Know My Name: A Memoir by Chanel Miller (2019), 357 pages. (Overdrive/Libby ebook also available)
She was known to millions as Emily Doe. After her sexual assault on Stanford’s campus, her rapist was convicted, only for the judge to sentence him to a paltry handful of months in jail. At the same time, “Emily Doe” agreed to publish her eloquent, blistering victim statement for the wider world to read, and it struck a chord with millions of readers around the world. In this book, “Emily Doe” reveals herself to be Chanel Miller, a specific person harmed in specific ways by her trauma but also a survivor who has the ability to bring hope and honesty to others in similar situations. Miller writes about the sexual assault itself and the events surrounding it, but a large portion of the book details the aftermath, the long and frustrating journey through the court system and the effects on Miller’s mental health and relationships. She talks about how the assault affected not only herself but also her sister, her parents, her boyfriend, and her friends – a widening circle of hurt and pain. Anyone who has experienced trauma will recognize Miller’s uneven road to recovering her former sense of self, a process that doesn’t have a clear path and backtracks as much as it progresses. Despite the heavy topic, I found Miller’s writing to be compulsively readable and even poetically beautiful in parts. The small sensory moments she describes really put me into the scene as she’s retelling what happened to her.
If you want to read more like this, may I suggest:
Fire Shut Up In My Bones: A Memoir by Charles M. Blow (2014), 228 pages. (Overdrive/Libby ebook also available) (Hoopla ebook also available)
Notes On a Silencing: A Memoir by Lacy Crawford (2020), 391 pages.
Educated: A Memoir by Tara Westover (2018), 334 pages. (Large print also available) (Audiobook on CD also available) (Playaway also available) (Overdrive/Libby ebook also available) (Overdrive/Libby eAudiobook also available)
-Teresa Moulton, Public Service Leader
