a good YA book with a stupid "how to get help" bit at the end

I just read Beautiful Monster, by Kate McCaffrey, published by Fremantle Press (which is partly why I bought it - supporting Aus small press) in 2010.

this is a venting post, not a review, so it's probably going to have massive spoilers and be emotive rather than thought through.

the story itself is okay - not particularly original, more a mixture of familiar themes and plot elements that many writers have worked with (not that there's anything wrong with that): how the death of a child affects a family - parents and sibling/s; how destructive eating disorders can be; how someone with an eating disorder can delude themselves so that they honestly believe they're striving for perfection while they're really doing themselves serious damage; the unreliable narrator...

the voice is great - Tess's thoughts and feelings are conveyed so well, I couldn't remember if it was first person or third (it's limited third, firmly fixed inside Tess's perspective). Not sure that I really get a sense of Tess changing with age - from 13 to 15 to 17 - but that could just be because everything is distorted by the grief, self-blame and self-loathing that she gets lost in.

the structure is okay - a steady flow of narrative interrupted by a couple of big jumps, each over a two-year gap, with some references in the third section to the major events that took place within the second gap.

from my perspective as someone who's had an eating disorder, the writer really does a good job of getting into that mind frame - fear, trying to stay in control, feeling physically ill at the sight of food, thinking about food all the time, an extremely distorted body image (very nicely written scene in which Tess, urged by a friend, sees for a moment how she really looks in the mirror - so thin she's skeletal - then her defenses spring up and enable her to see what she thinks is there - pudgy flabby fat), massive guilt and self-loathing.

the imaginary friend who personifies all of Tess's distorted thinking is well written, but I'm not so sure about that same persona hooking up with a new victim in the epilogue - it conveys the point that other people are putting themselves through hell with self-hatred and distorted thinking too, but it makes it seem almost as if the persona is an evil spirit separate from Tess - which surely wasn't the point?

anyway, apart from relating to Tess's nausea, fear and guilt, the thing that really made it hard for me to sleep after reading Beautiful Monster was the unhelpful "help" page at the back of the book.
I'm glad it's there - like any tv program, non-fiction book or novel that deals with mental illness, grief or self-harming, it's a good idea to provide viewers/readers with some contacts in case they need to talk to someone about how they feel after watching/reading it.
but this one, after asking "Need help?", says
"If you or someone you know needs help there are lots of people to go to. You can speak to parents, friends, siblings, teachers and counsellors."

hello?! this spiel presumably was written by someone at the publishing company, not by the author, and I'm sure their intentions are good - wonderful - but if you've read the book, you might've noticed that someone who is self-harming probably feels ashamed & isolated, and is trying to cover it up. people who are hospitalised cos they've nearly killed themselves probably *don't* feel like they can talk to anyone - even if there are caring, non-judgemental people who are actively trying to help them - and saying "there are lots of people to go to" doesn't change that.

at least they do put the urls for reachout, beyondblue, kidshelp, and other good websites, and the phone number for Kids' Helpline. I just wish they'd either left out the line about "lots of people" or put the websites first. Kids Helpline now has a live chat service on its website, because a lot of kids feel safer with the anonymity of being online, rather than ringing and having someone hear their voice, and have more chance of finding privacy on a computer than on their parents' landline or a mobile for which their parents may be paying the bill.

so anyways, I guess maybe I'm feeling a bit unable to communicate myself, to have been so stirred up by the book and the help info. and I do have caring, intelligent, non-judgemental friends and a fab sister that I can talk to. oh wells.

I might have another go at getting to sleep now (after I check FB to see if anything exciting is happening), and save my review (which might well be a review) of The Adoration of Jenna Fox for tomorrow, or sometime.

PS the cover illustration for Beautiful Monster is fab - it looks to me like the skeleton of a baby bird - baby birds are usually so ugly, but tug at our hearts despite that - they're so fragile, and will become beautiful being that can fly, if they don't fall out of their nests or get starved out by a cuckoo.

PPS YA fiction that deals with 'dark' stuff can be totally fabulous and can save people's lives. we do not need censorship of 'heavy' issues - kids (and other people who read YA) choose to read light or dark stories for various reasons, and not having gritty tales available to read won't make anyone's life all bright and sparkly if it isn't already.

amusing things to do indoors

pic of paired socks (with colour-coordinated pegs) taken on a sunny day, quite unlike today.








I was disgruntled by how chill, grey and overcast it was this morning, but pottering around at home can be so relaxing. I started out with no particular plans or expectations, and have had a lovely indoor day. have done a small load of washing & hung it on the balcony (the forecast showers haven't eventuated, but may yet), some vacuuming (!!), and some clothes- and paper-sorting.

matching socks is very satisfying - a dozen random single socks, some washed today, some previously, have now found their partners - yay! Not that there's anything wrong with being single, nor do I have anything against wearing odd socks, but it's nice to have the choice to wear matching socks - a choice that becomes difficult to put into action if the only socks available are lacking a partner. I also threw out (or rather, put into a bag) any socks or knickers that were holey or had dead elastic, and put into another bag a few nice, wearable clothes which I'd just washed but don't really fit into any more. the wearable clothes can go to one of the op shops nearby, but for the other bag I'll have to find a charity that accepts torn clothes and sells them for industrial rags.

Quentin Crisp said that after the first three years of letting it accumulate, you no longer notice the dust - it doesn't get any thicker and it drifts into areas that you don't use. I'm not game to leave it long enough to verify that theory, having a fear that I might get lost in the drifts and die of dust inhalation, like a poor little dessicated lizard curled up behind a bookcase. but I do tend to leave it a good while, so it was a thrill to do some vacuuming today. I used the little round brushy attachment to do papers on my desk (prior to uncovering and moving my 'in-tray'), my mediation shawl (sad to let something so precious get so dusty), the armchair that my dolls, bears, etc, sit on, and edges of bookcases. my poor bears and frog were a different colour once they'd been vacuumed. I didn't dare vacuum any of the dolls - they're too vulnerable, and have monetary or sentimental value.




Bambina, pictured here, was my maternal grandmother's doll, and I lovingly wipe her with a soft, dry cloth, never vacuum.












I also sorted through papers in the living room, mostly in hopes of finding an address I'd jotted on something a day or two ago, and also to make sure there weren't any of mum's bills lying around waiting for me to pay them (there was one that needed paying, down the side of the armchair that I use, and one that my sister had paid, in a pile of 'to do' papers). still haven't found the address, but tossed out some bits of newspaper I'd been keeping for the crosswords (now done) or the pretty pictures (which I probably won't use, specially now I'm doing more with digital images than paper), and put all current 'to do' documents for me & mum into the in-tray recovered from my desk.

being on Facebook and photoblog has inspired me to go through lots of old photo albums and scan pictures to post online, and in some cases I want to go through & scan all the photos in an album so I can save them on my desktop's hard drive, on a data stick, and eventually in an online storage service. both seeing other people's beautiful old photos in their blogs, and seeing how many people on FB answered 'photo albums & negatives' to the question 'what would I grab if my house was on fire?', prompted me to scan & save, scan, resize & post.

and in between all this, just mucking around on Facebook - doing quizzes, posting status updates, sending congratulations and commiserations to friends, looking at photos - and playing music and talks through iTunes and YouTube.

hope you're having a good week/end.