man and a wonderful father to their little boy Reed. He was also vengeful and violent. But Sundberg did not know that when she fell in love, and for years told herself he would get better. It took a decade for her to ultimately accept that the partnership she desired could not work with such a broken man. In her remarkable book, she offers an intimate record of the joys and terrors that accompanied her long, difficult awakening, and presents a haunting, heartbreaking glimpse into why women remain too long in dangerous relationships.To understand herself and her violent marriage, Sundberg looks to her childhood in Salmon, a small, isolated mountain community known as the most redneck town in Idaho. Like her marriage, Salmon is a place of deep contradictions, where Mormon ranchers and hippie back-to-landers live side-by-side; a place of magical beauty riven by secret brutality; a place that takes pride in its individualism and rugged self-sufficiency, yet is beholden to church and communal standards at all costs.Mesmerizing and poetic, Goodbye, Sweet Girl is a harrowing, cautionary, and ultimately redemptive tale that brilliantly illuminates one woman’s transformation as she gradually rejects the painful reality of her violent life at the hands of the man who is supposed to cherish her, begins to accept responsibility for herself, and learns to believe that she deserves better.

An intimate, linked, lyrical essay collection focusing on the longer-lasting effects of trauma and PTSD on survivors--challenging a culture in which violence against women is normalized and illuminating the nonlinear, complex nature of recovery--from the acclaimed author of Goodbye, Sweet GirlThe trauma of surviving an abusive marriage didn't make Kelly Sundberg stronger. In fact, it nearly broke her. But leaving the abuse behind was not the end of the story but the beginning of a new one. In that journey, Sundberg learned in ways both good and bad, that one doesn't necessarily get to leave abuse behind. Sometimes, everywhere you go, the memories of the abuse go with you. First learning to coexist with her rage and then turn that rage into strength and power, Sundberg's journey to alchemizing her suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder into post-traumatic stress growth was neither easy nor simple. But far from bleak, her story provides vital insight into the little-known recovery process, and how healing is possible.A narrative following a process of discovery as Sundberg's personal story is juxtaposed against established research, The Answer Is in the Wound offers a redemptive arc for trauma survivors, arguing for healing through an acceptance of their new state of being. Sundberg uses metaphors like the act of erasure--shown in erasure poetry created from her abusive ex-husband's apologetic emails--and includes theories from psychiatrists and researchers like Judith Herman, Bessel van der Kolk, and Peter A. Levine to construct a balanced meditation on trauma and the imprint it leaves.For readers of In the Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado and The Empathy Exams by Leslie Jamison, The Answer Is in the Wound is a beautiful, devastating, and nuanced examination into embracing a new reality after trauma and finding power and beauty in it.

“Lyrical and brutal, intimate and culturally relevant. I’ve never read anything like it.”—Maggie Smith An intimate, linked, lyrical essay collection focusing on the longer-lasting effects of trauma and PTSD on survivors—challenging a culture in which violence against women is normalized and illuminating the nonlinear, complex nature of recovery—from the acclaimed author of Goodbye, Sweet Girl An affecting memoir-in-essays from the acclaimed author of Goodbye, Sweet Girl, The Answer Is in the Wound is a radical examination of the fractured, nonlinear nature of life after trauma. In this remarkable account of her own road to healing, Kelly Sundberg challenges a culture in which violence against women is normalized and writes against the implicit demand for survivors to “get over it.” Kelly Sundberg’s abusive marriage nearly broke her, and finding the courage to leave and begin the difficult process of putting herself back together was only the beginning of her story. Deeply courageous, The Answer Is in the Wound deftly explores the trials and joys Sundberg encountered not only as a newly single parent but also as someone in full pursuit of life. She developed an appreciation for new spiritual practices, reclaimed her body through tattoos, and even became “the problem” rather than going along to get along in her professional life. From erasure poetry crafted from emails and a court-mandated apology letter from her ex-husband, to engaging with the research of some of the most prominent voices in fifty years of trauma psychiatry and psychology —from Judith Herman and Peter A. Levine to Bessel van der Kolk—The Answer Is in the Wound is a profound meditation on trauma and its lasting effects. With the formal innovation and radical vulnerability of Carmen Maria Machado’s In the Dream House and the cerebral precision of Leslie Jamison’s The Empathy Exams, Sundberg’s breathtaking collection offers a redemptive arc for trauma survivors and vital insight into what makes healing possible.